Annotation Summary of EJ1161794.pdf.

Young people are expected to be

prepared to collaborate in solving future problems and producing
innovations in areas that presently do not exist (Sawyer, 2006, 2012,
2014; Zang, Hong, Scardamalia, Teo, & Morley, 2011). If we look closer
to the definitions, we notice that it is quite usable in project-based
learning when describing projects outcomes such as novel products or
services that are not only ideas, but solutions taken into use.
Amabile (1996) defined innovation as the successful implementation of
creative ideas. According to Sawyer (2006), innovation is an outcome
of an innovation process whereby collaboratively created ideas are
transformed into a single product or other end result, often through
interactions with several stakeholders; the process involves rapid
prototyping and testing, manufacturing (making), and implementing the
product or service (see also Baregheh, Rowley, & Sambrook, 2009).
Innovations are not only technical novelties. Innovations can be any
kind of novel products, processes, services or other types of
outcomes, but not only ideas or inventions. To conclude, a
pedagogical innovation process is an authentic innovation process
whereby collaboratively created ideas are transformed into a concrete
end result, made concrete, prototyped and tested, and implemented to
convey value in the surrounding world through interactions with
several stakeholders… The general term competence needs clarification
in this context. Competence is the integration and manifestation of
knowledge, skills and attitudes in performance in a specific, pre-
defined context and in concrete, authentic tasks (following Mulder,
2012; … The competencies needed in innovation processes can refer to
knowledge, skills and attitudes (Zhuang, Williamson, & Carter, 1999),
but the influence of individual characteristics also seems to be
significant (Da Silva & Davis, 2011). Based on these preconditions,
individual innovation competence is understood here as a synonym for a
set of personal characteristics, knowledge, skills (or abilities) and
attitudes that are connected to creating concretised and implemented
novelties via collaboration in complex innovation processes. Similar
to other competences, innovation competence can be learned and
developed (Bruton, 2011; Peschl et al., 2014). However, the concept
innovation competence seemed to be used with several meanings. Most
of the articles examined the innovation competence of organisations
(e.g., Kodama & Shibata, 2014; Wang, 2014), country-, region- or area-
level innovation capabilities or competences (e.g., Chen et al., 2009;
DiPietro, 2009) or the innovativeness of non-human things, such as
innovative software… Consumer innovativeness was used in the context
of the diffusion or adoption of novel products or technological goods.
In the context of marketing, communication or consumer studies,
individual-level innovativeness was defined e.g. as the ability to
adopt, try, buy or accept innovations, and it was then defined as a
person’s ability to understand, receive, socially estimate, spread,
implement and use innovations (e.g., Goswami & Chandra, 2013; Manning,
Bearden, & Madden, 1995), but not create them. The authors of two
articles were contacted for more information on their research design
(Avvisati, Jacotin, & Vincent-Lancrin, 2013; Chell & Athayde, 2011).
When considering the relevance of the articles and their empirical
results, the definitions for innovation varied, but were well in line
with each other. In most of the articles, innovation was clearly
differentiated from creativity. According to Bruton (2011), a creative
product is understood as a novel solution to a problem; once it has
been applied to a valuable practical application, it becomes an
innovation. According to Mathisen, Martinsen and Einarsen (2008),
creativity refers to the development of novel and useful ideas and
innovations towards the application of ideas. The majority of the
articles defined innovation based on outcome. Some of the articles
defined innovation according to the process. Edwards-Schachter,
García-Granero, Sánchez-Barrioluengo, Quesada-Pineda and Amara (2015),
Jaiswal and Dhar (2015) and Waychal, Mohanty and Verma (2011) followed
Amabile (1996) in defining innovation as the successful implementation
of creative ideas with a subsequent economic and/or social value
generation in the market and/or society. According to Vila, Pérez and
Coll-Serrano (2014), innovation was the process of applying novel
ideas and new knowledge to increase the efficiency in the production
of goods and services. Bjornali and Støren (2012) and Waychal et al.
(2011) defined innovation as a process of turning opportunity into new
ideas and putting them into widely used practice. The common factors
in these definitions are the creative and novel ideas and the
obligation to implement them for the benefit of society or the market.
As shown in table 1, 71 competency factors were organised into 17 sub-
categories and further to 6 upper categories, which were named as
coherently as possible. The upper categories were identified as
personal characteristics, future orientation, creative thinking
skills, social skills, project management skills, and content
knowledge and making skills. It is based on openness and willingness
to change, which results in a greater diversity of choice,
effectiveness and efficiency in outcomes. Future orientation as an
innovation competency factor is highlighted in 12 studies. Creativity
is a key innovation competency factor in most studies. According to
Cerinšek and Dolinšek (2009), creativity is the ability to generate
new ideas independent of their possible practicability and future
value. The main measure of creativity is originality. Idea
generation, imagination and problem-solving skills are seen as core
abilities of an innovative person. Cognitive skills are also
considered crucial for innovation. Social skills are the core
competency in innovation development in most of the included research
articles. Social skills are necessary for interaction and
communication with others (see McFall, 1982; Riggio, 1986); social
skills are essential for innovation processes. Social skills are
divided into three sub-categories: collaboration, networking and
communication skills. Teamwork skills allow otherwise dispersed local
knowledge to be combined, which allows innovative capabilities to be
improved (Wang and Shuai, 2013). In most of the articles,
collaboration skills were defined as the ability to work productively
with others (Bjornali & Støren, 2012) or in teams (Bruton, 2011; Cobo,
2013; Jack et al., 2014). Social astuteness is defined as a person’s
ability to understand social situations and interpersonal
interactions, and to remain sensitive to the motivations and
responsibilities of different parties… This study contributes to the
educational aim to prepare students to collaborate in solving future
problems and producing innovations in areas that presently do not
exist (Sawyer, 2006, 2012, 2014; Zang, Hong, Scardamalia, Teo, &
Morley, 2011). Based on this review, in the collaborative activity of
innovation processes a successful participant should have good self-
esteem and achievement orientation, be flexible, motivated and engaged
with the task at hand. Social skills form the largest competency
category in individual innovation competence. According to the
analysis, personal communication skills are needed to make one’s
intentions clear to others. According to Edwards-Schachter et al.
(2015), creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship should be
integrated as generic or transferable ‘meta competences’ rather than
as independent competences. This review promotes a coherent
understanding of individual innovation competence on its own right.
The findings in the included studies have some categories that are
similar to the cathegorization of this study. Thurlings and Evers
(2015) highlighted individual factors that influence innovative
behaviour, such as personality (openness and curiosity), traits
(attitudes and beliefs, motivation, learning goal orientation, self-
efficacy, persistence, humour and job satisfaction) and competence
(recognising and evaluating opportunities, problem solving and content
knowledge of teaching). Regarding the innovation process as a
learning environment, successful competency development during the
process is the core target. According to Spencer and Spencer (1993),
competence always includes an intent, which is the motive or trait
that causes action towards an outcome. Innovation could be considered
an intent for the development of a competence. As a goal-directed
learning environment, the innovation process should enable the
development of personal characteristics, future orientation and
creative thinking skills, social skills, project management skills and
content knowledge and making skills. First, the large competence
entity (Table 2) should be further investigated because it is not
clear if it pertains only to innovation process as defined in this
study. Our fourth recommendation for further research is that the
findings should be compared with entrepreneurial competences (e.g.
Jena & Sahoo, 2014; Mitchelmore & Rowley, 2010, 2013; Taatila, 2010)
after testing in educational settings. The fifth area for further
research is the different competences in each phase of the innovation
process (Standing et al., 2016).