Quantitative case histories of urban innovations: Are there innovating stages?

A widely accepted `phase theorem' in the literature on organizational decision-making and innovation asserts that these processes occur in a series of sequential stages. The theorem is tested in a study on adoption of three types of urban innovations, in which 2000 episodes in the innovating process are scored on type of innovating function (or stage) and time of occurrence. For three pre-implementation functions of search, design, and appraisal, the data confirm a previous finding that these functions largely coincide in time. From a broader perspective of the total innovating process, however, clear separation appears between the first function of concern and later functions of implementation and diffusion. The data support a `demand pull' rather than a `technology push' account of organizational innovating. This paper suggests that for simple innovations that are borrowed with little change, the succession of stages will be moderately clear. But for organizational innovations that are originated or highly adapted, or those that are complex or uncertain, the staging sequence will appear overlapping and disorderly.