Canadian Innovation Culture Similar to US

TORONTO, ON--(Marketwired - May 19, 2016) -  A recent report by the Impact Centre at the University of Toronto has looked at innovation culture at companies in Canada and the United States. While many commentators claim that Canada lags behind the United States in its ability to innovate, we found no evidence of this in our study. 

Major Findings

We set out to examine three dimensions of corporate culture including:

• Receptivity to new ideas
• The factors which pressure companies to innovate
• Employee beliefs as to internal capabilities to innovate

And while we expected to find differences between beliefs in the two countries, when we looked at the data we found it difficult to identify any real differences. In many cases, the responses came back with very similar numbers. The only consistent trend that we found is an increased likelihood of Americans to be polarized in their opinions; more likely to answer "Strongly Agree" or "Strongly Disagree" than Canadians are.

Our study found that 69% of both American and Canadian knowledge workers believe their companies to possess positive innovation cultures.

• There was less than a 5% difference in Canadian and American responses for nine out of the twelve questions.
• Americans are 11% more likely than Canadians to identify problems at work.
• Americans were 13% more likely to think that their culture makes it easy to put forward new ideas.

Corporate innovation culture plays an important role in fostering or inhibiting the development of new innovative ideas. Culture sets the tone for an organization and permeate employee lives on a daily basis. This in turn affects a country's ability to create and foster an innovation economy.

While these results may appear inconsequential, they allow us to eliminate a potential cause of Canadian innovation problems by highlighting the similarities in the Canadian and American beliefs about a culture of innovation.

Read the full 13-page report:

http://www.impactcentre.ca/similarities-canadian-american-corporate-innovation-cultures

About The Impact Centre at The University of Toronto

The Impact Centre strives to bring science to society.

We believe that science is the foundation for a better quality of life. Research, invention, and innovation are considered among the key contributors to economic development and sustainability of communities in Canada and around the world.

Our vision is to be a place where you can connect with exceptional research, talent, innovative companies, and government to create products and services that benefit society.

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