Employee Creativity and Suggestion Programs: An Empirical Study

Strategic drivers to promote employee suggestion schemes in GCC organizations

Purpose

This study applies a decision support tool to prioritize the various drivers that influence employee suggestion schemes (ESSs) in both public and private organizations based in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries for better organizational performance.

Design/methodology/approach

Using theories of organizational creativity, an analytic hierarchy process (AHP) model was developed with 5 criteria and 24 sub-criteria. Data were collected from executives (n = 48) from both public and private organizations in the GCC. Later, the data were interpreted with a priority vector assigned to each criterion and sub-criterion.

Findings

The results indicate that leaders/management support, individual traits and organization culture are the key drivers that influence employees' involvement in an ESS.

Research limitations/implications

The study is limited to a small sample size, and data were collected only in three GCC countries. The study provides insights into ESS in the context of developing countries and is a relevant contribution to both theory and practice. The results will be of interest to businesses and academics for improving understanding on the various enablers of successful employee participation programme implementation and subsequent increase in organizational performance in the GCC.

Originality/value

The novelty of this study is that it resolves the lack of empirical research in the Middle East countries/GCC. The transition phase of knowledge-based economies highlights the significance of innovation and creativity through active employee participation to improve business results. The study attempts to prioritise both individual- and organizational-level drivers for promoting ESS by leveraging theories of creativity in alignment with the GCC National Innovation Agenda. This study can be generalized from the GCC context due to homogeneity in organizational governance and cultural aspects.

Antecedents to employee suggestion schemes: the study of UAE

Purpose

The purpose of this study is identifying and ranking the various antecedents or enablers that will enhance performance through employee suggestion schemes (ESSs) in various sector-specific businesses based in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), an emerging Arab country.

Design/methodology/approach

This study employs the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) to prioritize the factors affecting ESS. The AHP model was developed with five criteria and 24 subcriteria based on the interactional theory of organizational creativity. Data were collected through interviews with 27 top-level managers and industry experts from nine government agencies, nine semigovernment agencies, and nine privately owned UAE-based businesses.

Findings

The findings show that leadership support and management style, individual attributes, and corporate strategy are the most important factors that influence performance through ESS.

Research limitations/implications

The research model had limited dimensions and the findings cannot be generalized. To generalize the findings, the study should be carried out in other GCC countries because of homogeneity in the political, organizational, and sociocultural context. The outcome of the study provides both organizational and managerial implications for the better organizational performance through ESS.

Originality/value

Past studies on ESS have neglected the construct of individual characteristics of employees that generate novel ideas. This paper addresses the gap of sector-specific studies by considering that individual attributes of creative people as individuals are the heart of innovation, along with contextual factors that could help organizations to transform innovative engines through ESS. The originality of this research stems from a reliable and valid framework that can be subsequently used for driving performance through ESS. This study is a relevant contribution to both the academic literature and practical implications.

Effectiveness of employee suggestion schemes – from critical success factors to outcomes

Purpose

Past studies have noted the important role of employee suggestion system (ESS) within the organizations. The use of ESS has been shown to help organizations address improvement- and cost-related problems. The advantages of ESSs are not limited to improving a work-related performance but can also lead to innovations through employees’ creativity. Creative ideas are very important for organizations to build its competitive advantage. Therefore, it is important to identify and understand the factors that contribute to the effectiveness of employee suggestion scheme and its success which has not been well-studied. This study aims to provide decision-makers within organizations with a deeper understanding of the factors that need to be considered in organizing and managing ESSs for its maximum effectiveness

Design/methodology/approach

An analysis of 273 surveys collected from several organizations with ESS experience in the United Arab Emirates was conducted. Survey scales were developed based on previous research and hypotheses are stated. Regression analysis was used to test the hypotheses. Correlation analysis were used to understand the interrelations among the five factors

Findings

Results suggest that the four critical success factors, namely, system capability, organizational encouragement, leadership support and employee participation, are positively related to the ESS outcome and its valuable predictors. Some managerial implications of the results of this study are important to note. It is critical for managers to establish rewards, evaluation, feedback and awareness of ESS.

Originality/value

On the basis of a possible future extended research scope in combination with a qualitative research methodology, one could deepen the understanding of influence of country of origin and of institutional mechanisms that might explain higher effectiveness of ESS outcome This appears to be the first published research study to link critical success factors for maximum effectiveness of ESSs.

Critical success factors for employee suggestion schemes: a literature review

Purpose

Employee suggestion scheme (ESS) have existed for many years and many articles have been published over the past decades. They have been studied from many perspectives to illustrate their objectives, nature, content, process, significance and the benefits. Arguments have also been made with respect to success and failures of the suggestion schemes. Although the corporations widely use the suggestion schemes to elicit the creative ideas of their employees, sustaining a suggestion scheme is still a challenge. The purpose of this paper is to extract the critical success factors and critical success criteria to the suggestion scheme and to discuss the importance of these factors on sustainability of suggestion system. This is a literature review paper.

