Innovation
ARTICLES

Authors and thought leaders, submit your scholarly and informative articles about innovation. Add them to your Innovative People profile, or submit them independently. Add original articles, or link to content already available on the internet.

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Unsuccessful Open Innovation

Nov-05-13. By Stefan Lindegaard

There are lots of stories about successful open innovation initiatives, but we do not really hear much about those that fail. I see three key reasons for this: 1) Lack of willingness to share failures, 2) Open Innovation is a never-ending process, 3) Copanies have not even started their open innovation journey.

Innovate Out of Your Comfort Zone

Oct-30-13. By Jeffrey Phillips

I notice a pattern emerging this week. A consistent set of blogs that examine what executives and managers get backward about innovation. It's interesting, actually. As a consultant who is regularly planning and leading innovation projects, it can be a bit disconcerting to see how often well-meaning teams get things almost exactly wrong.

Many managers are too willing to innovate that which they understand and are familiar with, and ignore what is new, unusual or uncertain. Further, many firms innovate around internal capabilities or technologies rather than based on customer expectations or needs. What this leads to is a constant "doubling down" on existing capabilities, features or technologies, rather than an introduction of new capabilities or features.

Technology Wave Drives the Screen Content Explosion

Oct-24-13. By Edward Frauenheim

Earlier this year Steven Spielberg and George Lucas predicted the collapse of most megabudget movies and the end of Hollywood as we know it. What gets less attention, though, is HOW motion picture production is being turned upside down. More than a million screens are coming to worldwide consumers each day. Film and content producers are using all electronic production tools; they are producing and distributing internationally; the content is built to be played on phones/tablets, DVD’s, on TV screens, and in theaters - - - all in numerous languages. The shift to a new paradigm is more momentous than is generally recognized. And it is setting the stage for a new, decentralized cast of characters, companies and investors that will “make it big” in what might be called the era of the “screen-buster.” One firm is leading the way in this content explosion, the Ford Movie Group. It is producing quality films and content employing virtually all of the new capabilities. It has demonstrated the effectiveness of the new techniques with 7 films in various stages of production.

Entering the Zone of Innovation Uncertainty

Oct-22-13. By Paul Hobcraft

Today we grapple with more uncertainty than ever before. For many of us this is the time of year when planning out the future becomes more ‘top of mind’. These are moments where we have to stop chasing the daily numbers, pushing the immediate projects that are in the pipeline and turn our attention to laying out our future plans. Sadly we often make a poor ‘stab’ at this thinking through process; we don’t get our thinking into the right mental frames.

The problem for management is anything discussing the future enters the ‘zone of uncertainty’ and this ability to often ‘read the tea leaves’ can very much determine the future health and direction of the organization. Ignore these shifts or signals and you are on the path to your own ‘destruction’.

Top Innovation Secrets

Oct-21-13. By Henra Mayer

Being successful at innovation is a skill. One that takes time, patience, strategic intelligence and amongst other things, funding. Many organisations succeed only after they have experienced embarrassing failures and learnt some tough lessons in the process. How do others succeed with their innovation efforts? What is the secret? In this article we use the inspiring philosophy of Steve Jobs as stimulus and ask innovation managers about their “secret sauce for innovation success”. Learning from others reduce risk because resurrecting the organisational “innovation corpse” is not an action anyone should be tasked with.

Protection versus Connection: An Open Innovation Mindset

Oct-02-13. By Stefan Lindegaard

Even though, the open innovation movement is more than 10 years old, we still see people who are more concerned about protecting their assets rather than connecting them with others in order to create more opportunities faster.

It seems as if we still have to remind ourselves of this great qoute by Bill Joy: “Not all the smart people work for you.”

It All Began with Balls

Sep-27-13. By Mitch Ditkoff

Most companies begin on a shoe-string -- under-funded, under the gun, and under the radar. The company I co-founded in 1986, Idea Champions, was no exception.

Clearly, we'd have to do something different if we were going to distinguish ourselves from the 600 other companies vying for the same customers.

Open Innovation Collaboration puts New Demands on Leadership

Sep-24-13. By Caroline Örmgård

Anna Yström is now defending her thesis on how open innovation collaboration – the context in which different organisations meet and work together to create knowledge and innovation – can be led. For four years, she has closely studied SAFER, the vehicle and traffic safety centre where 25 organisations collaborate and conduct innovative activities. Anna argues that in work like this, another perspective on leadership and another way of enacting leadership than in traditional organisations are required. It also puts greater demands on everyone involved accepting the lack of clarity and the uncertainty that arises in these contexts.

Creating Employee Networks That Deliver Open Innovation

Sep-21-13. By Eoin Whelan, Salvatore Parise, Jasper de Valk and Rick Aalbers

A small number of “idea scouts” and “idea connectors” are disproportionately influential in producing successful open innovation outcomes. Smart companies make sure they are linked.

Bring Me Better Problems

Sep-20-13. By Stephen Shapiro

In life and in business, we are often told, “don’t bring me problems, bring me solutions.”

From my perspective, this is bad advice. I want people to bring me bigger and better problems. Or, as the fortune cookie I got last night (above) implied, if you don’t focus on the right question, the answers/solutions may be useless.

Unfortunately, most people continue to work on solutions to problems that don’t matter.

The Five Sense Guide to Inspiring Workplace Creativity

Sep-20-13. By Linda Naiman

This handy infographic by CIPHR.com captures the latest research on using sensory stimuli to enhance creativity. If you want to inspire workplace creativity, consider using these guidelines.

Managing Innovation Portfolios – Strategic Portfolio Management

Sep-15-13. By Dr. Ralph-Christian Ohr, Dr. Kevin McFarthing

Facing increasingly dynamic and unpredictable environments, firms are required to develop convenient innovation strategies, constantly adapt them to changing conditions and properly implement strategically aligned initiatives throughout their organizations. Innovation portfolio management (IPM) can act as the pivotal tool to translate strategic objectives and priorities into project-based innovation activities. Furthermore, it provides a framework to convert raw ideas into real investment opportunities, based on their risk profile.

