Full Team Engagement in the Innovation Culture
The possibility of innovation is born when people transcend the beliefs that limit their thinking, and engage in the search for new and better ways. When people are doing this consistently and throughout your organization, you will see a pattern begin to emerge which you will discover is the dawning of the innovation culture.
4 Tricks to Building a Successful Open Innovation Program
One of the most critical professional challenges that employees face today is being able to successfully manage positive change within their organization. Innovation has become a watch word, with so many divisions not being able to find enough valuable ideas and then successfully manage those ideas into a commercial offering that sometimes companies even respond to customer tickets and bugs and simply label those results as “innovation.”
Speed of Innovation – How to Master Rapid Prototyping
In the disciplined and structured process of innovation we search for unmet needs and unfulfilled desires, and when we think we find them we have to construct a sort of a mental map that defines why our proposed solution will be better than whatever currently exists. We may use the business model map to show how we’re using this innovation to move up and to the right, or we may use the customer value ladder to show how this innovation provides differentiated value. And once we’re convinced that our idea is a really good one, the next step is often prototyping.
Germany’s Innovation Jam
Is Germany loosing the connection to today’s speed of change? In his new book “Germany’s Innovation Jam – How we create a new generation of founders,” Author Jürgen Stäudtner looks at German innovation pitfalls and corresponding resolutions.
Innovation Stakeholder Management: Gain Success From My Failure
In the second article on innovation stakeholder management, Anthony Ferrier focuses on two examples where he tried to generate broad support for innovation efforts with varying degrees of success. The lessons learned from these experiences provide insights for practitioners to successfully navigate stakeholder relations.
4 Ways To Encourage Innovation In Your Startup Business
As the market becomes saturated, it becomes difficult for many businesses, especially startup enterprises, to stay on top of their competitions. Technology has paved a way for firms to revolutionize their marketing and management strategies. Another tried and tested way to infiltrate their specific markets successfully is to inspire innovation within their offices, from employees to their brand.
Becoming Agile Rapidly and Painlessly
To take advantage of today’s and tomorrow’s unique opportunities, and to rise above the intense existential challenges your firm will face in the months and years ahead, it will be supremely helpful and confer enormous advantages if your operations embody the Agile essence: quick, responsive, dynamic, innovative. You’ve got to learn to recognize opportunities and to act on them faster than your competitors do. In this chapter excerpt of Agile Innovation Langdon Morris explores what Agile means in detail, with a focus on the roots of the Agile movement and its many insights and implications for today’s organizations.
The Secret Sauce of Innovation
Could it be that today’s pervasive bad news, the news that causes everyone else to moan and complain—the economic malaise, the chaos that the digital revolution created, the impacts of outsourcing, political instability, global competition—can offer amazing opportunities to out- distance your competition? In this second chapter excerpt from the new book, Agile Innovation, Langdon Morris explores innovation-under-duress.
Starting at Sprint Zero: A Better Way to Innovate
How is Agile changing the world? Let’s begin with a bit of background. If you are new to Agile Software technique, then the term sprint zero, as used in the title of this chapter, may not mean much to you, but for Agile practitioners it means the initial phase of work where you sort the project out to make sure you start properly when you’re about to tackle a large programming endeavor.
Taxis vs. Uber: A Perfect Example of Resistance to Change
In cities all over the world an ugly war is being fought by “traditional” taxi companies against a new form of competition from Uber and other ride-sharing services. This article points out three things traditional taxi companies have in common with businesses of the past.
Paving the Path for Innovation Purpose and Closing the Alignment Gap
Defining the organizational purpose and promoting organizational alignment are two key factors for creating a culture that supports innovation. In this series of articles focused on Innovation Culture, we are going to share insights and cases of organizations that implemented innovation programs (and less structured initiatives) with the involvement of a wide range of managers and employees.
