What skills predict an intern¿s ability to innovate new products? A quantitative study of innovation capability of Mexican college interns Academic Article in Scopus uri icon

abstract

  • © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag France SAS, part of Springer Nature.The exponential adoption of new smart technologies related to digital transformation and Industry 4.0 (the 4th industrial revolution) (Lu in J Ind Inf Integr 6:1¿10, 2017.) requires the ability to innovate new products which is one of the most important and desired meta-skills for individuals, firms, and economies. Nurturing individual´s innovation capability will improve the ability to deal with a rapidly changing future and to propose new products to the market. There are many models to represent individual capabilities, but this study works with the D4 innovation model to test individual¿s innovation capability, it has four dimensions: defining, discovering, developing, and demonstrating. This study proposed a methodology that seeks to predict an individual´s innovation capabilities by analyzing a performance evaluation database of interns of a multinational global steel company to propose an ordered logistic model addressing whether the four Ds innovation skills predicts intern innovation capability. Data were collected using a company¿s unique instrument and categorized in foundation skills and professional competencies to assess the interns¿ performance. We performed multicollinearity tests, internal data consistency tests, and explanator descriptive analysis on these data. After the best model was identified, tests were performed for heteroskedasticity of residuals, model specification error, and omitted variables. The study confirmed that these attributes: discovery, developing and demonstrating, oral communication, ability to self-update, ability to establishing priorities and make knowledge explicit, foster individual innovation capability.

publication date

  • December 1, 2022