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- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
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- Sprache: Englisch
Whether in terms of practices, equipment or services, the sports sector is characterized by intense inventiveness and is an excellent subject to study innovation processes. This book provides a sociological reading of these processes, illustrated by case studies that allow us to grasp the complexity of innovation trajectories. The case studies highlight the astonishing pathways, from the origin of inventions to their effective dissemination and use, and including the bifurcations of projects. The "surprises" thus presented refer to an invariant of innovation processes, namely that trajectories are rarely linear and that the control exercised over them is relative. Innovation in Sport concludes with a set of recommendations for optimizing the management of sport innovation. This book is intended for students of sports science and management, as well as for professionals and entrepreneurs in the sports markets.
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Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1 Theoretical Elements: A Multidisciplinary Framework between Sociology and Management of Innovation
1.1. Classical approaches to innovation
1.2. Approaches based on uses and users
1.3. The socio-technical approach to innovation: networks and attachment
1.4. Critical innovation studies
1.5. Lessons learned from resistance to innovation and unsuccessful processes
1.6. Conclusion
2 The Different Phases of Innovation Trajectories
2.1. Proposal for an interpretive framework
2.2. Breakdown of the methodology
2.3. Ideation and invention
2.4. Relations with users and the market
2.5. Success or failure: assessment of the innovation project and effects on the organizations
3 Detailed Accounts of Three Sports Innovation Trajectories
3.1. The dualski: making downhill skiing accessible to people with disabilities
3.2. The Booster Elite calf compression sleeve from BV Sport: innovating to promote recovery and prevent injuries
3.3. Hyperion 7: innovating in the field of video recording sports events
3.4. Appendices
3.5. Sources used
Conclusion: Recommendations for the Management of Sports Organizations
References
Index
End User License Agreement
List of Illustrations
Chapter 2
Figure 2.1.
Classical fixation model with frame (Diamir Fritschi)
2
. For a color ...
Figure 2.2.
Front attachment in vacuum
3
. For a color version of this figure, see...
Figure 2.3.
Front attachment with shoe
4
. For a color version of this figure, see...
Figure 2.4.
The Swan9. For a color version of this figure, see www.iste.co.uk/so...
Figure 2.5.
The Hurricane Supermatic
10
Figure 2.6.
Photograph of the mechanical beater (fork placed horizontally)
11
. Fo...
Figure 2.7.
Diagram of the bottom of the fork with the beater (vertical position...
Figure 2.8.
Positionable profile clamps
13
. For a color version of this figure, s...
Figure 2.9.
The Ephithelium Flex sports knee brace (photo credit: Epitact Sport ...
Figure 2.10.
The kitefoil
14
. For a color version of this figure, see www.iste.co...
Figure 2.11.
Sketch of a prototype16. For a color version of this figure, see ww...
Figure 2.12.
Installation of the heel pad in the wedge of the shoe
17
. For a colo...
Figure 2.13.
Salomon’s swim run shoe
28
. For a color version of this figure, see ...
Chapter 3
Figure 3.1.
Dualski with stabilizers2. For a color version of this figure, see w...
Figure 3.2.
Piloted Dualski3. For a color version of this figure, see www.iste.c...
Figure 3.3.
Steel base and frame4. For a color version of this figure, see www.i...
Figure 3.4.
Extract from the patent for the suspension and lifting mechanism – w...
Figure 3.5.
Excerpt from the ski chair patent (1993) (Photo credit: INPI)
Figure 3.6.
Extract from the patent for a ski device for transporting people, es...
Figure 3.7.
Extract from the patent for a ski chair, especially for a skier with...
Figure 3.8.
The Booster Elite (Photo credit: BV Sport France Facebook page). For...
Figure 3.9.
Booster Elite (Photo credit: BV Sport France website). For a color v...
Figure 3.10.
Highlighting innovation through design (Photo credit: BV Sport Fran...
Figure 3.11.
Method and device for measuring blood pressure (Photo credit: paten...
Figure 3.12.
Schematic representation of the device (Photo credit: Hyperion 7 co...
Figure 3.13.
Cable winch (Photo credit: Hyperion 7 company). For a color version...
