Location
260-051, Owen G. Glenn Building
Start Date
12-15-2014
Description
There is growing interest in the potential of Internet-enabled crowdsourcing platforms to leverage distributed collective intelligence for innovation purposes. Central to the promise of such platforms is the broad participation of self-selecting innovators. However, the factors affecting solver engagement with specific challenges remains only partially understood. This paper presents a study of the engagement of 15 contestants with 5 different challenges on InnoCentive. The results reveal the effects of a solver’s attitude, their assessment of risk, expected value, challenge characteristics, coping mechanisms and the characteristics of the intermediaries’ website on a solver’s engagement with specific challenges. The analysis reveals that the decision making of solvers can be characterized as an ‘attitude vs. risk’ calculus rather than a ‘cost vs. benefit’ calculus. Given these results, the paper concludes by discussing our conceptualization of the solver as a “Speculative Freelancer,” which we posit represents a unique emergent form of knowledge work.
Recommended Citation
Cahalane, Michael; Feller, Joseph; Finnegan, Patrick; Hayes, Jeremy; and OReilly, Philip, "Leveraging Distributed Collective Intelligence: An Investigation of Solver Engagement with Innovation Challenges" (2014). ICIS 2014 Proceedings. 20.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/icis2014/proceedings/SocialMedia/20
Leveraging Distributed Collective Intelligence: An Investigation of Solver Engagement with Innovation Challenges
260-051, Owen G. Glenn Building
There is growing interest in the potential of Internet-enabled crowdsourcing platforms to leverage distributed collective intelligence for innovation purposes. Central to the promise of such platforms is the broad participation of self-selecting innovators. However, the factors affecting solver engagement with specific challenges remains only partially understood. This paper presents a study of the engagement of 15 contestants with 5 different challenges on InnoCentive. The results reveal the effects of a solver’s attitude, their assessment of risk, expected value, challenge characteristics, coping mechanisms and the characteristics of the intermediaries’ website on a solver’s engagement with specific challenges. The analysis reveals that the decision making of solvers can be characterized as an ‘attitude vs. risk’ calculus rather than a ‘cost vs. benefit’ calculus. Given these results, the paper concludes by discussing our conceptualization of the solver as a “Speculative Freelancer,” which we posit represents a unique emergent form of knowledge work.