A comparison of two frameworks for business model ideation

2018

Creativity is widely acknowledged as a necessary ingredient of innovation. Given the

importance of innovation in Business Models, managers should take action to stimulate the

employees’ creativity. Managers can facilitate the generation of creative innovation ideas by

using Business Model frameworks. However, there is limited empirical research on the

effects of using Business Model frameworks to facilitate the generation of innovation ideas.

In this thesis, we have studied the effects of using the Business Model Canvas and Doblin’s

Ten Types of Innovation to generate innovation ideas.

To study the effects, we conducted an experiment using 105 business students from the

Norwegian School of Economics (NHH), where we tested the frameworks ability to facilitate

idea generation. The participants in our study were asked to generate as many ideas as

possible to solve a fictive business case. We measured the quantity, creativity, and value of

the generated innovation ideas. Furthermore, we operationalized the creativity of the

innovation ideas into originality, implementability, applicability, and effectiveness. We

operationalized the value of the innovation ideas into priority. The results from the

experiment were compared to a control group that did not have any Business Model

framework to aid them in the ideation.

The empirical contributions from the experiment show that one of the hypotheses was

supported. We did not find any significant effect from using the BMC or the Ten Types for

ideation, compared to the free ideation control group. However, we did find that the Ten

Types framework produced innovation ideas that scored significantly higher on originality

and priority, than the BMC framework. We also find that the participants’ experience with

the Ten Types framework is a moderating variable affecting the effectiveness score of the

innovation ideas generated with the Ten Types framework.

The literature review and the discussion of the results have provided several theoretical

contributions that are highly relevant for scholars and managers. The empirical contributions

highlight that the Ten Types framework should be included in further research, and that

managers should incorporate the framework in their innovation work.