Differentiating the network effect across innovation development and innovation productivity

Many studies have investigated and shown how network structure affects individuals’ innovative performance. However, there seems to be a disconnection among network theories of brokerage, embeddedness and centrality, as they all argue that networks improve individuals’ innovativeness through different mechanisms. In a step towards reconciling these theoretical streams, our study proposes a two-stage model showing how different network mechanisms impact individuals’ innovativeness in different stages of the innovation process. After analyzing primary network data on 253 engineers working in three units of a multiunit and multinational company operating in the semiconductor industry, we find that in the first stage - labeled innovation development - brokers and highly central individuals are more likely to submit a patent application to the USPTO office. Contingent on the first stage, network closure positively affects the innovation productivity of each engineer, measured as the number of submitted patent ...