The Contours of Crowd Capability

Sep-13-13. By John Prpic

In this work we use the theory of Crowd Capital as a lens to compare and contrast a number of IS tools currently in use by organizations for crowd-engagement purposes. In doing so, we contribute to both the practitioner and research domains. For the practitioner community we provide decision-makers with a convenient and useful resource, in table-form, outlining in detail some of the differing potentialities of crowd-engaging IS. For the research community we begin to unpack some of the key properties of crowd-engaging IS, including some of the differing qualities of the crowds that these IS application engage.

Leaders’ Dual Roles When Managing Innovation

Sep-10-13. By Leif Denti

Leaders have dual roles when managing innovation. In a bottom-up role, they stimulate innovative results as they facilitate ideas and initiative coming from individuals and teams. In a top-down role, leaders are the primary means for the organization to realize its innovation goals and strategies. A fundamental challenge is to balance these two roles.

Why Innovation Must Become Business as Usual

Sep-10-13. By Jeffrey Phillips

We've got to find a way to reduce corporate resistance to innovation, and remove or eliminate the inertia that many corporations retain. While successful companies may feel secure with existing products and market share, that security is a myth. Much of what the resistance and inertia is based on is on protecting a customer base and market share that is under constant attack. Taking a reactive mindset and resisting change is counterproductive. Good innovators already understand this and take the fight to the market through proactive innovation. Good innovators don't hunker down, defend share and resist innovation. On the contrary they attack adjacent markets and rework their products to keep competitors off guard and uncertain.

Using the Innovation Pipeline to Drive Growth & Address Failure

Sep-04-13. By Matt Hunt

For many business leaders, failure is a four-letter word. Traditional management theory has conditioned us to run our companies under the philosophy that failure isn’t an option.

Often times with failure comes punishment or even termination from the organization but as innovation leaders we know that failure is the more likely outcome. How can we rationalize these two radically distinct perspectives?
- See more at: http://www.innovationexcellence.com/blog/2013/09/04/using-the-innovation-pipeline-to-drive-growth-address-failure/#sthash.VFCTd4yQ.dpuf

Is Innovation Generational?

Sep-04-13. By Jeffrey Phillips

I've been thinking a lot about the reasons why innovation seems so important and pervasive, and equally so poorly implemented. Everywhere I go, executives are talking about the need for more innovation. Elected officials at the federal and state level praise innovation. CEOs and senior executives extoll the importance of innovation. Entrepreneurs talk about innovation as the lifeblood of their businesses. Yet for all the talk about innovation, there's a huge gap between what gets talked about and what gets done.

Shut Up In a Brainstorm for Better Results

Sep-03-13. By Gijs van Wulfen

The underlying assumption of brainstorming is that people are scared of saying something wrong. In a period where employees still were scared to speak up, brainstorming was experienced as revolutionary.

Since the fifties a lot of people have challenged the effectiveness of brainstorms.

The Innovator’s Temptations

Aug-29-13. By Matthew E. May

One of the most frequently asked questions I get is, “How can we unleash innovation all across our company?” Through the course of working with dozens of different organizations and teams, I’ve noticed four common traps that are all too easy to fall into, and nearly always get in the way of building a culture of constant innovation. I call them temptations, because they are the siren call to many an innovator. They're quite intuitive, and thus very hard to resist.

Innovation, Like Eggs, is Cheaper in the Country

Aug-23-13. By Gregg Fraley

Do you assume that broadband web access is nearly universal? It’s not. Millions of rural Americans have no, or quite poor, web access. Our government allocated part of the 2.9 billion in the stimulus package (The American Recovery and Reinvestment act of 2009) to solve this problem. For many, probably most rural Americans — this had no impact at all. This inequality of access has the USA ranking 26th in the world. In Internet access! And we’re slipping.

This does not bode well for USA innovation.

Stakeholder Co-Creation: The Firm as an Orchestrator in Innovation Projects

Aug-22-13. By Kande Kazadi, Annouk Lievens, Dominik Mahr

A growing number of firms have realized that their innovation goals cannot be fully satisfied solely through their internal resources. Consequently, managers are increasingly supplementing their internal innovation efforts by tapping into the knowledge of external collaborators, taking an open innovation perspective (Chesbrough, 2003, Elmquist et al., 2009).

Traditionally, these external collaborators consisted of one type of external stakeholder, often other firms or customers. Nowadays, the sources of innovation are changing. Other types of stakeholders, such as competitors, activists and special interest groups have become active, well-informed and interconnected partners for innovation.

Who Innovates: Creating the Innovation Culture with Geniuses, Leaders & Champions

Aug-21-13. By Langdon Morris

Organizations that are successful at innovation naturally develop a strong innovation culture. But supposing an innovation culture doesn’t yet exist in your organization. Then how can you develop it?

Separating Entrepreneurs from Corporate Innovators

Aug-19-13. By Jeffrey Phillips

It's probably a distinction without a significant difference, but I try to distinguish very carefully between entrepreneurs, inventors and corporate innovators. While there are some significant overlaps in goals, purpose and intent, there are also some very significant differences which I'd like to explore.

Could Electric Cars Threaten the Grid?

Aug-16-13. By Kevin Bullis

Plugging in an electric vehicle is, in some cases, the equivalent of adding three houses to the grid. That has utilities in California—where the largest number of electric vehicles are sold—scrambling to upgrade the grid to avoid power outages.

Electric cars being sold today can draw two to five times more power when they’re charging than electric cars that came on the market just a couple of years ago.

25 Ways to DISRUPT!

Aug-15-13. By Matthew E. May

Using the real life stories of not only well-known business figures and founders, but also everyday innovators who have created everything from a Craigslist for people with disabilities to a Pakistani school for young boys who had been indoctrinated into the Taliban, Bill Jensen's interviews offer an inside look at the character of some of today’s greatest change makers.

Can You Spare an Innovation Dime?

Aug-13-13. By Jeffrey Phillips

Because of efficiency and effectiveness, and their cohorts in crime, Lean, Six Sigma, downsizing, outsourcing and right sizing, most organizations run today on the bleeding edge of staffing efficiency. This means that the bottom line in most corporations looks good, and the top line is often stagnant. Firms have placed so much emphasis on efficiency and cost cutting that there's little time, focus or resource to think about growth.

