The Life of a Project: Accomplishing Legitimacy

in Sustained Innovation

Renee Rottner

Why this study?

• Sustained innovation is key to R&D projects of high scientific, economic, and political impact:

– Pharmaceuticals, sustainable energy, aircraft design, military systems, basic research

– Long development times, iterative innovation

• Little is known about how innovation is sustained

– It is fragile (Cheng & Van de Ven, 1996; Dougherty & Hardy, 1996 Jelinek & Schoonhoven, 1993)

– Legitimacy is important (Arndt & Bigelow, 2000)

Definitions

Innovation: The creation and development of a new combination of materials or forces. (Schumpeter, 1934)

Sustained innovation: management of multiple innovation efforts in coordination with past and future efforts (Bartel & Garud, 2009; Dougherty & Hardy, 1995)

A longitudinal process involving…

Legitimacy: perception that actions of an entity are appropriate or ‘right’ within some social system, assessed by stakeholders who have varying interests and criteria (Suchman, 1995; Reuf & Scott, 1998; Elsbach & Sutton, 1992; Zelditch, 2001)

not a resource but a relation between power holders

Research Question

How is legitimacy accomplished in an innovation project over time?

Context:

An innovation project at NASA, 1972-2003

Method:

Inductive, grounded theory building

What do we know about legitimacy?

Institutional Theory Interactionist Sociology

Level of analysis

Organizational fields Individuals

Conception of legitimacy

Characteristic of entity Relationship between entities

Empirical focus

Outcome Process

Analytical focus

Typologies (e.g., pragmatic, moral, cognitive legitimacy)

Strategies

Sources of legitimacy

Components of institutions (cognitive, normative, regulative)

“Gatekeepers of resources” *

Deephouse, 1996; DiMaggio & Powell, 1993; Suchman, 1995; Ruef & Scott, 1998; Human & Provan, 2000

Fine, 1984; Strauss, 1978, 1982*, 1993

Blending the perspectives

Inhabited Institutions • Actions are embedded in organizations (Barley, 2008; Bechky,

2009; Hallett, Schulman & Fine, 2009; Hallett & Ventresca, 2006)

• Limited focus on legitimacy (Creed et al., 2002; Scully & Creed, 1997) • Limited empirical work (Binder, 2007; Hallett, 2010)

• Not focused on innovation

Need for building theory on legitimacy• Structuring of legitimacy (Barley, 2008)

• Sequencing of legitimacy (Deephouse & Suchman, 2008 Suchman, 1995)

• Creating and restoring legitimacy (Powell & Colyvas, 2008)

• Across audiences (Suddaby, Hinnings & Greenwood, 2002)

“Selling it”: Strategies for legitimacy

Creating shared meaning & managing stakeholders

• Storytelling (Lounsbury & Glynn, 2001)

• Issue selling (Dutton & Ashford, 1993; Dutton et al., 2001; Howard-Grenville, 2007)

• Discourse (Phillips, Lawrence & Hardy, 2004)

• Rhetoric (Creed, Scully & Austin, 2002; Suddaby & Greenwood, 2005)

• Impression management (Bansal & Clelland, 2004; Elsbach, 1994; Elsbach & Sutton, 1992)

• Consensus of stakeholders (Neilson & Rao, 1987)

• Framing (Rao, Morrill & Zald, 2000; Swaminathan and Wade, 2001; Dowell, Swaminathan & Wade, 2002; Fiss & Zajac, 2006; Kennedy & Fiss, 2009)

Technology also carries meaning (Orlikowski & Scott, 2009; Carlile, 2002; Suchman, 2007)

Research Design

WHO IS DOING WHAT

TO WHOM

BY WHAT CRITERIA

Actors• Project team• Power

holders

Strategies• Rhetorical• Material

Audience(s)• Resource

providers• Multi-level• Shifting

Rules/norms• Technical• Scientific• Political• Economic

“Our biggest challenge was figuring out what to worry about and when to stop worrying about it.”

—Deputy project scientist

Rhetorical vs. Material

Material strategy:

(Orlikowski & Scott, 2009; Latour, 2005)

Rhetorical strategy:

Persuasion through language

Persuasion through

structure or non-verbal

actions

Audience

/ Criteria

Rhetorical Strategy

Material

Strategy

NASA HQ

Buildable?

Write project proposals

Run

tests

Congress

Affordable?

Mention reuse

of military tech

Show

prototypes

Academics

Usable?

Publish articles on theory

Build

data

centers

Data: Longitudinal, multi-level, process

Actors/Period ‘71-’83 ‘84-’89 ‘89-’96 ‘96-’03

Scientists 3 5 4 5

Engineers 2 3 2 6

Contractors 1 1 2

Headquarters 2 3 3 2

Ext. Advisors 3 3 4 5

#’s: people interviewed

850 pages of interview transcripts

20,000 pages of archival documents

Feasibility Studies,

Decadal Surveys,

Budgets

Meeting Minutes, Decadal Surveys,

Budgets,

Meeting Minutes, Decadal Surveys, Budgets, Diaries

Meeting Minutes, Decadal Surveys, Budgets, Diaries

“Orphan moment”

33 inches

Bigger is not better

HQ: buildable? Congress: affordable? Academics: usable?

Analysis steps

1. Longitudinal in-depth case history

2. Identify critical events in timeline

3. Examine actions before/after events

4. Code the data for strategies

5. Compare strategies of legitimacy over time

Contributions to Theory

• Legitimacy as:– a process (not an outcome)– at multiple levels– over time

• Foundation for identifying and measuring legitimation strategies

• Framework for sustaining innovation over time

Questions

Additional Slides

• Temporal analyses of strategies

• Legitimation Processes (Strauss, 1982)

• Social movement theory

Temporal analyses of strategies

A. Event depth

(major event or critical juncture in one period)

B. Event breadth (one event that spans multiple

criteria in one period)

C.Frame depth

(one event that spans multiple periods)

D. Frame breadth (multiple events that span multiple

criteria in one period)

TIMELINES

Political criteria

Economic criteria

Scientific criteria

Technical criteria

E. Diachronic

(one criteria that spans multiple

periods)

Legitimation Processes (Strauss, 1982)

• Discovering and claiming worth

• Distancing

• Theorizing

• Standard setting, embodying, evaluating

• Boundary setting, boundary challenging

• Claiming, distancing, theorizing, standard and boundary setting

Social movement theory

Actions and resources are embedded in organizations and stakeholders

Framing (Snow et al., 1986; Snow & Benford, 1988)

– Diagnostic framing (what is the problem)– Prognostic framing (what is the solution)– Motivational framing (why should we do it)

Resource mobilization theory– Resources matter, they are variable and come

from a variety of sources (McCarthy & Zald, 1977, 2002)

Making the invisible visible

“Innovation was not simply suppressed it was unseen. It was ignored and invisible [by those] that could not understand its role.”

—Dougherty & Hardy (1995:___)

Biggeris better

Making meaning material