Figure 3.14.
The Spidercam
27
. For a color version of this figure, see www.iste.c...
Figure 3.15.
Positioning of the drone above the stand (Photo credit: Hyperion 7 ...
Figure 3.16.
Example of a view angle during a test (Stade Français rugby trainin...
Figure 3.17.
Tree of accident causes (green) and proposed preventive barriers (P...
List of Table
Chapter 1
Table 1.1.
Summary of biases in innovation studies
Chapter 2
Table 2.1.
Summary presentation of selected innovation case studies
Guide
Cover
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Begin Reading
Conclusion: Recommendations for the Management of Sports Organizations
References
Index
End User License Agreement
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Smart Innovation Set
coordinated by Dimitri Uzunidis
Volume 35
Innovation in Sport
Innovation Trajectories and Process Optimization
Bastien Soulé
Julie Hallé
Bénédicte Vignal
Éric Boutroy
Olivier Nier
First published 2021 in Great Britain and the United States by ISTE Ltd and John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms and licenses issued by the CLA. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside these terms should be sent to the publishers at the undermentioned address:
ISTE Ltd
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UK
www.iste.co.uk
John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
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USA
www.wiley.com
© ISTE Ltd 2021
The rights of Bastien Soulé, Julie Hallé, Bénédicte Vignal, Éric Boutroy and Olivier Nier to be identified as the authors of this work have been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2021941908
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN 978-1-78630-655-5
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the students of the 2015–2016, 2016–2017 and 2017–2018 classes of the Master’s in Sport Management of the UFR STAPS, Lyon, who helped bring this book to life through their collective work.
Madeline Abry, Sofiane Allaoui, Alexandre Alvarez, Samir Assefar, Elsa Aubel, Guillaume Babu, Emilie Bellemin, Etienne Benas, Marine Bernichon, Agathe Beulin, Matthieu Bonnetin, Lucie Brard, Martin Brénot, Jérémie Carrère, Théo Chevallier, Camille Constant, Thomas Danton, Coralie Deloche, Félicien Demure, Adrien Deprez, Bertrand Devaux, Nicolas Duzelier, Lisa Espinasse, Florian Faivre, Alan Gaudefroy, Edouard Guimas, Romain Ginier, Morgane Goupil, Nicolas Gourier, Dylan Grau, Bastien Grundreich, Emna Guiguet, Mathilde Hergott, Thomas Hernu, Romain Hilaire, Tiffany Hourdry, Tiphaine Isnard, Solène Jolicart, Chloé Joubert, Nastasia Kasprzak, Robin Lamache, Baptiste Le Moing, Olivier Léandri, Benjamin Leduc, Clara Legouge, Simon Manéo, Ouafa Mansouri, Daphné Marek, Antoine Martin, Clémence Martin, Aurore Médecin, Robin Miglioli, Manon Moachon, Thibault Moulin, Florie Moyne-Picard, Rouwa Neffeti, Julie Neime, Alice Paillat, Jérémy Paris, Alexis Passion, Daphné Perroud, Thaïs Pibouleau-Vuaillet, Malory Pilorget, Nicolas Pinay, Valentin Pinon, Romain Pinot, Alex Pinto, Fawzi Rahel, Jérémie Rioche, Loïc Rollat, Kevin Ronzon, Nicolas Roubin, Thomas Ruffin, Catherine Salciccia, Yoann Simonet, Charly Slonski, Bastien Teillon, Guillaume Thibault, Adrien Thomas, Valentin Toulemonde, Davy Tracol, Kevin Vannier, Loïc Vetter, Quentin Vouillon and Enzo Zuliani.
Introduction
I.1. Desacralizing innovation
Innovation stories tend to be idealized in a fairly classic pattern, which unfolds as follows: a bright or avant-garde idea carried by a figurehead; a rapid succession of steps allowing for smooth development; a positive outcome sometimes carrying the seeds of a “real transformation”. This is hardly surprising when attention is focused on successes and, moreover, when these are reported (notably to journalists) by companies and their spokespersons (Vinsel 2017). To succumb to this form of storytelling is more surprising for some researchers, who are supposed to show more distance but who ultimately follow this type of description, which contributes to shaping and maintaining a virtuous and linear vision of innovation, far from what more rigorous analyses reveal.