The Next Network

Aug-12-13. By Don Snyder

I’m on record with several groups of people on what I think the next big thing in social media will be, and in my opinion the next “big” thing will be small.

I think people will grow weary of vast networks of “Friends” and “Connections” that aren’t really personal friends (Facebook) nor true business connections (LinkedIn), and seek out a place where they can create an ultra-closed network of ultra-close people they really care about and really do business with.

Balancing Innovation via Organizational Ambidexterity – Part 2

Aug-11-13. By Frank Mattes, Ralph-Christian Ohr

The challenges for innovation management are mounting: convergence of industries, shortening product life cycles, explosion and globalization of knowledge, rising importance of business model innovation, increasing impact of internet-based social networks are just a few of the megatrends that generate new realities for innovation managers.

These new realities require innovation leaders to find out how exploration and exploitation can be run simultaneously and balanced concurrently. In theory, there is also the concept of a consecutive balancing in which a firm “switches” between exploration and exploitation. From a practitioner’s perspective, however, this is not a real option since the management of the switching cycles is overly complex and the whole approach is too sluggish to adapt to swiftly changing conditions.

The Value of Innovation and Quality Training

Aug-09-13. By Jeffrey Phillips

Even people with deep experience need to refresh their skills. As we say in innovation circles, it's a journey not a destination. That is, even people who have years of experience can learn something new to apply if they are willing to open up their minds. Developing skills and extending or refining skills and knowledge is vital, especially as we are increasingly in a knowledge based economy. Training is vital - in quality or in innovation, but the depth and type of training in these fields rapidly diverge.

10 Ways to Select Ideas

Aug-02-13. By Tim Kastelle

Innovation is the process of idea management:

Of course, you need ideas. But once you have them, you have to select which ones are most promising because we never have enough time and resources to execute them all. And we do have to execute – that’s a critical step.

Throw Out Your First 10 Ideas

Jul-26-13. By Don Synder

Whenever I facilitate a brainstorm session for an organization, I follow a rule of having all the participants in the room scribble down every single idea they can think of within the first 5-10 minutes – and then throw them all away.

There are three reasons I do this.

Why Does Innovation Take Longer Than Expected?

Jul-24-13. By Phil McKinney

During a recent meeting where team members provide updates on their innovation projects, one of the project leads pushed back when I challenged the team to “go faster”. So what should you do when you feel your patience is waning on a project?

When we loose our patience, we exhibit worry and anger. If we are the boss, we have a tendency to want to jump in to the project and start micromanaging. Innovation takes longer than you expect. Get used to it.

The Top 5 Idea Enrichment Issues

Jul-22-13. By Ron Shulkin

Idea Enrichment is a must have step for Disruptive Innovation.

The review of ideas is an important step in the ideation process. Crowdsourcing a topic will yield lots of contributions. You’ll end up with a ranked list of ideas. But are they of any value? The trick is to take the very best or winning ideas and THEN look very critically to see if they’ll fly.

Mind the Gaps in Innovation

Jul-22-13. By Paul Hobcraft

Innovation nearly always suffers some form of “mind the gap” and yet we tend to ignore the obvious and stumble into these gaps or fail to recognize them completely. These ‘gaps’ comes in so many different ways and guises.

We are in a need to constantly “mind the innovation gaps”, these are everywhere.

Ideas Are Not Innovations

Jul-17-13. By Matthew E. May

I'm constantly amazed at how often I see people confusing an idea with an innovation. The difference becomes quite clear once you've run a few experiments with some element of the idea.

But there's the rub: Most people struggle to understand what they must do when it comes to testing an idea. In fact, they struggle with the idea of trying to fail early in order to succeed later. Instead, they assume their idea is a good one (it usually isn't), craft a business plan (which holds little relevance in today's disruptive environment), run some numbers (mostly fantasy resting on a leap of faith assumption) and seek investment capital to run with it.

Innovation is a Practice

Jul-08-13. By Tim Kastelle

We have our innovation metaphors all wrong. Too many of them relate to point where we make the creative connection between ideas: the flash of inspiration
the eureka moment, a stroke of genius, and so on.

All of this makes us think that innovation is an event. But it’s not – innovation is a process.

Measuring Open Innovation – 3 Key Principles to Improve Your Innovation Measurement Practices– Part 1

Jun-23-13. By Marc Erkens, Susanne Wosch, Dirk Luttgens and Frank Piller

Obviously, since innovation by nature is a non-routine, creative and unpredictable task, metrics might seem like something for the Controller-nerds, rather than a common skill that is central to the innovator’s DNA. And while many argue that too much measurement stifles innovation, it still remains key for the survival of every business. Assessing progress and measuring the impact of your innovation activities enables you to change your strategy before mistakes become expensive or great ideas are refused. While the development of innovation metrics in general is still an emerging discipline, there is absolutely no clear guidance on how companies should approach them in order to measure the success of their open innovation initiatives. Anyway, in these times of fast changes, there is actually a good chance that the ‘old’ systems you set out to measure innovation won’t match the challenge you’re going to face when piloting the new and emerging trends of open innovation.

Could Your Innovation Failure Be Innovation Progress?

Jun-16-13. By Phil McKinney

Is innovation failure a contradiction? Innovation leaders and analysts say no. Venture Capitalist and Forbes writer Henry Doss observes that “…failure is a feature of highly innovative organizations….[T]here is a strong correlation between failure and innovation.” According to Doss, in a culture which is open to risk and experimentation, “[t]he paradigm is not one of failure, but one of frequency of trial.”

How to Breed an Innovative Company Culture

Jun-10-13. By Amanda Ciccatelli

As of late, innovation has become the corporate buzzword because it’s one of the biggest mysteries to business leaders. But, you can’t force innovation to happen. Instead, it’s about how you shape your corporate environment so that innovation is possible.

