“As a company with more than 5500 employees, located in ten countries worldwide, it is a must to apply collaborative management principle within the company and to improve collaboration with our partners. We have improved our innovation management system thanks to cooperation with our partners: SAP AG, HP Software, IBM, Microsoft, Citrix. Even more, we developed collaboration management softwares to enable a more effective collaboration”: Horea Ratiu, (Director), MSG Systems, IT company, Romania.

Generally neither individuals nor institutions have all the knowledge and information for continuous and effective innovation. Significant development of the innovation performance of an organization is possible only via cooperation of organizations and/or involvement of individuals.

Directing cooperation can enable organizations to get new knowledge, new competences and new resources. Moreover, it brings certain groups closer within the organization, enhances the possibilities of successful creativity and innovation, resolves solutions and helps to utilize external opportunities. 

Forms of cooperation:

• cooperation of teams
• cooperation of communities
• network cooperation
• open innovation

Main areas of directing cooperation in the innovation management system:

• identifying needs and requirements (internal and external) of parties concerned,
• innovation strategy: defining the required level of cooperation (why to take up innovation, what to expect, and how it will benefit us)
• culture: improving the cooperation among employees, giving a feeling of common goals, encouraging cooperation between teams, setting clear expectations, identifying needs for cooperation of various parties concerned,
• innovation process: identifying new ideas at the start of the process, giving solutions during the process and supporting marketing and utilization
• intellectual property: considering intellectual property in cooperation projects, internal identification of property, etc.