For anyone who intends to tell the story of innovation, the question of access to information is central. However, one of the limits of success stories is linked to the quality of the informants: through the voices of their executives and R&D managers, companies engage in communication exercises that promote their image, their mastery and their know-how in innovation. When the descriptions are backed up by diversified sources, the depth of the information gathered almost systematically leads to a departure from the usual narratives and the tenacious myths of the visionary innovator (Callon 1994) and of linearity (Joly 2019). Surprising pathways are revealed: the emergence of the concept and the origin of the invention become blurred; the sources of innovation are multiple; hesitations and forks in the road, starting from and around the initial project, are frequent; time is stretched out, and booms follow periods of inertia; control over the spread of the innovation is partial; and so on. These “surprises”, which reflect the complexity of innovation processes, in fact point to an invariant: trajectories are rarely linear, and the control exercised over innovative projects is relative.
For all these reasons, this handbook does not constitute a guide to sports innovation management prescribing “good practices” in this area. Seeking to innovate means venturing into unknown territory, confronting contingency and the risk of failure, having to accept changes or a loss of control, and, in the best cast scenario, being patient and convincing in order to achieve more or less lasting success. These are all elements that should not overestimate the control exercised over innovation trajectories (Bauer 2017).
Modestly, not for lack of ambition but because the facts are stubborn, this book therefore merely aims to provide an interpretive framework intended to facilitate the description and understanding of the processes that have led to innovations in the field of sport. The approach is resolutely illustrative: in order to encourage appropriation by example, we have drawn on about 20 cases of sports innovations. Some of these cases are used on an ad hoc basis to facilitate the understanding of the theoretical aspects mentioned in the first chapter of the book; others, in the third chapter, are examined in greater detail in order to relate the trajectory of innovation, in all its depth, over time.
In this way, we intend to demonstrate the interest of the proposed interpretive framework, in particular its heuristic character, in producing realistic explanations of the innovation processes at work in the sports sector. These cases are borrowed from work carried out by students of the Master 2 Management of Sports Organizations at the University of Lyon, as part of a course on the sociology of sports innovation taught by several university lecturers and researchers who are members of the L-ViS (Laboratoire sur les vulnérabilités et l’innovation dans le sport, Laboratory on Vulnerabilities and Innovation in Sport), a research team focused on the study of innovation in sport.
I.2. The importance of innovation in sports
The current confidence in the benefits of innovation for contemporary societies and their economies verges on belief (Sveiby 2017). This is evidenced by the calls for continuous innovation, in every field of activity, as well as the ever-increasing number of schemes to support and stimulate it. Innovation is almost unanimously considered the sine qua non for companies’ competitiveness, and even for their survival.
Historians will remind us that innovation has not always been placed on a pedestal in this way. Prior to the 19th century, it was even equated with a much-maligned form of transgression, a challenge to the established order and to religious and political balances (Godin 2017). Supposedly exceptional, emanating from the sacred and the divine, conceptualizing was shunned. To be innovative was indeed to be a troublemaker, even a heretic (Godin 2012).
It was only in the 19th century that innovation began to take on a positive connotation, in contrast with conservatism, customs and tradition. This meaning of the term is still very structuring in the way we think about innovation today. It has come to resemble a dogma that has replaced the myth of progress, which has been more and more seriously undermined over the course of the 20th century (Taguieff 2001) and in particular in the 1980s and 1990s (Lechevalier and Laugier 2019). It is associated with originality, difference and creativity, and tends to be seen as a source of “magical” solutions to all sorts of social problems (Oki 2019). Thus, innovating has become a socio-political injunction designed to free us from the economic crisis, thanks to the supposed capacity of innovation to create value and employment. “Innovation has become the emblem of modern society, a panacea for solving all problems,” summarizes Godin (2008, p. 5).