A new study from Accenture, “Why Low Risk Innovation Is Costly,” revealed that less than one in five chief executives believes their company’s strategic investments in innovation are paying off, while half said their companies were less likely to risk implementing breakthrough ideas. So, what are these unsuccessful CEOs and their people doing wrong with their strategic investment in innovation?

Should You Take That Innovation Job?

May-27-13. By Scott Anthony

You've been working at a small start-up for a while now when a large, deep-pocketed corporation comes knocking, asking you to join its innovation team. Should you take the job? Will this be the chance to exercise your entrepreneurial imagination in a more secure environment with ample assets? Or will you end up drowning in bureaucracy, pining for the white-knuckled start-up pace you're used to?

We have similar concerns whenever we consider accepting an innovation engagement.

The Logical Limits of Product Innovation

May-17-13. By Jeffrey Phillips

Innovation isn't stalled because we've run out of ideas or out of steam. There's a deeper issue at stake. Innovation appears stalled in many industries because the product or service has reached its point of diminishing marginal returns for innovation. In other words, for many products and services, the next big innovation will be a significant disruption. You can tell when this is true by watching what is being "innovated" - the base product, or other ancillary features.

Innovation: a Case for Entitlement (really!)

May-13-13. By Deborah Mills-Scofield

This article speaks about the growing sentiment of the new generation of feeling entitled to try to change the world and argues that this feeling of entitlement is a necessary ingredient to future innovation.

Leading an Innovative Company

May-06-13. By Jeff Dyer, Hal Gregersen

Having a reputation as an innovator is the ‘holy grail’ in business today. Leaders and companies want to be seen as innovative, and be tied to the many associations that come with it: creative, marketing leading, cutting edge. Leading business publications including Forbes, Fortune and Fast Company celebrate and publish an annual list of companies they consider innovative.But what is it to be innovative, and how do leaders foster it within their company culture?

Thought Walk

Apr-30-13. By Michael Michalko

The value of taking a thought walk whenever you are looking for new ideas.

Why is Success so Hard to Sustain?

Apr-23-13. By Robert F. Brands

Most Innovation research is focused on Product Performance. We as consumers admire the latest gadget, and seek to attain the “next big thing”. Innovation leaders and inventors often pursue innovations at the higher tiers of their markets because this is what has historically helped them succeed. However, according to Doblin’s research, there are more opportunities to create competitive advantage in the other types of innovation. In many cases these innovations may be more cost effective, and can even generate a higher rate of return.

Getting a Better Return on Your Innovation Investment

Apr-22-13. By Ben Thuriaux, Anders Johansson, Rick Eagar

So you’re convinced that investing in innovation is a good thing to do but you’re not sure that you are getting good value from your investment. You’ve seen over a dozen articles on innovation in the last year alone – typically these focus on a few iconic examples (such as Apple, eBay, or P&G) – but some of the advice is conflicting and you wonder how applicable it really is to your industry. You might be thinking that some of your innovation management practices need improvement but there seems to be little empirical evidence or reliable benchmarks about what really does and doesn’t work.

Arthur D. Little’s 8th Global Innovation Survey can help you address these problems. We’d like to share some initial findings with you and invite you to benchmark yourself against your industry peers.

Innovation Challenge: Your Market is Never Stable

Apr-15-13. By Tim Kastelle

Your market is never stable. One dangerous assumption that organisations make is that they know what market they are in, and that this will remain stable. Information technology is wreaking havoc on traditional industry boundaries. John and I visited a research lab for an engineering company last week, and it was very clear from the projects that they are working on that the firms that will win in this traditionally very conservative industry will be the first ones to become fully knowledge-based. As projects get more complex and more expensive, managing the flow of data becomes increasingly important.

Learning to see the Whole Elephant in Innovation

Apr-03-13. By Jeffrey Phillips

We, today, are a lot like the blind men when it comes to innovation, especially when we are focused on discovering new customer needs and expectations. In many discussions about what "customers" want, it often seems like we have a group of learned blind men who know only their particular perspective. Some speak about EXISTING customers and their needs. Some speak about POTENTIAL customers and their needs. Some speak about the firms internal CAPABILITIES and TECHNOLOGIES, as if this matters. Some talk about future SCENARIOS and TRENDS that may occur. Some talk about specific SEGMENTS of customers, ignoring others. Some will talk about what they believe to be true, not what customers have told them. In the end, many clients often have very narrow, segmented and biased interpretations of customer needs, often influenced by current market conditions and the existing capabilities of the business, rather than what they've learned by interacting with customers.

How to Get Ideas Quickly

Mar-28-13. By Michael Michalko

A checklist of questions designed to generate a lot of ideas quickly and easily

Scenarios for Anticipatory Intelligence and Innovation Competition

Mar-25-13. By Alireza Hejazi

Why are some companies better at using anticipatory intelligence to generate innovation than others? And more importantly, how will that intelligence be distributed to enhance innovation competitions? Responding to these questions, four scenarios are suggested below.

The evolving nature of futures studies forces us to rethink how foresight is being used for mitigating approaching "tsunamis." That rethinking not only embraces our functional prospects, but also addresses heuristic aspects of foresight as a profession. One of those heuristic features is anticipatory intelligence. Anticipatory intelligence is defined as "an oft-cited rationale for conducting foresight that provides background information and an early warning of recent developments. (UNIDO a & b, pp. 23, 228)"

Idea Rallies Yield Breakthrough Thinking

Mar-18-13. By Paul Arnold

IdeaConnection develops a new model of open innovation to generate breakthrough thinking and solve problems. Crowdsourcing is a powerful engine that can fuel better problem solving, faster innovation, and novel thinking. It is defined as “the practice of obtaining needed services, ideas, or content by soliciting contributions from a large group of people and especially from the online community rather than from traditional employees or suppliers.”

What is Crowdsourcing?

Mar-18-13. By Paul Arnold

Crowdsourcing gathers new ideas and information from large groups of people via the Internet. It is often defined as tapping the collective intelligence of the public to perform business-related tasks that a company would otherwise do itself or outsource to a third party.

Crowdsourcing is based on the belief that more people working together are smarter than one individual. The term is an aggregation of two words ‘crowd’ and ‘outsourcing’.

