Renewal towards strategic agility in a public organization: Case Tekes

Abstract

Objectives

The objective of this study is to examine how a public innovation funding organization Tekes renews itself. More specifically how it is able to renew itself same pace or even faster than its customers in pursuance of creating positive impact to the Finnish business life, which is going through disruptive changes. Interest was also focused if the organization is able to benefit from its position as a public sector organization but near customer interface, which consists of innovative, growing companies, research institutions and other public organizations. Additionally was examined if Tekes as a public organization is able to use practices from private sector companies to its own benefit in renewal.

Methods

Research represented a single qualitative case study. Main data collection method was interviews. Altogether 16 interviews were conducted. of which twelve (12) inside Tekes, two customers of Tekes and two partners of Tekes. Other sources were documents of the organization and observations. Empirical data was collected with inductive approach as exploratory study. Data and theory were revised alternating deriving the final analysis and conclusions to the study. Through the interplay between empirical data and theories was found a framework of strategic agility, which was used to elaborate the empirical data.

Findings

To renew itself, Tekes is using its unique position between companies and public administration as well as the practices of e.g. strategic agility from the private companies in high-velocity industries. In addition to these, the whole top management has taken the strategic agility goal to themselves and open- mindedly take forward experiments, practices to support agility and act as examples of the culture they want to create in the organization. Especially decentralized decision making has had huge impact on for example the dynamics of top management, speed of actions, ability to take responsibility and start experiments. Also some practices related to the top management concerning strategic agility has been implemented through the organization. In this way Tekes is building capabilities across organization, which help to prepare for the future needs and keep Tekes in the cutting edge knowledge.