Crowdsourcing: Magic bullet for any innovation issue?

So unterschiedliche Organisationen wie NASA, Coca Cola, Patagonia, Amazon, Greenpeace und Nissan haben eins gemeinsam: Sie setzen auf Crowdsourcing-Wettbewerbe, um ihre Innovativität zu stärken. Die spektakulären Erfolge dieser Methode haben zu einer Explosion an einzelnen Wettbewerben, Crowdsourcing-Plattformen wie Innocentive, Atizo und NineSigma und sogar Unternehmen geführt, deren gesamtes Geschäftsmodell auf dem Prinzip der Innovativität der Masse beruht, wie Threadless und Local Motors. Prof. Nikolaus Franke, Akademischer Leiter des Professional MBA Entrepreneurship & Innovation, analysiert im Folgenden, ob Crowdsourcing tatsächlich eine Innovations-Wunderwaffe ist und warum die Masse bessere Ideen und Konzepte  hat als hochbezahlte interne SpezialistInnen.

Die Grundidee von Crowdsourcing ist einfach: Eine Organisation veröffentlicht eine Problemstellung, zu der innovative Lösungen gesucht werden, und schreibt einen Preis für das beste Konzept aus. Jeder, der will, kann mitmachen und Ideen einreichen. Am Ende wird die beste Lösung prämiert. Jeff Howe prägte für den Begriff „Crowdsourcing“ 2006: man bedient sich („sourced“) aus der anonymen Masse, der „Crowd“. Doch das Prinzip ist viel älter. Schon im Jahr 1714 suchte die britische Regierung beispielsweise eine Lösung für das Problem, dass man den Längengrad auf See nicht zuverlässig berechnen konnte. Die Folge von Falschmessungen waren durchschnittlich rund 1.000 Tote pro Jahr – ein schwerwiegendes Problem also, zu dem man intern keine Lösung finden konnte. Während die Fachleute Sternbeobachtungen und Planetenbahnen als vielversprechend ansahen, kam die Gewinnerlösung aus einer gänzlich unerwarteten Richtung. Der Uhrmacher John Harrison schuf eine ganggenaue und schiffstaugliche Uhr, mit deren Hilfe man den Längengrad auf See genau bestimmen konnte.

One reason why the number of crowdsourcing competitions has increased so dramatically can be found in the lower transaction costs of communication. In this age of ubiquitous internet access and permanent connectedness, the crowd, and thus a vast multitude of potential solutions to a problem, can be reached very easily. The spectacular successes achieved also play a role. When NASA, for instance, looked for an improved algorithm for the alignment of nucleotide sequences in the field of immunogenomics, the crowd delivered a solution that was 1,000,000 (yes: one million!) percent more effective than the procedure developed by the organization itself. How is this possible?

Two principles explain why the crowd frequently produces superior results compared to in-house experts.

Principle 1: self-selection bias

There is a rather low chance that the people charged with a task within an organization are actually the ones best suited to solve the problem at hand. What is far more likely is that somewhere there are people who have greater expertise in the field in question, have solved a similar problem in the past or have looked at the problem from a different perspective, producing a wholly unexpected solution (as was the case in determining longitude at sea). Unfortunately, we usually do not know who these people are. The self-selecting bias, however, assumes that those most suitable to solve a problem will proactively assign themselves to the task. A person with an idea will participate without having to be prompted to do so. In a recent research project carried out at WU Vienna’s Institute for Entrepreneurship & Innovation, the crowdsourcing competition investigated clearly attracted particularly proficient problem-solvers. The qualifications of the 69 people who submitted their ideas of their own accord by far surpassed those of the 11,897 people that were actively contacted to consider a submission.

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^{The principle of self-selection helps to generate unexpected ideas - powerful problem solvers are attracted like a magnet. Photo © CC0 Licence}

Principle 2: the law of large numbers

Even the smartest and most creative thinker cannot produce innovative ideas at the drop of a hat. At the same time, anyone can have a stroke of luck occasionally. Throughout history, individuals have come up with genius ideas, a feat that they could not reproduce a second time no matter how hard they tried. Such “one-hit wonders,” as they are called in the music industry, can also be found in science and economy. Crowdsourcing harbors great potential because it reaches a large number of likely solution-providers. Even though on average, their qualification levels might be eclipsed by those of the organization’s own experts, the best ideas produced by the crowd often prove stronger than concepts developed by in-house staff. A follow-up research project conducted by the Institute explored whether the number of participants or their qualification profiles was more important for success in the competition. The profiles of 1,089 participants in a (different) actual crowdsourcing competition provided the preliminary data. Based on these data, we computed 36,400 crowdsourcing competition simulations. The results spoke a clear language: the number of participants had a greater impact than their average qualification level.

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^{The more potential problem solvers you, the more creative, diverse and better the ideas become. Photo © CC0 Licence}

Firstly, crowdsourcing works best in situations in which it is unknown who will produce the optimum solution. It is thus particularly suitable for creative, poorly structured, and difficult problems. It is more adequate for issues related to innovation than projects centered on optimization. You can rest assured that it will attract those who easily come up with innovative solutions – and the competition should be designed in a way to appeal to them.

Secondly, crowdsourcing competitions should strive to reach and strike the interest of a large number of potential participants. Innovation cannot be programmed and the outcome depends on luck more than we can appreciate. However, you can try to attract good luck by increasing the number of attempts. This is also a question of how the competition is organized. Keep these principles in mind and crowdsourcing may in fact become your magic bullet.

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