Thinking innovation

Mar-15-13. By Marc Worth

Senior management at companies large and small pay lip-service to innovation, but in my experience a genuine commitment to innovation is still hard to identify – and the individuals with the truly innovative ideas have to secure the support of their senior management to progress those ideas.

How do you make it happen? Some companies are now using crowd-sourcing techniques internally to draw on the knowledge and innovatory capabilities of their own teams.

An Interrelationship between Democracy and Development

Mar-13-13. By Moshiur Rahman

Democracy is a universally recognized ideal based on values common to people everywhere regardless of cultural, political, social or economic differences. Development is multi-dimensional and ever changing. Modernization theory holds that the conversion to democracy is an inevitable result if economic development has no significant effect on the rate of change to democracy. Even so, high income countries are more likely to be more democratic one other factor is taken into account.

Innovation: Harnessing 3.8 Billion Years of R&D

Mar-06-13. By Andrea Meyer

If you’re stuck on how to solve a problem, see if nature has already solved that problem. Nature has already solved many challenges; the best solutions have survived and improved through evolution.

Architect Mick Pearce collaborated with engineers at Arup Associates to design a mid-rise building in Harare, Zimbabwe, called Eastgate, that has no air-conditioning, yet stays cool.

Brainstorming: Innovation's Punching Bag

Mar-01-13. By Jeffrey Phillips

I don't hold a particular brief for or against brainstorming. But we should consider it in its context. Brainstorming is a tool for generating ideas. You can choose to like and enjoy brainstorming, or you can choose to generate ideas using hundreds of other creativity and idea generation tools. But that's all SCAMPER or brainwriting or mind mapping or any of hundreds of other potential aids are - just tools. And tools used with insufficient preparation or for the wrong application or by an inexperienced user are often blamed for the outcomes.

Convincing SMEs that Innovation Management Matters

Feb-25-13. By Eva Diedrichs

SMEs are perceived as the back-bone of most economies in Europe. Therefore, a lot of programs have been launched to support their growth. Over the past years, offering innovation support has become popular, complementing the well-known start-up financing and technology transfer programs. Despite the above, there is a level of dissatisfaction regarding the impact of these services.

Most SMEs have other priorities than innovation management. Therefore, the main concern is not how to introduce innovation management to SMEs, but what prevents the SME manager from sleeping at night. It is the challenge to find and retain new customers. It is the question of how to cope with the price pressure from low-cost countries.

Future Proofing: Ten Ways Big Companies are Staying Agile

Feb-15-13. By Jeremiah Owyang

A CEO of a new startup in Silicon Valley confided in me over beers that he said it’s easy for startups to disrupt big companies as they’re so busy internally fighting themselves. He’s right, I mostly see companies in internal battles and struggles over resources and power, leaving them exposed to outside startups. Coincidently, may of the startups I see disrupting large companies are composed of ex-employees who recombine as they know the weaknesses to exploit these larger companies, damning! To stay Future Proof, I’m seeing at least ten trends larger corporations are applying in the last year to stay lean and agile.

The Supremacy of Innovation

Feb-11-13. By Naseem Javed

Corporations engaged in innovation and seeking image supremacy must embrace both sides of the equation: the hard asset issues, like productions, material and costs along with soft asset issues, like vision, creative ideas combined with hidden talents blended with desires and emotions.

There is a serious lack of three dimensional modeling for soft issues, like innovative thinking and the dimensions of the core vision itself enveloping all production issues. These image supremacy rules challenge current methods and offer checklists to assess the need of newer, softer and special agenda-centric approaches.

The Realization of Personalized E-Learning platform based on 3G Mobile phone and NGN control frame work for SIP based IP Netwo

Feb-08-13. By Abdul Wahab

NGN core flexibility, its subject to adoption and the rapid growth in the personal mobile devices led to rapid growth in
mobile based services as mobile E- Learning. The personalized E-Learning service is proposed based on J2ME , it is
integrated with open source IMS control frame work for user management, session establishment using SIP protocol and
Multimedia learning content delivery like voice, video, whiteboard sharing using RTP and RTSP. The proposed E-Learning
platform comprises on four layers user agent layer (3G mobile phone, J2ME based SIP learning and teaching agent
application software), access layer (3G UMTS, Wi-Fi, GPRS), Data communication layer (SIP signaling, XML data
exchange between mobile client and Application server) and E- Control and Management layer (IMS control functions,
HSS, Learning content application servers ). This personalized E-Learning provides opportunity for learners and teachers to
learn, teach and control management everywhere.

Where Open Innovation Stumbles

Jan-28-13. By Andy Zynga

When I urge managers in a company to make open innovation part of their innovation strategy, they get it conceptually. They see that a solution coming from outside is more likely to be a dramatic leap versus an incremental one—simply because it came from a mind not narrowed by conventional thinking. They understand that the infusion of fresh ideas can also open their own R&D engineers and technologists to new and different possibilities and cause them to push their thinking further. At a minimum, they agree that better solutions tend to emerge when there are more options to consider in the first place.

Innovation Ignition

Jan-24-13. By Jeffrey Phillips

I read a lot about innovation, and I'm constantly amused by the articles that talk about "kick starting" innovation. If there is one activity that is resistant to forward motion based on one quick action like a kick start, it's innovation. What people who advocate "kick starting" innovation don't understand is the analogy, and the effort involved before the fact.

Innovation is a reason to Re-shore

Jan-23-13. By Paul Sloane

A recent special report in the Economist highlights a growing trend among American and European companies; they are bringing back work which was previously offshored or outsourced to cheaper locations. Offshoring means moving work and jobs outside of the country in which the company is based; outsourcing means giving work to outside companies. The process of bringing the work back is known as re-shoring.

GM, Raising the Innovation Sting Ray

Jan-21-13. By Gregg Fraley

Why does it take a near death experience to wake some companies up?

I guess there is an innovation equivalent to a drunk hitting bottom. If only the drunk could see where they are headed — maybe they could avoid the hard fall into the gutter.

Case in point: General Motors. GM hit bottom, and, the good news, they’re in recovery.

