Handling Innovative People

In innovative environments or departments, where employees must be motivated to produce new ideas, products or processes, is critical to consider not only technical skills but soft skills such as communication, leadership, responsibility and teamworking. The result of an innovation team goes beyond the optimum performance that is asked of a standard team, since they usually set ambitious goals that allow to go beyond the current state of the art and this makes the operation of these teams especially delicate. As a result, general considerations about work teams are considered, focusing on the model of Tuckman’s team development sequence and Belbin Theory. Last but no least, a section is dedicated to “what to pay attention to in groups” as a key issue. As a conclusion, the working group can be an effective management tool for companies to solve difficult and complex problems. In the case of innovative profiles, special attention must be paid to the motivations of these people, who are often different from others. The authors have identified all these aspects as key issues to research and they will dedicate the following academic courses to study in detail some specific roles and their implication in successful innovative projects.