This book introduces cutting-edge issues and thought-provoking concepts on innovation management. It illustrates how robotic developments allow new powerful support functionalities for harnessing workplace innovations and new types of work in enterprises. In particular, low status jobs-heavy, repetitive and dangerous jobs-are disappearing and increasingly replaced by creative and meaningful work. It situates the research within theoretical developments and academic literature in business and management studies on innovation networks and partnerships. The book then introduces the notion of "friction management," which invites us to re-examine creative tensions and explore how contradictions may spur or restrain change and innovation in this landscape. Innovation and change challenge established patterns, cultures, value systems, interests and network configurations-which creates a variety of frictions. Therefore, a theory of friction management is crucial, particularly in innovation-intensive industries, and can help professionals to understand change and the dynamics of innovation so that they can orchestrate events and learn to distinguish between the creative and negative frictions that can arise and that are important for change and the innovation process. Thus, the goal of friction management is to orchestrate, mobilize and (re)combine key organizational resources to strategically increase innovation capacity and promote dynamic renewal and creativity. It will be of interest to scholars and postgraduates in the areas of innovation management, sociology and business administration.

This book introduces cutting-edge issues and thought-provoking concepts on innovation management. It illustrates how robotic developments allow new powerful support functionalities for harnessing workplace innovations and new types of work in enterprises. In particular, low status jobs-heavy, repetitive and dangerous jobs-are disappearing and increasingly replaced by creative and meaningful work. It situates the research within theoretical developments and academic literature in business and management studies on innovation networks and partnerships. The book then introduces the notion of "friction management," which invites us to re-examine creative tensions and explore how contradictions may spur or restrain change and innovation in this landscape. Innovation and change challenge established patterns, cultures, value systems, interests and network configurations-which creates a variety of frictions. Therefore, a theory of friction management is crucial, particularly in innovation-intensive industries, and can help professionals to understand change and the dynamics of innovation so that they can orchestrate events and learn to distinguish between the creative and negative frictions that can arise and that are important for change and the innovation process. Thus, the goal of friction management is to orchestrate, mobilize and (re)combine key organizational resources to strategically increase innovation capacity and promote dynamic renewal and creativity. It will be of interest to scholars and postgraduates in the areas of innovation management, sociology and business administration.

This book reports cutting-edge cases of emerging health technologies.Some health care fields are experiencing paradigmatic shifts because of robotic technologies and the new relationships that they create in r-Health (r-Curing and r-Caring) activities.The book explores emerging health care technologies such as image-guided surgical robotics, pharmacy robots, new visualisation methods (3D, 4D & 5D ) and home telehealth management systems and their acceptance in the workplace but also, more generally, their special role in business and society. These technologies allow health care professionals to effectively reach far beyond the current service offerings, providing new methods for communication, diagnosis, and treatment. The relocation of certain knowledge areas from physicians to patients in self-care management or the reconfiguration of health care expertise from one health profession to another are examples of topics developed in this book. The book describes the emerging relocation of innovative visual knowledge and expertise within health care organisations and beyond, such as in the patient's home environment."