Measuring innovation in services

After having recalled the difficulty of measuring innovativeness in general, this entry addresses the issue of measuring innovativeness in the service, or tertiary, sector. The latter is highly heterogeneous, and such heterogeneity helps explain why measuring innovativeness within it is so difficult. Given that services are intangible activities that, as a rule, are produced and consumed simultaneously and cannot be stored, traditional manufacturing indicators can tell only part of the story. In order to have a clearer picture, non-technological indicators of innovativeness (e.g., new marketing methods) must thus be considered. The role of ICTs in services is also stressed. The entry refers to the latest theoretical and applied tools made available through the fundamental OECD-Eurostat Oslo Manual which have led to the reshaping of the (leading) large-scale Community Innovation Survey.