Why Managers Kill Good Ideas and How Networks Help todayheadline

Managers systematically reject employee innovations despite claiming they want fresh thinking, but research reveals that diverse social networks can overcome this creativity bias.

A comprehensive study examining how managers evaluate novel ideas found that while supervisors generally disfavor originality due to uncertainty aversion, both managerial network diversity and employee network centrality significantly improve the odds that innovative concepts receive fair consideration and implementation.

The findings, published in the Journal of Applied Psychology, help explain why groundbreaking ideas often languish in corporate bureaucracy—and point toward practical solutions for fostering organizational innovation.

The Innovation Paradox

“Though bosses claim they want to take on new ideas, they don’t want to take on the uncertainty that comes with them,” explained Vijaya Venkataramani, Dean’s Professor of Leadership and Innovation at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business and lead author of the study.

This contradiction creates what researchers call the “innovation paradox”—organizations desperately need creativity to survive, yet the very novelty that makes ideas valuable also makes managers uncomfortable. The research team found consistent evidence across three studies that managers exhibit systematic bias against novel concepts, even when those ideas demonstrate clear utility.

Historical examples abound of this pattern. United Artists rejected the first Star Wars film because studio executives found the concept too strange. Kodak dismissed digital camera technology despite inventing it. Xerox executives ignored personal computer designs, believing PCs would never gain widespread adoption.

Networks as Innovation Catalysts

The study employed both experimental manipulation and field research to examine how social networks influence idea evaluation. In laboratory settings, researchers varied idea novelty levels and measured how managers with different network characteristics responded. Field studies then tracked real product ideas as they moved through organizational hierarchies.

Results revealed two critical network effects that combat anti-novelty bias. First, managers with diverse advice networks—connections spanning different functional areas, industries, and expertise domains—showed significantly greater openness to novel employee suggestions. These cross-functional relationships appear to expand cognitive flexibility and reduce the tendency to dismiss unfamiliar concepts.

Second, employees’ own network positioning proved equally important. Ideas originating from workers who held central positions in their peer advice networks received more favorable evaluation from managers, regardless of the supervisors’ own network characteristics.

The Credibility Signal Effect

“The employee’s network ties can act as a prism for the manager—they provide signals about the credibility of the idea,” Venkataramani noted. When managers observe that idea-proposing employees maintain diverse internal connections—such as marketing specialists who regularly consult with R&D teams or supply chain experts—they perceive greater legitimacy in those workers’ suggestions.

This credibility effect operates through what researchers term “social proof mechanisms.” Managers unconsciously reason that if an employee’s ideas merit attention from colleagues across different departments, the concepts likely possess genuine merit rather than representing isolated speculation.

The network positioning also serves a practical function. Well-connected employees typically possess broader organizational knowledge, enabling them to craft proposals that consider multiple stakeholder perspectives and implementation challenges.

Breaking the Rejection Cycle

The research identified specific strategies for overcoming systematic idea rejection:

• Managers should actively cultivate diverse professional networks through industry associations and cross-functional collaborations
• Organizations need to provide structured networking opportunities like research days and cross-departmental lunch sessions
• Employees should strategically build internal advisory relationships beyond their immediate work groups
• Leadership must recognize and address inherent anti-novelty biases in evaluation processes

“Having more interactions with people in different areas of expertise helps a manager become more open-minded,” Venkataramani observed. “So when an employee comes to them with an idea, the manager can see how it might work because they are able to appreciate different ways of approaching the same problem.”

Organizational Innovation Architecture

The findings suggest that innovation success depends as much on social architecture as on individual creativity. Organizations that fail to invest in network-building infrastructure essentially waste their creative human capital by creating systematic barriers to idea implementation.

Co-author Kathryn “Kay” Bartol, Professor Emerita at the Smith School, emphasized the persistent nature of this challenge: “But they’ll probably reject that too, because they’re just accustomed to doing things a particular way and can’t see the value in changing it.”

The research demonstrates that overcoming entrenched resistance to novelty requires deliberate structural interventions rather than simply exhorting managers to be more open-minded. Building diverse networks takes time and organizational commitment, but the investment proves essential for maintaining competitive advantage in rapidly evolving markets.

Companies cannot survive without innovation, making the creation of bias-free evaluation environments a strategic imperative rather than a nice-to-have cultural enhancement. The study provides evidence-based guidance for leaders seeking to transform their organizations into genuine innovation incubators.

Related