Design/methodology/approach

This is a literature review paper. The research used the university library to search for the relevant material. The university has an access for 25,000 journals. As the university had the subscription to main databases such as EBASCO, SCIENCE DIRECT, EMERALD, Google Scholar and WILEY, a search was performed on these databases using the key terms. The keywords used in the searches included: Suggestion System, Suggestion Scheme, Employee Participation, Employee Involvement, Innovation, Employee Creativity and Ideas Management. The Google Scholar citation tab was also searched further to identify any related articles. The citations of resulting articles were scrutinized further for further clues.

Findings

This paper identifies 23 critical success factors and 9 critical success criteria for suggestion schemes. It also discusses the interconnection between the critical success factors and the critical success criteria. Further, the frequency of each of the factors is also presented. It recognizes the lack of work on the assessment framework for sustainability of a suggestion scheme.

Practical implications

This paper should be of value to practitioners of suggestion schemes and to academics who are interested in knowing how this program has evolved and where it is today and what future it holds. It offers practical help to an individual starting out on research on the sustainability of suggestion schemes.

Originality/value

The paper attempts to put together many factors discussed in the literature and proposed a definition to define the sustainability of the suggestion system and categorized them as critical success factors and critical success criteria.

Assessing sustainability of employee suggestion schemes: a framework

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to assess the employee suggestion scheme of three organizations based in the United Arab Emirates. A framework that consists of five sustainability factors identified based on an empirical study has been applied. The sustainability factors identified through this study include leadership and organizational environment, system capability, system effectiveness, organizational encouragement and system barrier. The paper draws conclusions about the key practices necessary to foster sustainability of the employee suggestion system. The paper then presents a final framework that the organizations can apply to assess their suggestion schemes and to develop potential change strategies. The study findings reveal the importance of five factors, and with more cases, future research can be conducted to identify further practices relevant to specific industry. More levels of maturity for sustainability suggestion system could also be defined with future research.

Design/methodology/approach

– The assessment framework was developed drawing on a thorough review of the literature and data collected and analyzed using various statistical tools. The developed assessment framework was validated using case study method. Semi-structured interviews were used to elicit relevant information during the case study.

Findings

– An assessment framework comprising five major factors for sustainability of suggestion scheme of has been presented. The five factors include: leadership and work environment, system capability, system effectiveness, organizational encouragement and system barriers. Sustainability of a suggestion system can be understood as a three-stage model comprising three stages: the initial stage, the developmental stage and the advanced stage. The key practices associated for each of these stages are discussed in detail.

Research limitations/implications

– The framework has taken into consideration the critical success factors, and critical success factors emerged from the literature review conducted for this study. The framework therefore could be further refined by conducting more case studies and can propose maturity levels.

Originality/value

– The paper has developed a framework that can be used to assess the sustainability of the suggestion scheme in an organization. This model has been applied to assess the individual schemes and draw upon potential change strategies.

Employee suggestion scheme sustainability excellence model and linking organizational learning

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to propose a sustainability assessment model and to discuss the implications for organizational learning. Paper presents a sustainability excellence model comprising of three stages and discuss the good practices for sustaining the employee suggestion scheme.

Design/methodology/approach

– The assessment framework was developed drawing on a thorough review of the literature and data collected and analyzed using various statistical tools. The developed assessment framework was validated through a case of an organization based in the United Arab Emirates. Semi-structured interviews were used to elicit relevant information during the case study.

Findings

– An assessment framework comprising five major factors for sustainability of suggestion scheme of has been presented. The five factors include: leadership and work environment, system capability, system effectiveness, organizational encouragement and system barriers. Sustainability of a suggestion system can be understood as a three-stage model comprising the initial stage, the developmental stage and the advanced stage. The key practices associated for each of these stages are discussed in detail.

Practical implications

– The framework has taken into consideration the critical success factors and critical success factors emerged from the literature review conducted for this study. Therefore, the framework could be further refined by conducting more case studies and can propose maturity levels.

Originality/value

– The paper has developed a framework that can be used to assess the sustainability of the suggestion scheme in an organization. This model has been applied to assess the individual schemes and draw upon potential change strategies.

The determinants for sustainability of an employee suggestion system

Purpose

– Although the corporations widely use the suggestion schemes to elicit the creative ideas of their employee, sustaining a suggestion scheme is still a challenge. Employee suggestion schemes have been studied from many perspectives to illustrate its objectives, nature, content, process, significance and the benefits. Arguments have also been made with respect to the success and failures of the suggestion schemes. The purpose of this paper is to explore the factors to assess the sustainability of a suggestion system.

Design/methodology/approach

– This paper thus explores the critical success factors of suggestion scheme through a literature review and filters the critical determinants for sustainability of suggestion using factor analysis. The data collection was done using a survey technique.

Findings

– The results identity the five major factors as determinants to sustainability of a suggestion system as reported in the paper.

Originality/value

– This paper has made an attempt to explore the determinants to assess the sustainability of a suggestion system and has contributed toward the new knowledge in terms of sustainability of a suggestion system.