Nowadays, everyone is invited to innovate, everywhere and all the time (Gaglio 2017). This “setting in motion” is supported and stimulated by the creation of investment funds, incubators or dedicated places that encourage actors from different backgrounds to “take action” (Mootoosamy 2016), without necessarily attaching great importance to the evaluation of the real positive effects that are brought about, as well as to the collateral effects generated (Godin and Vinck 2017). Entrenched as an ideal, innovation in fact tends to constitute a value in itself – innovate to innovate (Gaglio 2011) – or even an ideology – innovate or perish (Oki 2019) – where stability and conservatism are mostly described in a pejorative way. It refers indiscriminately to everything that is good, new and useful, likely to play a role in the socio-economic and societal challenges facing modern societies (Oki 2019). It is no longer a matter of challenging the established political order, but rather of reinforcing and conforming to it. This sacralization is nothing new: more than 50 years ago, Rogers (1995) pointed out the existence of a “pro-innovation bias” in Western societies, which consisted of considering innovation as fundamentally and systematically positive for the economy and society. We expect innovation, especially innovation based on science and technology, to lead us out of stagnation, or even economic and social crises (Joly 2019; Lechevalier and Laugier 2019). Innovation is said to be economically virtuous: there is indeed a myth according to which the maximization of value obtained through innovation is not merely a source of competitiveness, but also of trickle-down to other spheres of the economy (maintaining employment, protecting social models), according to a very classic but widely contested theory in economics. More broadly, innovation is increasingly seen as the solution to major challenges, in very different sectors (global warming, food security, depletion of natural resources, demographic aging, etc.) (Joly 2019).
Within the sports and active leisure sector, innovation has long been associated with the evolution of practices, equipment and techniques (Vigarello 1988). As early as the 1980s and 1990s, Pociello (1995) emphasized the diversification and hybridization of sports activities, which gave rise to the somewhat undoubtedly excessive (see Passeron 1987), term of “new practices”. In the sporting goods industry, product innovation is presented as a strategic necessity for achieving competitive advantages (Desbordes 2000). It is described as a way of differentiating and stimulating demand by Tjønndal (2016), which is all the more crucial as the sporting goods industry is a highly segmented economic sector, particularly competitive (Hillairet 1999, 2005) and highly subject to fads (Andreff 1985)1. Since the end of the 2000s, the prospects offered by digital technology have attracted increasing attention. Beyond this strong focus on the technological dimension, which seems to permeate all sectors of activity (Lechevalier and Laugier 2019), innovation in the field of sport also concerns services, processes or events. Moreover, it can be organizational, territorial or social.
For example, research on the federal or public sector focuses on service innovation (Hoeber et al. 2015; Wemmer et al. 2016; Winand et al. 2016). The sports sector, understood here in the broadest sense, thus constitutes a privileged observatory of innovation situations. It provides a glimpse of the many facets of inventive activity, within contexts, organizations and spaces that are themselves very diverse.
I.3. What innovation is and is not: in search of a definition
In view of the evolution of its meaning, the sacredness of which it is currently the object and its omnipresence in the field of sport, we need to clarify what is meant by innovation.
Indeed, a notion that has become unavoidable is not yet clear. Still rather obscure, often confused with invention, creativity or change, the term innovation covers different realities depending on who uses it, and therefore remains rather vague (Mootoosamy 2016). It is in fact a “catchword” that is a source of ambiguity (Garcia and Calantone 2002), on the one hand because it has been the subject of multiple definitions (depending in particular on the scientific disciplines (Boly 2004)), but also because it is strongly imbued with values.
This situation refers to a classic difficulty in the social sciences: the concepts used circulate for the most part in everyday language, often in a vague manner and according to a variety of meanings (Bajoit 2003; Passeron 2006). A classic trap is to consider the categories of common sense sufficiently “meaningful” not to bother with costly terminological precautions (Duchastel and Laberge 1999).
