Reprint of: From open innovation projects to open innovation project management capabilities: A process-based approach

• Published in: International journal of project management Vol. 39; no. 2; pp. 170 - 182
• Main Authors: Melo, Júlio Cézar Fonseca de, Salerno, Mario Sergio, Freitas, Jonathan Simões, Bagno, Raoni Barros, Brasil, Vinicius Chagas
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier Ltd 01-02-2021
• Subjects: ESA; Event Structure Analysis; Open innovation; Organizational capabilities; Project capabilities; Project capability-building; Project capabilities; Organizational capabilities; ESA; Event Structure Analysis; Open innovation; Project capability-building
• ISSN: 0263-7863; 1873-4634
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ijproman.2021.01.003

•Key projects leverage an open innovation project management capability.•Organizational context tightly mediates the relationship among these projects.•Past trajectory triggers the vanguard project and this, in turn, the new capability.•The open innovation project management capability building model is a four-stage process: closed mode, open driver, vanguard project, project-to-organization.
How do organizations use the experience from projects to build a systematic capability to manage open innovation projects? Drawing upon Project Management and Open Innovation capability-building frameworks, we studied the crusade of an industrial company to create an open innovation capability. In that sense, we applied an Event Structure Analysis (ESA) to evaluate the event network, which evidenced a four-stage process: closed mode, open driver, vanguard project, project-to-organization. Results demonstrate, from causal connections, that the referred capability can be leveraged from the execution of key projects, especially from a vanguard project. Our study contributes to Project Management theory by reveling that previous experiences in both project and organizational levels offer a fertile ground for the emergence of a vanguard project. For the open innovation field, this paper provides a project-oriented approach to the discussion of open innovation's adoption in mature firms.