The One Word Answer to Why Innovation Fails
Innovation sounds easy, but it is not. The majority of enterprises report dissatisfaction with innovation performance. Three quarters of the CEOs of multinationals view external collaborative innovation as vitally important, but only half do it, and those only rate themselves as doing it ‘moderately well’. And remember - two thirds of organizational ‘change’ efforts fail. In case you are now asking yourself, why are these odds that low – we have a straightforward answer. It’s just one word.
It Works! The ‘Results Equation’
We are moved by goals. The resolve to reach the finish line pushes us forward: at work, in life. Why then do we keep idea management initiatives alive when it’s not clear what results they deliver (if any)? And how often have we yearned for a formula that definitely makes it all happen?
Seven Signs That Your Innovation Program is at Risk of Failure
There are plenty of examples of innovation program failure at large organizations. In this article, I examine the key markers that I have observed, that indicate a program may be in trouble and at risk of failure.
How to Build a High Performance Innovation Culture
Innovation is the mantra in leadership these days. Isolated innovation efforts abound. Still, most likely, your innovation program will fail, as many do. Not because you’re incapable of good innovation or because you’re lacking a mandate, but because you’ve probably overlooked some fundamental pre-requisites. Don’t worry, we have good news.
Mourning the Dead: Why You Should Have a Funeral after Killing Your Product
Pulling the plug on an in-flight project is hard. No one wants to be the person calling it quits, offending team members and admitting defeat. It is this mentality, however, that ends up sucking the life out of resources and budgets and setting the organization up for continued failure because the process is broken. How can you ensure only the right projects survive, wrong ones are killed early and lessons are celebrated after an appropriate mourning period? It’s going to take courage.
The Role of Top-Down Management in Enterprise Innovation
Running a successful enterprise innovation management program can be a challenging mission. Multiple factors have to be considered,each of which affect potential outcomes. One key aspect is the level of support an innovation program receives from an organization’s management. Connecting the needs of top-down management with the strategy and architecture of an innovation program will always lead to greater levels of success.
The Value of De-Risking Lies In the Process
Mitigating the high failure rate associated with entrepreneurial endeavour is something that concerns investors as well as potential entrepreneurs - “do I risk myself?” is a lurking question many ask of themselves or the person putting money on the table.
Brag about Your Failures
Many organizations in both the public and private sectors suffer from a corporate culture which is risk averse and fearful of failure. People are reluctant to try new things or even to suggest innovations. They remember old stories about colleagues being punished for experiments that failed. They have learnt that it is safest to keep a low profile and focus on standard operating procedures. Mean while the executive committee is desperately trying to think of ways to make the outfit more agile and innovative.
Top Innovation Secrets
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.
Disappointed By Innovation Results? It’s The Culture!
Though companies invest into innovation they like results less and less. There seems to be a glass ceiling for driving innovation, which neither new tools and processes nor innovation consultants seem to crack. It is time to face the elephant in the room: company culture and its impact on innovation performance. Top management needs to learn deal with it. Then company culture will become a driver of innovation rather than getting in the way.
Being the Chief Innovation Officer. Amy Radin, one of America’s first Chief Innovation Officers, Shares the Lessons
Amy Radin became one of America's first Chief Innovation Officers when Citigroup appointed her to the role in 2005. She is currently Chief Innovation officer at E*Trade Financial, the leading online discount stock brokerage. Amy talks to Innovation Management about what it takes to be a head up on innovation in a major corporation.
6 Ways To Commit Innovation Suicide
When starting innovation, a lot of the same mistakes are made over and over again. Here is how you can recognize and avoid them.
How to Shock Management into Rethinking the Business Model – Prove They can be Blindsided by a Fingerprint
Despite a detailed process with countless hours of work, and sincere efforts to take a longer-term, strategic look at where to play and how to win, many businesses fail to anticipate fundamental shifts that should cause them to rethink their entire business model. The results are often disastrous - too many businesses end up on life support. This article presents a new concept called “Competitive Fingerprints” that will allow readers to anticipate shifts and adapt their business model to capitalize on future market realities.