In this opening section, we will try to avoid the frequent confusion between invention and innovation. In light of the above, it would be futile to seek a generic definition of innovation. However, all of the work in the social and management sciences incorporates a fundamental distinction made by Schumpeter nearly a century ago: invention – the inaugural discovery of a new thing – should never be confused with innovation – a process of a fundamentally social nature (Alter 2000). If the former refers to an idea, initial concept or prototype, the latter is conceived as the progressive socialization of this discovery. In a way, the condition for innovation is that the initial idea be “adopted, at least by and in a social milieu” (Gaglio 2011, p. 4). This may involve bringing the invention to market, but this step cannot be considered sufficient to make it an innovation: many commercialized products and services hardly find any takers (Teece 2010). The success of an innovation is indeed linked to its appropriation by consumers or end-users. Beyond this common denominator, the understanding of the process leading from invention to innovation (for example, the conditions of emergence or expansion), as well as the types of actors considered to play a role in it, clearly vary according to theoretical and disciplinary approaches. It should also be noted that there is an ambiguity in the term innovation, which designates both a thing and a state (a novelty that has succeeded) and a process (the actions and trajectory of diffusion of a novelty).
It is also necessary to distinguish between different degrees or regimes of innovation. To do this, we shall use the concept of dominant design (Abernathy and Utterback 1978; Garel and Rosier 2008)2. It is a standard, a set of characteristics and properties of products that are accepted, recognized at a given time and common to all market players. A dominant design implies that we know how to identify, design, manufacture, promote, distribute and use a product or a service. A product is then easily and quickly recognized for what it is, within the framework of a dominant design. It is a stable architecture that enables functions to be fulfilled and users to be satisfied, with a certain level of performance around which competition shall be organized, but also an ecosystem and an established business model (with its technologies, regulations, market, commercial relations, value creation system, etc.). Disruptive innovation involves a change in dominant design. This emergence is rare, systemic, and it is a long process. It rarely emanates from established companies, which have little interest in upsetting markets that have consolidated their competitive position, in destabilizing customers who are mainly looking for marginal improvements, and are more or less captive to the network that has been set up within their sector (Christensen 1997). There is also a widespread fear that already marketed products will be “cannibalized” in this way (Leitner 2017).
In short, change is more difficult the more advantages the situation presents, and the more doubts there are about the viability of a nascent market. Moreover, small companies (including iconic start-ups) or those from other sectors are usually the ones that trigger disruptions. Conversely, supporting (or incremental) innovation is part of an established dominant design. It improves it at the margin, renovates it without fundamentally altering it, and develops while remaining within the constraints of the pathway (Vergne and Durand 2010) that frames it, or even locks it in. One can nevertheless seek to make things smaller, lighter, cheaper, faster, less fragile, while remaining within the framework of the established dominant design and its main performance criteria. It is therefore quite rational for dominant companies in a market to opt for these supporting innovations (Christensen 1997).
As mentioned above, the evolution of practices initially constituted the main part of the research carried out on innovation in the field of sport. Subsequently, analyses focused on product innovations against the backdrop of accelerated technological change. Other types of innovations exist and have also been studied: organizational (Hillairet 2003), service (Paget et al. 2010), process (Desbordes 2001), practice (Rech et al. 2009), territory (Nordin and Svenson 2007), social (Tjønndal 2016, 2017; Coignet 2013) or event-related (Bessy 2013). What these studies have in common is that they focus on cases of proven success, which implies a tendency to produce “seamless narratives of success stories” (Gaglio 2011, p. 3). Little research analyzes failures or unfulfilled innovation trajectories. However, talking about innovation also necessarily means taking an interest in the latter, which in fact constitute the majority of situations and are rich in lessons learned. This is why, in this book, we will focus on both successes and failures, which we prefer to describe as unfinished innovation trajectories or processes.
1
This dynamism refers to what Gaglio (2011, p. 107) calls an intensive regime of innovation: “the transition, albeit incomplete, from an economy of scale to an economy of innovation, where product differentiation, shorter product lifetimes and a variety of product lines are becoming the norm.”
2
To learn more about the elements related to disruptive and supportive innovations and dominant design, we would recommend the MOOC
La fabrique de l’innovation
, coordinated by Gilles Garel and Loïc Petitgirard, both university lecturers and researchers at the
Conservatoire national des arts et métiers
(CNAM).
