How Useful is the Theory of Disruptive Innovation? Harvard Case Solution & Analysis

In one of the Book in 1997, The Innovator’s Dillema, a HBS professor Clayton M. Christensen provided an explanation for failure of famous and well managed organizations.

Christensen's theory of disruptive innovation has gripped the business consciousness like few other notions in the past several years, and its own predictive power is rarely challenged. But what's the proper way to use this theory?

What exactly are its core components, and how predictable is it? In this informative article, writers Andrew A. King and Baljir Baatartogtokh analyze these questions. To begin with, they found the theory's crucial validity and generalizability has been rarely tested in the academic literature. The studies which have been published fail to supply confirmatory evidence for the theory. To measure the theory, the writers surveyed and interviewed experts on each of 77 cases discussed in Christensen's two books, The Innovator's Dilemma and The Innovator's Solution (the latter with coauthor Michael E. Raynor).

Predicated on the interviews, the authors found that many of the exemplary instances of the theory did not fit forecasts and its conditions. A handful corresponded with all of the theory's components (for instance, the interruptions by salesforce.com, Intuit QuickBooks, and Amazon.com). However, the bulk were found to contain distinct motivating forces, and some exhibited unpredicted results. Among them were cases involving the effect of numerous adversaries, legacy costs, and changing economies of scale. The dangers faced by the companies in the sample, the writers say, can't be understood from just one viewpoint or solved by a single prescription. "Instead,"they write, "supervisors should assess challenging problems from a lot of distinct outlooks.

In that spirit, the authors don't advocate discarding the theory of disruption. Instead, the authors recommend using the spirit's best parts as well as ancient strategies to tactical analysis.Case studies about disruptive innovation "can provide warnings of what may occur,"the authors assert, "but companies are no substitute for critical thinking. High-level theories can give supervisors encouragement, but they're no replacement for careful investigation and challenging choices."

PUBLICATION DATE: October 01, 2015 PRODUCT #: SMR536-PDF-ENG

This is just an excerpt. This case is about INNOVATION & ENTREPRENEURSHIP

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