Competing on Innovation: Implications for Building the Middle-Skill Talent Pipeline

This 33-page paper, written by Robert G. Sheets and Jason A. Tyszko, discusses increased innovation competition for United States businesses and workers. This paper addresses the growing importance of innovation in global competitiveness, defines innovation and explores major types, provides an overview of research on the changing organization of work, explores promising practices, and then concludes with a call for further research. 

This paper includes the following sections: Competing on Innovation and the Race against Routine Work, What Do We Mean By Innovation, Multiple Types of Innovation, The Discipline of Innovation Embedded in All Work, The Changing Organization of Work and the Role of Open Cross-Functional Teams, Open Cross-Functional Teams: The Horizontal Dimension of Work, Building Innovation Capacity and Talent in Organizations, Promising Practices for Building Talent Pipelines, Illinois Innovation Talent, Career Pathway Frameworks and Sector Initiatives, and more.