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Many of our seminars and public events this year will continue as in person or as hybrid (online and in person) events.

Please check our website listings and Twitter feed @STICERD_LSE for updates.

Unless otherwise specified, in-person seminars are open to the public. Please ensure you have informed the event contact as early as possible.

Those unable to join the seminars in-person are welcome to participate via zoom if the event is hybrid.

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About this event

Most innovation occurs inside firms, yet little is known about the organizational forces that shape it. We study the role of middle managers in within-firm innovation using uniquely rich administrative data from a global manufacturing firm that tracks workers? ideas from invention to patenting and commercialization. Exploiting quasi-random manager switches across teams, we show that managers with prior invention experience substantially increase both the quantity and quality of workers? innovative output. Within two years, teams exposed to the most innovation-experienced managers roughly double their production of patent-granted inventions relative to teams experiencing little change in managerial experience, with no evidence of differential pre-trends. The effects emerge quickly, persist over time, and extend along the entire innovation pipeline, from invention, to patenting and commercialization. Our findings also shed new light on the underlying mechanisms: innovation-experienced managers transmit knowledge through close collaboration, foster a more innovation-supportive climate that encourages experimentation and persistence after failure, and improve project screening by disproportionately increasing high-quality outcomes.