ICT based service innovation – A challenge for project management

In this paper we investigate to what extent ICT based service innovation can be successfully facilitated by traditional project management thinking. Should service innovation initiatives be organized the same way as high-tech product innovation, i.e. with expert teams in well structured projects? Or should they be organized in some looser fashion, with more interaction with users and other stakeholders?Our empirical evidence is a survey of 130 public sector projects in Norway, run within a national e-government program. We find that ICT based service innovation is not associated with a tightly run project (focused on cost, time and quality) or a professional project manager. Rather, successful service innovation is found in projects with a strong integration with the service providing organization and the external users of the services. We discuss three alternative models as an agenda for further research.