The lesson here is not to wait until you’re bankrupt to innovate. It’s a simple point but profoundly difficult for some organizations to do. It’s a culture thing. If the culture doesn’t encourage and implement exciting innovation, they are that drunk headed for the gutter. Is that your organization? Take steps, and drastic ones, now, if that’s the case.

Four Key Issues in Innovation Management

Jan-14-13. By Ralph-Christian

Sustainable innovation cannot be achieved by one-size-fits-all and one-sided approaches. It requires a common understanding of what innovation is, classifying concepts in order to assure individual assessments as well as differentiated approaches for firms to strengthen their innovation capabilities and performance. Further, innovation is about balancing complementary, and often opposing, variables. Therefore, integrative frameworks may help to gain a more holistic perspective and direction of impact.

The Theory of Crowd Capital

Jan-11-13. By John Prpic

We are seeing more and more organizations undertaking activities to engage dispersed populations through Information Systems (IS). Using the knowledge-based view of the organization, this work conceptualizes a theory of Crowd Capital to explain this phenomenon. Crowd Capital is a heterogeneous knowledge resource generated by an organization, through its use of Crowd Capability, which is defined by the structure, content, and process by which an organization engages with the dispersed knowledge of individuals – the Crowd. Our work draws upon a diverse literature and builds upon numerous examples of practitioner implementations to support our theorizing. We present a model of Crowd Capital generation in organizations and discuss the implications of Crowd Capital on organizational boundary and on IS research

China – Hotbed of Innovation for our Planet in the 21st Century?

Jan-09-13. By Georges Haour

Never has the world witnessed a large market emerge so quickly as China has. As the economy grows it is also changing. China is fast climbing the value curve, transitioning from low-cost manufacturing to innovation-led growth. In telecommunications, supercomputing, life sciences, non-fuel energy sources and “green-tech” in general, there is already a vibrant innovation/research and development (R&D) scene.

Driving Innovation by Corporate Venturing: How to Master Governance and Culture Challenges

Jan-07-13. By Joachim von Heimburg

Corporate venturing is becoming an important tool for big companies to complement internally driven innovation activities. However, becoming a serious player in corporate venturing requires governance principles and creates cultural dynamics which do not fit into existing corporate environment easily. This article discusses those challenges in detail and suggests ways how to deal with them.

The Role of Education and Learning for Innovation

Dec-27-12. By Paul Hobcraft

I have to be clear here, I am becoming increasingly frustrated by the lack of advancement in our understanding of innovation. Today we have a real challenge, all of us, in boosting our capacity for innovation. We need to achieve this ‘boost’ as the outcomes we will gain are both economic and social in their potential value. We need to move beyond the existing and tackle the blockages to the preferred, when it comes to innovation achievements.

50 Ways to Foster a Sustainable Culture of Innovation

Dec-10-12. By Mitch Ditkoff, Val Vadeboncoeur

Want a culture of innovation? Choose a few of the following guidelines and make them happen. If not YOU, who? If not NOW, when?

Managers are for Efficiency, Leaders are for Innovation

Dec-03-12. By Jeffrey Phillips

...the top down, command and control organization is rapidly becoming a thing of the past. First, it takes too long for commands to filter down through the organization, so the responsiveness of a top down command and control organization is limited, when the environment is changing rapidly. Second, the executives and leaders rotate through jobs and positions like a roulette wheel, in one slot and then on to another slot every two to three years. This lack of longevity in any role doesn't create much stability or desire for long term change. Third, most workers in large organizations have far more training and education than their forebears, and are able to make informed decisions, if they are informed of the goals of the organization.

Innovation Sighting: Music That Morphs Using Attribute Dependency

Nov-26-12. By Drew Boyd

The Attribute Dependency Technique tends to produce innovations that are smart. They seemingly know when to adjust or change in response to a change in something else. It is one of five techniques of the SIT innovation method, and it accounts for a majority of new product innovations.

Navigating the Intellectual Property Roadblocks to Open Innovation

Nov-26-12. By Peter von Dyck

OVERVIEW
In an effort to incorporate outside sources of innovation into their new product acquisition programs, there has been a significant increase in the number of firms opening their organizational boundaries to external ideas. Over the past few years, large multinational companies such as Kraft, IBM and 3M have initiated active open innovation (OI) programs. The benefits to the organization of accepting new product ideas are lower research and development costs and the more rapid procurement of new products to fuel sales, and to the submitter, this can be financially rewarding if their idea is selected for product development or commercialization. Consumer products giant Procter & Gamble estimates that as many as 1.5 million researchers and scientists could contribute materially to the efforts of their own 7,500 researchers and scientists in corporate research and development. However, the economic benefits of open innovation can be diminished if organizations do not effectively manage the legal issues and logistical challenges that are presented. They include the quality/quantity of submissions, and once received, what is the most efficient way to process the submissions received?
To be successful, organizations must be able to effectively sort through the potentially high volume of idea submissions, identify and then select the few that hold the potential of a profitable return. In addition, In patent-centric industries where intellectual property (IP) serves as a necessary barrier to entry, USPTO (US Patent & Trademark Office) restrictions and other legal issues are now more pressing that ever. The America Invents Act, which was enacted in September 2012, can seriously complicate the OI process if not properly addressed.
In this paper we’ll examine the primary challenges of OI and outline how the introduction of web-based software tools can address these challenges. By integrating the best of the emerging OI practices, with a secure point of access on your corporate website, your organization will be able to deploy an IP safe portal through which to collect and manage the external submissions of new ideas, products and technologies.

Overcoming Resistance to Innovation

Nov-16-12. By Jeffrey Phillips

Well, there I've gone and said it. Yes, the title is about resistance to innovation. You may ask yourself, who is crazy enough to resist innovation? And the true answer is: all of us. Because while the result of innovation can be excellent new products and services, the implementation of innovation brings about the dreaded "C" word. Change. And believe me, any person, team or corporation is completely capable of resisting change. One reason innovation is difficult to do is the undeniable fact that innovation introduces change.

