Innovations as a Key Factor of Competitiveness Improvement in the Organization

While innovation has long been recognized as a key element of organizational competitiveness, the gap between knowing and doing remains significant, especially in emerging economies. This essay reviews the existing economic and management literature on the interplay between innovation and competitiveness at the organizational level, drawing on firm-level comparisons and statistical data from both developed and developing economies. The argument put forward is that competitiveness is enhanced not by technology investment alone, but by the management of the innovation process across the dimensions of product, process, and organization. Nigerian firms serve as a primary case, with a comparison drawn between their innovation management practices and those of firms in South Africa and South Korea, and the conditions under which innovation leads to sustained competitive advantage are identified.