1. Adaptability

First, to understand the relationship between adaptability and open innovation, we must have a clear understanding of both concepts to know what we are referring to. Adaptability is a fundamental factor in any field, including the workplace.

What is adaptability?

To begin with, we need to be clear about the definition of adaptability. In short, we could define adaptability as the capacity of an individual or group to adapt to different contexts or situations. In other words, the capacity to respond appropriately to the demands of the environment, regulating the behaviour of the individual or group.

The capacity for adaptability is closely linked to technological advances, which have brought enormous transformations to the workplace. However, it is a mistake to think that we are only witnessing a massive digitalisation of processes. Behind this digitalisation lie a series of social, political, and economic changes of which we have only seen the tip of the iceberg, but which will shape the employment landscape in the coming decades.

Adaptability is currently one of the most sought-after skills in the labour market, both for prospective employees and employers.

In the end, adaptation is a process that happens between living conditions and the way a living being deals with them. We could say that there is adaptation when the way in which we manage to survive in these conditions works and can continue to do so without major tensions. All these actions are necessary for a good relationship and organisation in the workplace.

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Adaptability requires several key factors that are absolutely necessary for a good overall functioning. We will now list a few factors to better understand this necessary skill:

• Formalisation of the organisation
• Institutional centrality
• Permeability with the outside world
• Capacity for teamwork
• Social skills with the team

But why is the ability to adapt to the environment like a chameleon so necessary? As we mentioned at the beginning, there is an increasing supply in the different industries and their respective lines of business.

As a result, competition has become increasingly fierce, causing companies to develop strategies to face it.

Knowing how to adapt to the changes that are constantly occurring in the markets will allow businesses to deal with problems.

In this way, they will have a greater capacity to respond to difficult situations that may arise.

Relationship between Open Innovation and adaptability.

The advantage of the concepts open innovation and adaptability is that as well as being similar, they also feedback and need each other to work. In other words, open innovation is the order of the day in the business world, and if it is not yet, we must pay attention because soon it will be part of our daily lives. To implement open innovation, it is necessary to have a great capacity for adaptability to the working environment. That is why both disciplines are necessary for the future, which is just around the corner.

To understand the need to innovate and adapt to change, we must understand that these are processes that are fully accelerated by globalisation. Globalisation is a phenomenon that is vastly altering and transforming the landscape of large corporations. The disappearance of borders between countries, the decrease in transport and communication costs and the intensification of interactions between different countries facilitate companies’ access to new markets and accelerate the innovation process. Companies seek to innovate to expand their business and progressively reach different parts of the globe. Therefore, innovation within the company is an essential factor in maintaining its competitiveness, the growing rivalry unleashed by this globalising process. In the past, companies concentrated their activity in a single territory, today it is possible to invest, produce, innovate and market anywhere in the world regardless of the nationality of the company, thus turning the planet into a single market.

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Thus, while expansion into different countries forces companies to face the new challenges of globalisation, it is important to adjust the business strategy to a certain extent to the different territories. To do this, it is important to look at and understand the different cultures and traditions to detect opportunities for innovation that are adapted to the territory. To adapt is to survive.

Relationship between adaptability and Human Resources

The relationship between adaptability and Human Resources is another factor to highlight. By way of introduction, we can state that adaptability is one of the skills most sought after by human resources recruiters.

This tool is fundamental in the team and above all, it is a very important part of the good atmosphere in the company.

For a potential candidate, personnel selection is one of the steps that all potential candidates must pass and demonstrating an optimum capacity for adaptability considerably increases the chances of passing the selection process and even of joining the company or institution in question.

At the end of the day, companies want to find the perfect candidate and a person with great adaptability increases their value in the company and can learn faster.

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Implementation of adaptability.

Adaptability is now a quality that we must know how to implement in the European business fabric. Charles Darwin defined it very well when he said that it is not the strongest species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one that responds best to change.

We can apply the same phrase to companies: only those that are able to adapt to the characteristics of the environment will survive in the market.

There are six axes that are transforming the working environment as we have known it up to now. Their importance is pushing us to modify not only the tools we use or the workspaces, but also our attitudes. It is therefore worth bearing them in mind:

1. Process automation
2. Emerging professions
3. Greening
4. New models of work
5. Increasing ageing of the population
6. Mental health and emotional well-being