1Theoretical Elements: A Multidisciplinary Framework between Sociology and Management of Innovation
In line with the aim of this handbook, which is to allow a realistic explanation of the innovation processes at work in the field of sport, we shall develop in this theoretical part the main contributions of several approaches from sociology and, to a lesser extent, from socioeconomics and management sciences. The description of these theoretical currents is coupled with another intention: to reflect on how they are structured.
In this regard, a clarification is needed now as to the respective projects of management sciences and economics, on the one hand, and of sociology and anthropology, on the other. If not clearly stated, this sometimes leads to misunderstanding, which can make interdisciplinary dialog difficult. Sociologists and anthropologists have essentially focused on understanding the spread of innovations (whether social, cultural, industrial, political, etc.), their adoption in different cultural milieus, which is synonymous with the transformation of practices and uses. Less concerned with cultural dimensions than with organizational and industrial issues, specialists in management science and economics seek to identify (and, to a certain extent, prescribe) the best way to successfully commercialize a novelty, with a singular focus on technological innovation. From then on, the innovative company, its stakes and the expected return in terms of added value are central (Godin 2017). Appropriation on the one hand, commercialization on the other; although this division is often schematic, it is nonetheless rooted in a certain epistemological reality, even if several theoretical approaches propose going beyond it.
1.1. Classical approaches to innovation
Schumpeter’s thinking has already been mentioned, and it is of great importance in the work on innovation, since the economist has contributed to highlighting the driving role of innovation in economic evolution, including through its paradoxes (Schumpeter 1935). In particular, we owe him the famous “creative destruction” achieved by the novelty that competes with the old to the point of harming it. He drew up categories that are still used today, including that of typology (product innovation, organizational innovation, process innovation, etc.) and degree (difference between major and minor innovation). Above all, he highlighted the decisive action of an economic agent: the entrepreneur. The latter is not necessarily an inventor (or even a company founder), but a creative and persevering actor, capable of reconfiguring both the resources of the organization and the economic circuits (Munier 2013).
This classical approach has the advantage of highlighting the centrality of innovation in the creation of value in the sports sector (see for example (Chantelat 1992)). It allows us to account for the long time span between invention and innovation in many cases. In this respect, it is interesting to note that recommendations from management science and economics generally encourage the acceleration of processes, in order to increase the pace of innovation and, in so doing, the chances of success (Segercrantz et al. 2017). This acceleration, which aims to prevent competition from taking advantage of innovations, is not without ambiguity: the multiplication of destruction cycles can lead to the lasting destabilization of markets.
Above all, it is important to avoid focusing on providential entrepreneurs, on the one hand because the exceptional figure of the enlightened entrepreneur can be criticized as a chimera (Mustar 1994), but also, as we shall see, because it obscures many other actors and factors. This perspective is not self-evident, since we have been used to seeing innovation as essentially the work of avant-garde individuals capable of recombining productive systems. A recent history (Schutt 2012) of the manufacturer Petzl (technical outdoor sports equipment) describes the founder (Fernand Petzl) and especially his son (Paul Petzl) as visionary, determined and driven by a desire to innovate and capable of anticipating new needs and practices in order to reconfigure outdoor markets. While the career paths and sociological or personal characteristics of innovators must certainly be taken into account in innovation trajectories, they cannot be an exclusive explanatory factor for the fate of new products.
This caution is all the more necessary as we sometimes see the individual figure being substituted by that of the organization in studies. Following the example of the visionary entrepreneur, companies with exceptional characteristics (decompartmentalized, learning, hybrid, etc.) are designated as the driving force behind successful innovations. The Salomon company thus appears to be an ideal type of creative, even intuitive, organization, capable of managing uncertainty in order to regularly bring about innovations (Moingeon and Métais 1999; Puthod and Thévenard 1999; Desbordes 2001; Deroy 2004; Bueno Mérino et al. 2010). The Décathlon group – and one of its private labels, Quechua – are in turn analyzed as a hybrid organization capable of combining rational and turbulent processes in the service of effective innovations (Hillairet et al. 2010), in a description that seems somewhat idealized.
