For some of us, the rapid rise of artificial intelligence may not seem to be the least worrying. We learn it and try it. And slowly but we are definitely incorporating the new technology into our lives and work. In other words, we adjust – as we did with the appearance of internet vaccines and smartphones and mRNAs.
However, rotation in new territory can be more tax than we realize, raising questions for both individuals and organizations, he says Benjamin JonesProfessor of Strategy at Kellogg School, where he encodes the Ryan Institute for complexity.
“On an individual level,” how will it go when I deal with a new area – great things happen, I fail or are it the same as before? “He says.” From organizational or social level, “how can we rotate our human resources and know -how to engage in a new region?”
Jones worked with Kellogg’s Ryan Hill and Dashun WangDoctoral Student Xizhao Wang, Yian Yin of Cornell University and Carolyn Stein of the University of California, Berkeley, to explore these questions in the context of research and technological inventions.
They develop a method to determine what happens when scientists shift tools and research issues beyond their standard focus or when inventors and organizations create products outside their steering wheel.
Following the application of their method to millions of research documents and patents of technology in a period of about five decades, the team found that shift directions significantly reduced the impact of the resulting patents and patents. This result, which the team described the “axis of the penalty”, not only affected almost all areas of the research and patents, but also became more serious over time.
“The penalty of the axis we record can be a surprise to many people,” says Hill, assistant strategy professor. “We often believe that strangers could bring new ideas to a topic that could facilitate new discoveries.
“Exploring has always been an important part of scientific work,” Wang adds, “but our data shows that when researchers move far away from their basic experience, they face sharp sanctions.” Wang is Professor of Management and Organizations and the President of Technology at Kellogg, where he also directs the Center for Science and Innovation (CSSI) and the Northwestern Innovation Institute and connects the Ryan Institute for complexity.
The penalty of the axis
During the study of the sciences, Jones, Hill, Wang and his associates examined 26 million research documents from 1970-2015 in 154 fields.
They identified the focus of a paper based on the type of research journals mentioned in the list of its reports. Previous survey published in US financial criticismFor example, it will be categorized as financially, while the research published in US Political Science Review It would be political science. They then quantified the axis of a paper on a scale of 0 to 1, based on how closely the categories of its reports are in line with those of the same researcher’s previous documents.
“If the distribution of the magazines you mention in a new document is exactly the same as distribution in your previous work, this is a zero axis,” Jones says. “But let’s imagine that none of the magazines you mention on your new paper are in any of your previous tasks. Do something completely different. This is a one axis of one.”
The team also measured the impact of each paper based on whether it was at the top 5 percent of the most mentioned documents in its field in the year of its publication. They then introduce all this box into an algorithm to calculate the size of the shaft and the impact of all documents.
They found that the greater the axis of a paper-or the more a researcher was removed from the previously investigated area-the less likely to be a high-effect paper.
“The more the axis, the worse it seems to go,” says Jones. “It’s not that you can’t enter a new area and hit a run at home, but there is only a much lower chance of this happening.”
To be specifically, the papers that required the smallest amount of rotation became a high -impact cards of 7.4 percent of the year, compared to 2.2 percent of the time for papers that require the most rotation. The largest axis documents were also 43 % less likely to be reported by patent -patented inventions and 35 % less likely to go from a Preprint document to a magazine publication.
Within a portfolio of this researcher, the document requiring the smallest axis was 40 % more likely be a high -impact paper from the rest of the researcher’s work. On the contrary, the paper with the largest axis was 36 % less likely be a high -impact paper.
Ultimately, the axis sentence continued regardless of factors such as the researcher’s career stage or individual productivity, project group size, the use of new roommates and funding.
A central tension
A simple answer to these findings may be simply to stop rotating. After all, as science and technology continue to move on, it is becoming more and more difficult for researchers and inventors to keep up with the growing intelligence group. This burden of knowledge obliges many of them to limit their dining area to their already specialized field.
“As people become more specialized, the disadvantage of movement – the penalty for rotation – is getting worse,” says Jones. “And the advantage of staying in your area is increasing.”
This finding also applies to the development of new technology.
The team evaluated the impact of 1.8 million technology patents from 1980-2015 on 127 technological classifications. As in the case of research work, rotation had a negative effect on the effect of patents. The patents that required the minimum rotation were shown to be 8 % of a patents of patents, compared to 3.8 % of the time for patents that required the highest rotation.
In addition, rotation caused the market value of a new patent – as measured by the way the price of a company was in response to the patent – to reduce abruptly. Patent diplomas that required the highest rotation had a lower market value of 29 % of those requiring the minimum rotation.
And yet, despite the clear consequences of rotation, the ever -changing nature of the real world can make it almost impossible to stop rotating completely. External events, such as the Covid-19 pandemic or the rise of AI, continue to attract people’s attention if they do not require an answer.
“If you make a huge axis on Covid or AI, it’s likely to go bad,” says Jones. “But at the same time, it attracts you because there is this demand premium and it is potentially very important. It will be a slow start, but you may need to rotate anyway.”
“Understanding these compromises is vital,” Wang adds, “if we are to build a research ecosystem that is both durable and responding to emerging challenges.”
Addressing larger questions
The need for rotation – and the best way to approach it – is not unique to science and technology. It is a dilemma that organizations, governments and society as a whole all the time.
Sometimes organizations remain in their weapons and choose not to adapt at all. In other cases, they choose a full axis, throwing their current projects and shifting their priorities. Even other organizations have turned into acquisitions, buying smaller companies at the forefront of a particular area to acquire not only their intellectual property but also their talent.
In other words, “they are entering a new area by gathering expertise – who have been working or working with people who are experts in this area,” says Jones. “Designing these experts can limit the collective penalty of rotation and release a greater advantage.”
Organizations in many industries have been operating in this way for years. Academic institutions are collected by students, scientists and other experts from a wide range of backgrounds to lead their research. And businesses often call on a varied team of consultants to help big decisions.
The ability to rotate well is particularly critical when emergency situations force people to adapt unexpectedly.
This was the case with the Covid-19 pandemic. If structural biologists, immunologists and Iologists were not already well familiar with the coronies and if the vaccine manufacturers had not already devoted years of research and funding to develop mRNA vaccines (which would then seem like a failed technology), then the pandemic could be even more than a failed technology). “We are very lucky, in a sense, that with Covid we had the prediction of important types of human capital,” says Jones.
Whether or not people or organizations have to spread. “We need to have people who are special in different areas so that we are willing to handle emerging challenges and address greater questions.”
