MKT520 Facebook Innovation Audit Report - Assignment Solution

Facebook 

Facebook is not only a social networking site but also a public forum that is founded by Mark Zuckerberg. The company is headquartered in California and was established in 2004. Thoughts and all sorts of information can be shared over this wide domain. Facebook is an interactive network that connects those with similar interests. Persons sharing similar economic, financial and political views get the opportunity to unite with each other over Facebook (Debatin, et al., 2009). The company is renowned for diminishing the rigid geographic boundaries amongst people and bringing them closer to one another. Facebook completes the lives of the students. This social network service has gained immense popularity since its inception. It has also become a tool that facilitates social interaction, network building and personal identity (Luedtke, 2003).

Innovation 

Many organizations in the world have prioritized innovation. As a result, they are always working on their ability to develop new ideas. An organization can obtain competitive advantage through innovation, particularly because of technological advancements and increased competition all across the globe. There are quite a lot of ways in which organizations can obtain competitive advantage, such as, using the innovation levels in organizations or projects/teams Innovation can be defined as introducing product modifications, or even new products into the market. In fact, when a new market is discovered, innovation is said to have occurred. Various industrialists and other researchers have been interested in comprehending the phenomenon of innovation. How an organization defines the concept of innovation determines its operations; those that will occur within the company. Also, the interpretation of innovation by an organization also influences its outsourcing decisions. Innovation has been defined in a way that determines its nature in an organization. The innovation process of the organizations influences their comprehension of the term. There are some terms, such as, “discovery,” “disruptive,” “revolutionary” or “irregular” that attach meaning to innovation in the context of effects, instead of attributes (Garcia & Calantone, 2002; Freeman, 1974; Tushman & Anderson, 1986). 

There are quite a couple of features of innovation that vary from organization to organization. This is explained through a variation in the characteristics of the organizations, solely relying upon the type of innovation taken into consideration. The features varying across organizations are popularly referred to as the “secondary characteristics of innovation” (Downs & Mohr, 1976). One of the features could be “compatibility.” Same level of innovation in one organization may be different in terms of other organization(s) (Ramiller, 1994). Costs, relative advantage, or the complexity is likely to vary across organizations. On the contrary, primary characteristics of innovation refer to those features that remain constant in every organization and do not vary. They also remain closely associated to the industry in which the innovation has occurred. There are other features of innovation, for instance, its magnitude and effects on the competencies of the organizations (Damanpour, 1991). 

Organizational Innovation 

There are a lot of structural factors that are commonly found in the large firms. The small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are recognized for their learning, flexibility, and strategic orientation. The organizational innovation is directly affected by the internal and external factors, through the number of innovations implemented. The internal factors range from the policies pertaining to learning and technology to market orientation. These factors enhance the innovative conduct of an organization. External factors, on the other hand, range from barriers to entry to industry concentration. The attitude of an organization towards innovation is directly affected by the external factors through the stimulation or inhibition of related work (Salavou, Baltas & Lioucas, 2004). The theory of organizational innovation only has a single dimension. It is through organizational innovation that the companies are able to implement or initiate several distinct types of innovation. These include product innovation, technological innovation, administrative innovation, and process innovation.