Management of Technological Innovation: Encouraging the Adoption and Effective Use of Tools for Environmentally Conscious Manufacturing

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Proposal # 9421272 Massachusetts Inst. of Technology The key to effective use of environmentally conscious manufacturing (ECM) tools rests both in the designing of the tools, and in understanding and designing the organizational context in which they are implemented. Based on previous research at MIT by the project team (and by others, elsewhere) on environmental innovation in firms, the latter aspect, organizational factors, is believed to be the more significant. Using important new developments that relate information technology and innovation, coupled with the team's understanding of the use of existing ECM design tools the project will study the adoption, use, and exploitation of these tools through a large industry survey and coordinated longitudinal studies at our industrial partners' plant. The participating firms, UTC and Motorola, both members of MIT's Leaders for Manufacturing program, have begun to use ECM, but not at all facilities. The situation poses unique opportunity to examine different approaches to adoption and use in a pretest-post test format. By employing multiple methodologies, the research will produce understanding of both the ECM system and its inner links. The research should: {SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol"} Facilitate the adoption of ECM design tools {SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol"} Improve the use of the tools, and {SYMBOL 183 \f "Symbol"} Provide additional benefits to the firms using them.