During this year’s Academy of Management Annual Meeting in Chicago the symposium “Improving Lives through Responsible Innovation - Practices and Challenges” took place. The symposium was organized by Florian Findler and Markus Hametner, research fellows at the Institute for Managing Sustainability. The symposium covered the topic of Responsible Innovation with special attention to the healthcare sector.

Innovation evokes positive associations in practice and in research – competitive advantage and societal progress are just some of the benefits caused by innovations. At the same time, innovations are, due to their inherent uncertain character, prone to risk and have (possibly unintended) impacts on society, the economy and the environment. Practical and academic approaches can enhance our understanding of innovation and help to shape them in a way that allows for creating societal benefits and tackling sustainability challenges.

The symposium brought together researchers and practitioners and set the frame for an interactive and interdisciplinary debate on the chances and challenges that Responsible Innovation holds. In a panel discussion André Martinuzzi (Head of the Institute for Managing Sustainability), Minna Halme (Aalto University, FI), Nir Menachemi (Indiana University, US), Lydia Montandon (ATOS), Bettina Maisch (Siemens Corporate Technology) und Janett Klaus (Otto Bock Healthcare GmbH) debated theoretical and empirical approaches to Responsible Innovation in the healthcare sector.