Team Collaboration in Innovation Contests

25 Pages Posted: 16 Jun 2020 Last revised: 7 Dec 2023

See all articles by Sıdıka Tunç Candoğan

Sıdıka Tunç Candoğan

National University of Singapore (NUS) - NUS Business School

C. Gizem Korpeoglu

Eindhoven University of Technology

Christopher S. Tang

University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) - Decisions, Operations, and Technology Management (DOTM) Area

Date Written: May 22, 2020

Abstract

Problem definition: In an innovation contest, an organizer elicits solutions to an innovation-related prob- lem from a group of (external) solvers. Although solvers are capable of developing solutions individually and making individual submissions, they may collaborate as teams and make team submissions when encouraged by the organizer. Motivated by different policies adopted on various crowdsourcing platforms (e.g., Wazoku, Topcoder, and 99designs), we identify conditions under which the organizer can benefit from encouraging team submissions. Methodology/results: We build a game-theoretic model of an innovation contest where solvers make either individual or team submissions. The quality of a submitted solution depends on the effort(s) of the solver(s) working on it and whether it is easy to decompose the problem to be tackled by different solvers submitting as a team. The quality is also subject to an output uncertainty, the level of which increases with the novelty of solutions the organizer seeks. We show that given a nondecomposable problem, an organizer benefits from team submissions when seeking high-novelty solutions (e.g., system design chal- lenges at Wazoku) but not when seeking low-novelty solutions (e.g., logo design challenges at 99designs). We further show that when the organizer seeks (low- or high-novelty) solutions to a decomposable problem (e.g., software challenges at Topcoder), the organizer can only benefit from team submissions under certain conditions. Managerial implications: We show the innovation-contest organizer should encourage team submissions when seeking high-novelty solutions to a nondecomposable problem or when seeking low-novelty solutions to a relatively difficult decomposable problem where solver effort is costly.

Keywords: Crowdsourcing, Platform, Team Submission, Tournament

Suggested Citation

Candoğan, Sıdıka Tunç and Korpeoglu, C. Gizem and Tang, Christopher S., Team Collaboration in Innovation Contests (May 22, 2020). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3607769 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3607769

Sıdıka Tunç Candoğan (Contact Author)

National University of Singapore (NUS) - NUS Business School ( email )

1 Business Link
Singapore, 117592
Singapore

C. Gizem Korpeoglu

Eindhoven University of Technology ( email )

PO Box 513
Eindhoven, 5600 MB
Netherlands

Christopher S. Tang

University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) - Decisions, Operations, and Technology Management (DOTM) Area ( email )

110 Westwood Plaza
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1481
United States

HOME PAGE: http://www.anderson.ucla.edu/x980.xml

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