Moreover, Schumpeter’s brainwave leaves the concrete conditions of the success of innovations in the dark (aside from a mechanism of imitation of the innovator by follower companies). The work of Rogers (1995) would deepen the study of diffusion mechanisms, characterizing the way in which a novelty, more or less easily adoptable, spreads in a context (historical, social, technological, etc.) that is more or less favorable. The progressive adoption of an innovation by a growing number of users is done by persuasion and imitation, via a “trickle-down” movement (from the producer to the consumer, from the pioneers to the laggards, from the upper classes to other social circles). The success of an innovation is described as being linked to a double movement between certain endogenous factors which favor (or don’t favor) its progressive spread towards a market which is variably favorable (thus exogenous factors).
Several favorable characteristics of innovation can be singled out:
– the relative advantage over previous solutions;
– compatibility with existing values and practices;
– simplicity and ease of use;
– trialability or possibility of testing the innovation;
– finally, the observability of the results obtained.
Salomon’s arrival on the ski market in the 1990s, through a strategy of innovation (Desbordes 1998, 2001), is thus interpreted in the light of an organized rationality, centered on these factors of success: advantageous technological breakthrough for the skier, compatibility with the current practice of skiing, “visibilization” of the innovation, progressive marketing to validate the trialability, etc. The widespread uptake of the monocoque ski was described as a “snowball” effect, with users confined to the role of successive adopters, starting with champions, expert skiers, high-end customers and then regular skiers. Conversely, Trabal (2008) reveals the effects of social resistance to innovation within the French canoeing federation: a new form of competition kayak, technically optimal, was not taken up because it was not compatible with what certain key actors in the system (the first adopters: coaches, elite athletes) perceived as technical progress.
Classical approaches in sociology are therefore interested in the intrinsic properties of objects in order to deduce their advantages and disadvantages in relation to the social or cultural context in which they are received. Innovation spreads (or doesn’t spread) in a more or less receptive environment and makes it evolve or transforms itself to respond to major trends. This is how the relatively rapid adoption of the fiberglass pole vault in the 1960s was analyzed (Defrance 1984). However, in spite of obvious relative advantages compared to the previous solutions (bamboo or metal poles), it is again the compatibility with the traditional definition of the activity (body techniques, the spectacle on show, the validity of records) that is debated. For Defrance, the context (ideology of progress) and the adoption of the fiber in other countries obliged the French athletes to imitate. But if the contextual dimension of an acceptance or rejection is undeniable, the mechanisms of adoption (or rejection) are not always made explicit.
Thus, Martha’s (2006) account of technological innovations modifying BASE jump practices only partially describes how practitioners became interested in the invention. As a result, she hardly discusses how the invention was not only adopted, but adapted to a physical environment (take-off site, air) and social environment (uses, techniques, conceptions), which were both evolving together.
KEY POINTS – The studies included in this first set of theories have the merit of highlighting the role of social factors and the influence of the global innovation environment. They sometimes deal with cases of resistance or failure to spread, which can be considered as failures. From this point of view, innovation appears less as a result than as a process; it is not limited to the emergence of a novelty, however ingenious it may be, and only succeeds when it is adopted by an environment and goes hand in hand with the renewal of social practices as much as of productive systems. Such works have thus made it possible to anchor technical constraints in their social, economic and cultural contexts, in order to underline the complexity and the progressiveness of the processes of sports innovations (Vigarello 1988; Chantelat 1993; Pociello 1995). The five factors that facilitate diffusion (relative advantage, compatibility, simplicity, trialability and observability) also constitute a solid basis for analyzing the downstream phase of innovation trajectories.
THE LIMITS OF THESE APPROACHES – Schumpeterian thinking remains marked by a conception of innovation centered on the suppliers and their products1, with the adopters appearing as relatively passive agents. Boullier (1989) in turn underlines the imprint of these reductions in the diffusionist theory. Focusing on the acceptance of the novelty, the analysis neglects what happens upstream, as well as the influence that users can have on the genesis of the innovation. More broadly, this point of view is in some ways linear and unidirectional (top down, from the producer to the consumers, from the elites to the ordinary users, from the center to the periphery). It does not completely escape determinism, obscuring certain contingency effects, uncertainties and the sinuosity of real innovation stories. Finally, the focus on a main actor (whether an entrepreneur or a pioneering organization) seems in some cases excessive (falling under the “myth of origins” pointed out by Callon (1994)), whereas stakeholders with multiple roles generally take part in innovation processes. Bauer (2017) also questions certain diffusionist assumptions: the anchoring of the novelty in a single, specific place; the need for rapid spread; the only temporary nature of possible rejections; or the absence of evolution (or only at the margin) of innovations during the diffusion process. Rogers (1995) also recognized the unrealistic nature of most diffusionist assumptions, especially since they are based on the study of a carefully selected set of success stories.
