2021 Innovation Survey

We are pleased to present the CEIBS 2021 Innovation Survey. This project came together as a natural byproduct of years teaching in China. Over the past decade, there has been a notable shift from manufacturing to dreaming up innovative new products and services. In response to these trends, we launched this survey to better understand how executives define innovation and what policies and practices companies are currently engaging in to help foster innovative climates.We also hoped to glean important insights into how these trends might differ across different industries and types of companies. Finally, we wanted to gage the impact that innovation has on employee attitudes toward innovation and intentions to leave their organization.We want to sincerely thank all of the executives who participated in this survey for their time and valuable contributions. In particular, we thank the CEIBS alumni community and current students who have shown their support by responding to our call for volunteers. We also acknowledge the financial support from the CEIBS Research Fund, support from the Alumni, MBA, EMBA, FMBA,HEMBA, and Executive Education offices at CEIBS, as well as the many friends that helped tospread the word through their networks. We are grateful to all of them.The CEIBS 2021 Innovation Survey was completed by a total of 950 respondents in the Fall of 2020. In terms of demographics, 72% of the respondents were male and 96% had more than 10 years of work experience (with no respondent having worked for less than 5 years). Tenure in their current organization varied, with 52% working in their firm for over 10 years, 19% working 5-10 years, 23% 1-5 years, and 7% less than 1 year. Of those working in China, most (93%) had been here for over 10 years (with the remainder working here for 5-10 years [4%], 1-5 years [3%], or less than 1 year [1%]). The majority (58%) reported working in the head office whereas 12% were in marketing, 8% in project management, 7% in finance, and 15% in other functions.As demonstrated by these responses and the positions represented in Figure 1 below, our broad and experienced sample provided rich perspectives to the survey.