MBA: The door to open for future career improvement, success
If you’re considering an MBA, research supports that an MBA degree is a valuable investment, said Dean Peter Rodriguez, Jones Graduate School of Business, Rice University. He added that employers demand MBA talent, and alumni of MBA programs report an impressive career trajectory since graduation.
Latest Blue Bell ice cream licker jailed for criminal mischief
The ice cream maker’s response to these tampering incidents can either make or break the brand’s reputation. “I cannot imagine how these (ice cream licking) videos would not affect buying decisions and consumer confidence during the middle of ice cream season,” Utpal Dholakia, a professor of business and marketing at Rice University, recently told Houston Chronicle.
Drag show in Houston Montrose inspired by movie characters
"I work full time at Rice University at the business school," explained Derek Hill, who dresses up as Genie in "Aladdin." "And, so, it's really interesting being able to go from 8-5 as like an IT guy, clacking at a computer, and then from 10-2, it's like drag time! Spotlight's on."
Rice research delves into the importance of trendspotting in consumer behavior
Rice Business professor Wagner A. Kamakura and Rex Y. Du of the University of Houston set out to create a model that makes analyzing data across large panels of time to identify marketing trends quickly, accurately and quantitatively possible.
How to encourage voter registration and voting
“Voter apathy is a civic abdication.”― Charles M. Blow. Rice University Jones Graduate School of Business includes pop-up stores, flash mobs, and Instagram, among other methods in their article: “Innovators Are Finding New Ways To Encourage People To Vote.” The Washington Post cites classroom registration as a good method for getting students to the polls (among other methods.)
Texas Legislature's fix to surprise health care bills still leaves millions vulnerable
Millions of Texans will remain unprotected from surprise medical bills despite state lawmakers this year passing one of the nation's most aggressive pieces of legislation to curb such bills. "I worry primarily about those who work for big employers ... for Dell or any other big electronic manufacturers in Austin," said Ken Janda, a Houston-based health consultant and professor at Rice University. "That is why the activity in Washington is so important, because that will fix the other big piece of the puzzle."
Toutes accros au Netflix de la mode
Every Sunday morning, Mary Kate goes shopping in the same shop in downtown Washington. A pink and cream store equipped with the usual displays where dozens of dresses, blouses and pants are hung. The only thing missing is the prices. And for good reason, here nothing is for sale. Mary Kate, a pretty 32-year-old green-eyed blonde, is a subscriber to Rent the Runway, a sort of American-Netflix of clothes. For a monthly subscription of 159 dollars (142 euros), she can borrow, in the shop or via the site, four clothes ... (Originally in French)
Rice U. study: Creativity is a two-way street
Some workers come up with new ideas by themselves, but actually doing something with their ideas is often a social process that requires support, collaboration and sponsorship. So a creative idea generally adds value to an organization only if it is recognized by others.
Some workers come up with new ideas by themselves, but actually doing something with their ideas is often a social process that requires support, collaboration and sponsorship. So a creative idea generally adds value to an organization only if it is recognized by others.
A new study by management experts at Rice University, Tsinghua University in Beijing, Erasmus University Rotterdam in the Netherlands and the University of Texas at Dallas reviews four decades of empirical research on the receiving side of creativity scattered across several business and social science fields. The study is published in in the Journal of Management.
Lead author Jing Zhou, the Mary Gibbs Jones Professor of Management and Psychology at Rice’s Jones Graduate School of Business, and her co-authors offer a framework that tells managers how they can build an environment in which creative ideas are spotted and utilized. “Idea generators can benefit from this body of knowledge in their efforts to make their work recognized by others,” they wrote.
First, the authors advise, new product managers, designers and marketers need to know that their personal characteristics will affect their ability to spot creativity and novelty. “Though one’s prior knowledge and experiences affect creativity recognition, one’s constructions of what creativity is (implicit theories of creativity) also color how creativity is perceived,” they write. “Decision-makers without any creating experience should be aware that they might downplay creativity or inaccurately forecast its success.”
Just as importantly, managers should foster an environment where new ideas are valued, recognized and implemented, the authors advise. “At the organizational level, having a culture in which innovation and creativity are valued facilitates creativity perception,” the authors wrote. “To enable idea implementation, managers need to provide resources and team leaders need to convey the message to the implementers that their endeavors are endorsed and supported by the organization and management.”
Scientists and artists, whose work needs to be recognized by a discerning audience, can in particular benefit from understanding the dynamics of how creativity is received, the authors said. “They need to know that (for example) women’s ideas are underrated and that creators who want to sell breakthrough innovation may encounter resistance, as people tend to prefer moderately new ideas or products that are only moderately incongruent,” the authors wrote. To level the playing field, they suggest women and people with radically new ideas may benefit from presenting their ideas to people or organizations who value creativity.
“Surprisingly, limited research has been conducted in the field of management on the receiving side of creativity, especially compared to other business fields and social sciences, such as education, entrepreneurship, marketing, psychology and sociology,” the authors wrote.
The authors limited their research to papers published between 1970 and 2018. They obtained an initial set of 8,346 papers from more than 400 journals representing several business and social science fields and interdisciplinary subfields. Only a fraction of the initial set of papers were deemed pertinent, and the process led the authors to focus on 107 papers to review and discuss.
“In this paper, we … show that there is a tremendous opportunity for management scholars to study this topic,” the authors wrote. “To the best of our knowledge, no published paper has systematically reviewed research into the perception and evaluation of creativity. We hope this review will inform and inspire management inquiry in this important field of study.”
Zhou co-authored the paper with Xiaoye May Wang of Tsinghua University; Davide Bavato and Stefano Tasselli of Erasmus University; and Junfeng Wu of the University of Texas at Dallas.
For a copy of the study, “Understanding the Receiving Side of Creativity: A Multidisciplinary Review and Implications for Management Research,” email jfalk@rice.edu.
For more information about and insights from Rice Business faculty research, visit the school’s Rice Business Wisdom website, https://business.rice.edu/wisdom.
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