Innovation Quality – On the Value of the New

The reason for human progress lies in that unconditioned feeling: the here and now that one can only ever feel as not good enough. One always feels that there must be at least something better than the existing situation. Innovation serves as the vehicle of progress; that is, the active action by which something new becomes reality. Our belief that progress in itself is always something good leads us to tend to perceive everything that comes as „innovation“ as something that is inherently good as well.

Innovation – this term is used almost in an inflationary way, especially in the management literature. Innovation – the open secret – is the best and most sustainable way to achieve greater competitiveness, greater profits and sales, and in general more of everything and for everything.

Beyond this naive enthusiasm for progress and an uncritical cult of the term »innovation,« however, these questions must be asked: What does progress really bring? What is the new actually worth? Does an innovation make everything better, or is it just different?

In the present work, a new measure is to be established in which the value and significance of the New are expressed. We will call this measure: Innovation Quality, or in short InQ.

About the authors:

The authors Werner G. Faix, Jens Mergenthaler, Rolf-Jürgen Ahlers and Michael Auer are active in various capacities for Steinbeis. With the publication »Innovation Quality«, the authors address the dual phenomenon »innovation« & »quality« and ask the question: What is the value of the new?