Human resources as fundamental element determining the development of innovation

The issues of innovation and innovativeness have been addressed by a number of papers, both theoretical and those including research results. However, there are few studies devoted to the analysis of factors determining innovation. According to the Author, human resources are one of its key elements. This was the premise for taking up reflections in this paper on innovation in the context of its main determinant, i.e. human resources. Innovation is one of the most important directions of the Union’s policy and is supposed to be a basis of EU Member States’ lasting economic growth and improvement of economic and social conditions. In view of the above, the paper adopts the countries of the European Union as the subject matter of analyses and particular emphasis is given to Poland. The paper’s main purpose is to assess the level of human capital – a fundamental element determining the development of innovation – in Poland against the background of the European Union countries. The paper also sets detailed objectives: an assessment of the innovation level in Poland against the countries of the European Union using the European Summary Innovation Index (SII) and the Global Innovation Index (GII); an assessment of the level of human capital in the context of innovation in Poland against the European Union countries using components of the SII; an assessment of the level of human capital in the context of innovation in Poland against the European Union countries using components of the GII; an assessment of the level of human capital in the context of innovation in Poland against the European Union countries using components of the Human Resources for Science and Technology (HRST) with its components. The research methodology involves statistical analyses. The paper uses innovation-related indices (SII, GII and HRST) and their components allowing the measurement of the human resources factor. The comparative analyses were based on descriptive distribution characteristics. Also, grouping of countries was performed adopting the EU average as the classification criterion. The geographical scope of the analyses includes 28 countries of the European Union (EU-28). The time horizon of the analyses covers the years 2010-2016. The year in which the European Commission presented the proposal of the Europe 2020 strategy was adopted as the beginning of the analyses. The analysis of the development of the SII and the GII shows significant diversification of the European Union countries in the level of innovation. The leaders include mainly the countries of Northern Europe. A similar trend is seen when assessing the EU countries in terms of the development of the human factor as a fundamental element determining the development of innovation. It is significant that most of the EU states both in 2010 and 2016 were classified in the same groups specifying the level of innovation as well as the level of human resources constituting a fundamental element determining the development of innovation. Polish economy features a low level of innovation-related indicators as well as human resources indicators in the context of innovation, both in comparison to EU innovation leaders and EU countries with a similar level of economic development, i.e. the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovenia.