The Organizations’ Paths to Market Success

Abstract

Management of innovation processes is still not enough researched and applied by managers, because they often do not know models that may help them make the best decisions in this context. This study aims at researching what types of paths to success are followed in innovative organizations, using a model that includes the ideas considered by the value chain evolution theory and the tetrad-value theory. A survey was carried out among large, medium and small organizations in Portugal. The results showed that the main reasons for failure in the market were: lack of adjustment to customers’ requirements, economic unfeasibility, price too high, ignorance of the market, lack of resources and internal support, financial instability in destination markets, a lot of competition, and there has not yet been enough time for evaluation. At the light of the proposed model, it was also possible to know the distribution of the organizations’ paths for success. Many innovative products followed a path that implied costly reformulations of different kinds. As such, it will be very important that organizations try to be more market oriented, enhancing their processes to collect, disseminate and analyse information, with better cross-functional coordination to achieve the best response to the market.