Dr. Lars Janzik

Two examples of the great events we did in the last years with the Gründerszene team.

I was honored to contribute a chapter to this new book about open source innovation (phenomenon, participant’s behavior, business implications), edited by Prof. Dr. Herstatt and Daniel Ehls from the TIM team at the Hamburg Universitz of Technolgy. My article provides some insights what motivates participants of online communities to contribute for free. The book shows open source innovation from multiple perspectives with all its different facetts including an article by Eric von Hippel professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management (the power of participation motives). The book will be available at the 3rd of April 2015.

In my research about user innovation I identified a phenomenon that I described as „Open Motivation“. Open motivation is not a complete new finding. In view of motivation psychology it is more a specific mindset you can observe at user in product related online communities. Based on the changed usage patterns and new technological option in the social Web, open motivation is an opportunity for companies to influence users and to integrate them in their value chain.

Open Motivation Interview with Lars Janzik, English from Lars Janzik on Vimeo.

In 2014/15 my German Monster team and me developed a lean and clean white label job board cloud solution. We only had a very short development period available and used agile frameworks as a basis.

In the beginning of 2012 I released my doctoral thesis:
Online communities in the interactive Web, driven by changed usage patterns, have become a potent means of identifying user needs and solution ideas, thereby supporting companies to innovate. That is especially the case for online communities that are related to particular products or brands. My research focuses on innovative user activities in such virtual communities mainly dedicated to tangible (physical) consumer products. Most fundamentally I analyze the motivation to innovate and contribute to online communities voluntarily. The results support companies in understanding online community members relating to the company’s brand or products as active resource and in improving the integration of such users. Thus results provide a foundation for the development of specific incentives and tools that stimulate user activities.

In 2011 I had the great honor of getting an article through the validation for the ZFB journal. ZFB is one of the most credible and famous German scientific magazines in business economics. Together with my Ph.D. supervisor Prof. Dr. Herstatt and my research fellow Prof. Dr. Christina Raasch we have written an empirical approach categorizing motivation in online communities. The goal was to make such user motivation measurable and usable for companies.

During my research project on user motivation to innovate in online communities I was interviewed by the HBM in late 2010. One important finding was that attention by others is a very important incentive for such innovators, more important than any material rewards.

Innovation and change management are key success factors of any company in any line of business, I try to give a very simple definition and personal view how I experienced both elements in the last years.

When I started remixing old Beatles tracks with techno grooves in 1992 I did not seriously believe that we could do any official release. But the idea was stronger and so after a longer fight I finally received support from EMI Publishing that owned the publishing rights at this time. Of course I have not been allowed to use the original recordings, but there was the rumour that Mr. Paul McCartney himself listened to the demo and liked it. So however, we re-recorded the track with the Beatles Revival Band – maybe the best Beatles cover band ever. The track was picked by Virgin Records in 1994 and released in Germany and UK. The most experts predicted a number one hit – but it wasn’t. For the most radio stations the Beatles still have been a sacred cow – they did not play the song.

I have written and produced the song in 1991 for my formation „D-Parture“. The track was released on the Sony Dancepool music label as CD, 7inch and 12inch record and reached several top positions in dance charts of five European countries. Recording and production was done at Acoustic Arts Studio close to Frankfurt with the former Frank Farian sound engineer Tammy Grohé.