Innovation in services

OR335S

To an increasing extent, organizations in both private and public sector are confronted with expectations on being innovative, being open for changes and being creative. In private sector the discourse is much about competitive advantages and expectations linked to this. In public sector these expectations take the form of reform elements and governance and management discourses. In both private and public sector concepts such as "lean", "co-creation", "innovation leadership", and "social entrepreneurship" is frequently used, however what is the content of these concepts or discourses? And what is the drivers behind the expectations on innovations? Coming to public sector some scholars point to scarcity, other argue that the problems one is dealing with have become increasingly complex. However, these expectations on innovation can also root in internal characteristics, for instance that organizations or leaders need to comply with their environments or portray themselves as proactive. We will also investigate the public sector’s role for businesses innovations activities.

The main aim of the course is to reflect on the expectations about innovation in public and private sector, what these expectations mean in practical life, and how potentials, challenges and problems is related to different types of innovations. In addition, the course will introduce the concepts and provide knowledge about how organizational characteristics might influence on organizations capacity to become creative and innovative.

Applicants must either fulfill one of the following criteria in order to qualify for admission to the course:

have a Bachelor or Cand.mag and must have passed exams for a minimum of 80 ECTS credits in social science courses at bachelor level in fields as Organization, Management, HRM, Business administration, Psychology, Political science, International relations, Sociology, Social anthropology, Social work, Pedagogy, Geography, Criminology and Development studies. A minimum of 20 ECTS credits of the social science subjects must derive from specialization. In addition a minimum of 20 ECTS credits must belong to the following fields of study: HRM, Public Policy, Public Administration or Organizational studies. Research methods, Ex.phil and Ex.fak are not considered to be among the 80 ECTS credits in social science courses. The 80 ETCS within the field of social science will have to have a minimum grade of C.
have a Bachelor degree of 3 years' duration (180 ECTS), equivalent to a Norwegian Bachelor degree, with an average grade of C, and a minimum of 2 years of relevant work experience.

Knowledge

Upon successful completion of the course the student should be able to document knowledge in important issues and approaches in studying innovations in public and private sector

Skills

To critically reflect on the problems and challenges pertaining to the implementation of innovation projects in public and private sector.

General competence

To be better prepared in dealing with practical challenges of participating in innovative processes. The ambition is to strengthen their skills in creative problem solving

No costs except semester registration fee and course literature

Compulsory for Master in Human Resource Management, Master in Social Science with specialization in HRM and for Master in Social Science specialization in Public Administration.

The course is given during one-week intensive teaching lectures and seminars. The course is a combination of lectures, groupwork with a case, reading of the mandatory literature and an examination paper (essay). We seek to involve students in their own learning process. A leader in charge of a selected case organization is invited to the University, giving a lecture on the kind of problems and challenges they deal with in everyday life, and to answer questions from the students. The students shall, in groups, based on the mandatory literature and lectures give solutions to the case organization. The students do design their essays (examination paper), within the theme innovation in service. Often the students use the case organization as empirical resources for their reflections in the examination paper as a base for their essay.

Annual evaluations which are included in the university's quality assurance system

The examination consists of one assignment, an essay. The students choose the topic and the research question with in the broad theme ‘innovation in services’. There will be given academic supervision on the assignment during the week with session-based teaching. The exam can be written either in Norwegian or English.

Pencil, pen, ruler, simple calculator and Dictionary.

Course language

Norwegian

Credits

Bodø

Responsible faculty

Faculty of Social Sciences

Course coordinator

Information about the course coordinator for the selected semester is no longer available. Please contact the current course coordinator.