Innovation Balancing Act

Nov-12-12. By Robert Brands

There are many possible roads to innovation. Successful innovation means defining your own road. Much like Nik Wallenda’s walk across Niagra Falls, some of the best innovations come from stepping outside your own comfort zone and balancing the many different facets of innovation. The formula for success in innovation is about finding the middle ground, walking the tightrope between risk and innovation; between ideation and value creation. The Innovation Balancing Act.

Why a Common Language Matters for Innovation

Nov-02-12. By Jeffre Phillips

Innovation is a lot like the tower of Babel, only in reverse. A god-like leader, typically the CEO, requests, no demands, more innovation. And everyone in the organization runs off to "innovate" interpreting what innovation means and applying to their situation. This means that in any company several "innovative" things happen simultaneously:

- Old, tired ideas long in limbo are reframed as "innovative"
- Any small change to an existing product or service is labelled "innovation"
- A completely irrational, disruptive idea is justified on the basis that it is "innovative"
- Soon every thing is "innovative" and nothing is.

The Global Innovation 1000: Making Ideas Work

Oct-30-12. By Barry Jaruzelski, John Loehr, and Richard Holman

The early stages of innovation can be challenging. But Strategy&'s (formerly Booz & Company) annual study of R&D spending reveals that successful innovators bring clarity to a process often described as fuzzy and vague.

Every economic downturn comes with the same refrain: The world, we’re told, is losing its creative capacity, hurting our chances for a speedy recovery. Yet inevitably, when worries about innovation erosion surface, some company rises up with a great new product, technology, or service to prove the naysayers wrong. And all too often, observers simply fail to pay attention to the many companies that make successful innovation part of their regular practice — indeed, their operating model — in ways that don’t necessarily make big headlines.

Innovation and the Base Rate

Oct-29-12. By Drew Boyd

Understanding the base rate with a product's performance can lead to hidden insights and opportunities.

Why Environment Matters to Innovation

Oct-19-12. By Jeffrey Phillips

In this context, environment has several meanings. The first is obvious, the environment in which you work. Is the physical environment conducive to innovation? The second context is the intangible environment erected by your corporate culture. This creates barriers and limits to thinking, to risk and uncertainty. Does your intangible environment block innovation? The third context is an internal/external environment. How "far" does your environment reach? Do you have extensive interactions and networks with external partners, customers and prospects? The fourth context examines the fluidity of your environment. Does your organization have porous borders? Can you find a good idea or technology outside the boundaries of your organization and bring in "inside"?

56 Reasons Why Most Corporate Innovation Initiatives Fail

Oct-12-12. By Mitch Ditkoff

Innovation is in these days. The word is on the lips of every CEO, CFO, CIO, and anyone else with a three-letter acronym after their name. As a result, many organizations are launching all kinds of "innovation initiatives" -- hoping to stir the creative soup and differentiate themselves from their competition. This is commendable. But it is also, all too often, a disappointing experience. Innovation initiatives sound good, but usually don't live up to their expectations. The reasons are many.

Associations Unorthodox: Collaborate Everywhere

Oct-07-12. By Jeff de Cagna

Throughout most of the 20th century up to the present day, the headquarters office has been a visible symbol of association importance and success, as well as a proud showcase of organizational history. Yet while having a central location to house face-to-face staff and voluntary activity offers certain benefits, the association headquarters also can be the physical embodiment of the bureaucratic inertia and risk aversion that too often slows the pace of organizational progress, especially in the areas of strategy and innovation. Meanwhile, as previously mentioned, there are billions (and counting) of smartphones and tablet devices in use worldwide. As the adoption of these mobile tools accelerates, and new social work arrangements such as co-working grow more popular, associations will need to adapt to collaborate with highly connected “on the go” generations of stakeholders capable of interacting on the fly from everywhere, all the time.

When is the Best Time to ask your Team for Ideas?

Sep-25-12. By Ron Shulkin

You first have to come to accept the fact that some times are better than others to ask all of your smart people to spend time on collaboration. It may be as simplistic as putting aside some time for ideation (“Join us for innovation week!”). But human nature is a bit more complex and your organization can wring the creative juices out of your team more optimally under some conditions more than others. At least if we extrapolate from the social, psychological studies out there.

Why you can't multi-task innovation

Sep-14-12. By Jeffrey Phillips

When you are trying to innovate, especially when you are trying to create new ideas that are unique or different from what your organization normally does, you cannot multi-task, you cannot dilute your engagement or awareness. You cannot attempt to concentrate on day to day, routine tasks at the same time you are trying to create interesting new insights and ideas. Your brain doesn't work this way, and you will be pulled in the direction of your expertise and competence.

A Hybrid Method for Edge Continuity Based on Pixel Neighbors Pattern Analysis (PNPA) for Remote Sensing Satellite Images

Sep-12-12. By Abdul Wahab

Edge enhancement is derived from lack of accurate result from edge detection techniques. The image which is captured from long distances carries a lot of noise and blur which causes edge discontinuity. Although some novel algorithms which are based on cellular neural network, fuzzy enhancement and binary morphology have shown accuracy in order to obtain refined edge but still the problem of edge discontinuity arises. Eliminating discontinuity of edge a hybrid technique is proposed based on pixel neighbors pattern analysis PNPA. In the technique Canny operator for initial edge detection, PNPA operation for edge enhancement are performed for remote sensing satellite image successively. The visual and subjective evaluation shows that the proposed PNPA operation can effectively eliminate the influence of edge discontinuity which occurred due to noise and blurr in original captured image, as comparing to existing edge segmenting processes.

25 Reasons Why Nothing Happens After a Brainstorming Session

Sep-07-12. By Mitch Ditkoff

How many times have you participated in a brainstorming session, only to be underwhelmed by the utter lack of follow up?

Unfortunately, in most businesses, this is often the norm.

Here's why:

Innovation Infrastructure and Skills: In Search of a Few Good People

Sep-01-12. By Andy Beaulieu

What are the key roles and accompanying structures you need to drive innovation and creativity in your organization? In this article, Andy Beaulieu considers each role and the skills that are required to get innovation happening in a way that will actually benefit. He also shines a light on the important question of how roles need to be structured around teams and stakeholders.

