Crossing Boundaries: Toward Integrating Creativity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship Research Through Practice

In contrast to the siloed research domains of creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurship, where interdisciplinary barriers have largely prevented collaboration and integration, this article focuses on the inextricable, self-reinforcing linkages between the 3 and the productive exploitation of those linkages in both education and practice. In addition, an educational program designed to integrate creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurship in practice, called Innovation Quest, is described to illustrate how these domains can be and should be complementary. Emphasizing the capturing of market opportunity and value-laden outcomes, this experiential program has evolved over 16 operational years by continually integrating knowledge developed from each of these domains. Ideally, it is hoped that this discussion will serve as a catalyst to encourage creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurship researchers to work together. In so doing, they can exploit the intersection of these domains, particularly at the boundaries where the potential to expand knowledge is rife with opportunity, thereby moving us closer to integrating and benefitting both theory and practice.