Resumen de Towards an appropriate comprehension of innovation sources in agrifood cooperatives

Cristina Segovia López, Manuel Sánchez Pérez

• The existing typologies of innovation sources rely on classification criterions which are excessively generalist and developed under the consideration of private owned organisations. It difficulties the precise identification of the origin of organizational innovation and complicates their empirical measuring. This is specially emphasized by agrifood cooperatives, because their government and operative dynamics. The present paper seeks to shed light on the special structural and operative features of cooperatives demanding a more comprehensive classification of innovation sources. A sample from the agrifood cooperative industry was selected as the scenario of the empirical research. The results confirm our classification proposal of innovation sources into four differentiated groups (managers, technology, market and normative context) with regard to the management orientation of change (strategic vs. technical/legal) and the strength motivating the innovation process (internal vs. external).