1.2. Approaches based on uses and users
Sportsmen and women (whether experts or “ordinary” sportsmen and women) are not the subject of much attention by the authors mentioned so far: “second roles”: they often appear as simple recipients who accept or don’t accept an innovation, either as a trailblazer or a follower. Innovation is still thought of as a closed process, carried out by organizations (generally companies). In this sense, the main role attributed to the user is to have needs that the manufacturer tries to identify, to fill or even to transform by designing new products.
However, it has now been proven that consumers are not passive: they appropriate goods (even the most standardized ones) through their “arts of doing” (de Certeau 1990), and they are creative through their “techniques of use” (Julien and Rosselin 2005). For their part, the management sciences have clearly shown how much the consumer participates in the processes of servuction, and even production (Vernette and Tissier-Desbordes 2012).
Moreover, it is possible to consider users as actors in innovation, given their capacity to move, adapt, extend, divert and transform novelties and their prescribed uses (Akrich 1998). This is by no means to postulate an absolute symmetry between designer and consumer (Flichy 2003), but simply to note that there is no watertight barrier between design, production and use – which are all sources of creativity.
1.2.1. The lead-user theory: the user-innovator
The consumer may seem to be nothing more than a tactician, capable of playing with innovations designed by market professionals. By developing the lead-user theory (LUT), Von Hippel (2005) pushes the consideration of the user to the point of affording him or her a “lead role” in the innovation process. More so than the early adopter, according to Rogers, who approves or diverts manufacturers’ innovations, the lead user is a developer of specific products or services that the market does not yet know how to use or does not yet want to use. Von Hippel was interested in lead users (or “pioneer users”) in the creation of “informational goods” (such as software), but also in the manufacture of “material goods”, with a particular focus on the sports sector, which is teeming with creativity carried by these user-innovators.
The lead user is generally an expert in the activity concerned, but he is also characterized by a willingness to tinker. He may even rationalize the process to the point of creating a “mock laboratory” to test and compare different solutions. He also sometimes seizes the opportunity to use his close circle and/or custom manufacturers to obtain resources. Although important compromises are made at this stage (due to time, money, etc.), this low-cost innovation niche is likely to produce prototypes with novel functionalities. The solutions thus generated are generally shared with other users who will examine them, comment on them, imitate them, test them and eventually appropriate them (modifying and enriching them in the process, in many cases). This sharing, based on a free and generalized free access opposed to intellectual protection (close to the open-source movements (Von Hippel 2013)), is very frequent among most lead users2. Favoring the dissemination and circulation of knowledge, their approach is not necessarily disinterested because it is the source of symbolic benefits (recognition, notoriety, status) within communities of practice.
By definition, the number of user-innovators is greater than the number of people working in the R&D departments of companies in the sports sector. Beyond the diversity of needs expressed by this mass of sportsmen and women, another element that explains the effectiveness of these communities, in terms of innovation, can be evoked: technical expertise and cognitive diversity are a source of creativity. Von Hippel supports the idea that innovation is all the more effective when it is elaborated collectively; on the one hand, through the successive addition of improvements and transformations made by others; on the other hand, because of the heterogeneity of needs and the capacity of users to imagine solutions to lead to a stable (and generalizable) form of progress. The collective activity of lead users, especially when mediated by structured communities of practice, offers manufacturers a large amount of information about the stated needs, envisaged solutions, and, indirectly, potential markets. This information is all the more useful to manufacturers because it is either unavailable or extremely costly to obtain. Sometimes, companies only have to reproduce prototypes developed and progressively optimized in this way, thanks to the virtues of this “distributed innovation”.