Smart nation: building the national innovation system

Aug-29-12. By Tim Mazzarol

Few would deny that innovation is important to the prosperity and growth of the national economy. Around the world governments are keen to see more innovation occurring with the anticipation that this will boost economic activity. Since the 1980s attention has been given by governments to the enhancement of their country’s National Innovation System (NIS).

Create Your Own Definition of Innovation

Aug-20-12. By Jorge Barba

As part of my auditing process, one of the key questions I ask is: what was the most recent innovation in your industry?

Depending on how this question is answered, it will tell me a few things:

How this company both defines and perceives innovation
If they are focused on innovation
If they are keeping tabs on their respective industry

Turning Customer Intelligence into Innovation

Aug-20-12. By Scott D. Anthony

It’s a paradox of the information age. The glut of information that bombards us daily too frequently obscures true insight. Intelligence should drive better innovation, but unless it is strategically collected and used, it functions like a summer beach novel — an engaging distraction.

Why Make the Creative Choice?

Aug-13-12. By Gregg Fraley

I believe that one of the most fundamental choices a human being can make relates to creativity. The choice is: do I wish to be a creative person or not. It would seem to be a no-brainer, but it’s interesting that at least half of people I talk to make the choice to Not be a creative person.

Channeling Culture, Communications and Motivation for Innovation

Aug-06-12. By Andy Beaulieu

Knowing how difficult it is to change the culture in any organization, how can you align your company's culture to support creativity and innovation? In this article, we focus on four key cultural aspects you need to master if you want to drive innovation.

Innovation Isn't About New Products, It's About Changing Behavior

Jul-31-12. By Thomas M. Koulopoulos

Companies are not so much in the business of what we buy, but the way we act.
Behavior is the unknowable variable in every innovation, and it is the variable that most determines the opportunity a new business model has to evolve and take advantage of the new behavior.

10 Lessons on Growing Innovation from the "Davos for Doers"

Jul-27-12. By Victor W. Hwang

Last week, a remarkable thing happened. 400 people from 49 countries gathered in Silicon Valley for an ambitious vision.

They convened to do something that had never been attempted before: to reinvent the whole notion of economic growth, by shifting the focus from subsidizing individual projects to growing entire ecosystems of vibrant entrepreneurship and innovation. We call such systems Rainforests. And rather than just talk in the abstract, attendees actually worked on building real Rainforest solutions, in-person and in real-time. We literally watched hundreds of “Rainforest Makers” in action. It was like a Davos for Doers.

Ten Ways to Inhibit Innovation

Jul-24-12. By Ron Ashkenas

Every company is looking for the magic formula that will produce breakthrough products and services. But a better starting point is to think about what gets in the way of innovation, especially in firms that already have lots of talented, creative, and motivated people. In other words, by identifying and removing barriers, it might be possible to accelerate innovation simply by leveraging the capability that's already there.

Strategy and Leadership for Innovation: Making It Real, Urgent and Attainable

Jul-02-12. By Andy Beaulieu

Effective leadership with a clear focus on the organization's strategy is a key ingredient to successful innovation in your business. Andy Beaulieu considers the well-known and not so well-recognized aspects of leadership and strategy that could be holding up your organization's capacity to innovate.

Why This Decade will be the Most Innovative in History

Jun-26-12. By Vivek Wadhwa

Many people believe that we’ve run out of ideas and that the future will be one of bleak shortages of food, energy, and water. Billionaire Peter Thiel, for example, argues that, despite spectacular advances in computer-related fields, technological progress has actually stalled because the internal combustion engine still rules our highways, the cancer death rate has barely changed since 1971, and the top speed at which people can travel has ceased to improve.

Thiel is right about engines, speed, and cancer death rates. But he and the pessimists are completely wrong about what lies ahead. I don’t believe that the future holds shortages and stagnation; it is more likely to be one in which we debate how we can distribute the abundance and prosperity that we’ve created.

Why am I so optimistic? Because of the wide assortment of technologies that are advancing at exponential rates and converging. They are enabling small teams to do what was once only possible for governments and large corporations. These exponential technologies will help us solve many of humanity’s grand challenges, including energy, education, water, food, and health.

Far-Fetched Ideas Are Fun. But Innovation Usually Starts Small

Jun-26-12. By Daniel Sobol

Despite what New York Times editors might think, innovations aren't always way-out there ideas. Rather, they can be small, incremental changes that better people's lives. Innovation is about solving people’s problems in a way that’s meaningful to them in the context of their lives. It’s about finding ways to design services, products, and experiences that help people achieve their goals. It’s about making life better for people, on people’s terms, however they define what “better” means.

Why is Innovation so Often “Hit or Miss?”

Jun-25-12. By Greg McLaughlin

This question has baffled many executives for quite some time. Management tries to replicate the special event or circumstances that created a successful innovation project but often fails. Companies have created positions such as Chief Innovation officer, innovation teams, and organizational strategies that promote innovation through diversity, team dynamics, and social networking. However, failure rates of 90% are common when innovations occur due purely to chance. What distinguishes whether an innovation is hit or miss?

Natural Ways to Eliminate Nematodes in Soybeans

Jun-20-12. By Cris Diaz

Organic approach in controlling pest on agricultural plants is the latest in agriculture technology. The method is not only effective in controlling pest but ,likewise, improved productivity of crops. Aside from its environmentally-friendly approach, the organic method for sustainable agriculture is encourage by the Food and Agriculture Organization, an agency of economic and social council of the United Nations.

- The article tells on the possibility of controlling fungal infestation on soybean farming without using expensive chemical pesticides and fertilizers,
- Organic pesticide is the treatment of quality soybean seeds prior to germination,
- The method is commercially viable. Its raw materials are cheap and available.

14 Ways to Get Breakthrough Ideas

Jun-20-12. By Mitch Ditkoff

Is there anything a person can do – beyond caffeine, corporate pep talks, or astrology readings – to quicken the appearance of breakthrough ideas?

Yes, there is. And what follows are 14 catalysts ‐ simple guidelines, principles, and approaches that will help you on your way.

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