Five Aspects of Innovation Governance
The leverage point is to let innovation shine via effective governance discipline, but not adding too much complexity. In this article, we'll look at what innovation governance is, and practices to help you manage a successful innovation program.
Do You Know Your Company’s Implementation Rate?
With the rise of the innovation department, numerous organizations are focusing their attention on their company’s ideation rate. A good ideation rate generally predicts other positive company health indicators: profitability, higher employee retention rates, reported customer success, but there’s another innovation health indicator that we think organizations should pay attention to: their implementation rate.
Start Here for Creative Leadership
How can leaders fight apathy or indifference in the workplace and create an environment where creativity and innovation can naturally flourish?
How to Combine Innovation with Lean and Six Sigma
Innovation never takes place in a vacuum cut off from other initiatives to improve performance. Doug Collins takes a look at how to team up with people in the Lean and Six Sigma processes.
Chinnovation – Unravelling the Dynamics of Chinese Innovation
Innovation in China—mystery or mastery? It is widely believed that China’s entrepreneur class has grown, and that their businesses are succeeding, primarily due to their knowledge of the domestic market, their quick adaptation to market changes, and their resourcefulness. What are the real secrets? Yinglan Tan, author of Chinovation, in an exclusive look at his upcoming book discusses....
How to Manage Both Incremental and Radical Innovation Projects in Parallel
This in-depth article provides you with fresh experiences and insights from how SCA, a consumer goods multinational company, has developed and worked with a new model for managing both incremental and radical innovation projects.
Chesbrough on Service Innovation
Henry Chesbrough has earned a worldwide reputation for his pioneering work on open innovation, influencing a generation of executives by identifying and describing the practice of innovating in collaborative groups outside the enterprise. We caught up with Henry to talk about his upcoming appearance at the European Innovation Conference and his new book.
Managing Information, People and IT to Improve Business Performance
How can companies acquire greater maturity in the use of information? Ground-breaking research reveals some answers. Following an ambitious program of “field” research – involving more than 1200 managers in more than 100 companies across 26 economic sectors and 40 countries – we at IMD have scientifically demonstrated a causal link between a company’s performance and its maturity with regard to its “information orientation” (IO)
The Case for Innovation and Talent Management
As globalization of the world economy continues and accelerates, we are beginning a process of fundamental change in organizational design that will take us to configurations we cannot yet fully imagine. However, we can already see enough to identify major opportunities for organizations that want to exploit the benefits of these changes, even as they unfold.
Innovation Lessons from Apple – Learn From a Modern Day Leader
In the face of increasing shifts in the world economy, and particularly increased competition across markets and company offerings, it would appear that one of the latest trends in instinctive strategic advice for companies is to become “more innovative!” Yet being more innovative is not necessarily easy. Learn more in this article by IMD professor Bill Fischer.
Forget your Customers and Develop Innovative Business Models!
Merely focusing on customers will not lead to groundbreaking changes in your business model. Instead, opportunities for business model innovation arise when focus is shifted to value creation for non-customers.
Convoy Model: The Dynamic Perspective of Porter’s Cluster Model
For some 20 years, regional and city based innovation and economic development policy focused on clustering, based on Michael Porter's (1990) Competitive Advantage of Nations. However, there are still those that are doubtful about whether clusters foster economic development. In this article an alternative is proposed: the convoy model. The evidence that clusters lead to successful inter-firm regional interaction is inconclusive. Is it time for a rethink?
Five Steps to Profitable Innovation
Innovation is one of the hottest topics in business these days. More and more, companies are coming out with new products and services designed to amaze their customers and get them to dig deeper into their pocketbooks. Only problem is, most of what passes for innovation these days doesn’t stand out as very new, different or compelling. As a result, most innovation efforts are lucky to pay for themselves, much less actually turn a profit.
Make Yourself Obsolete or Your Competitors Will
As history teaches us, maintaining the status quo may keep you in the money in the short term, but long term it can hurt your company and your industry. You have two choices: Make yourself obsolete, or your competitors will, warns Patrick Lefler.
From Blind Spots to Strategic Intelligence
Nothing breeds success like success, at least according to the old proverb. However, this is not always the case when it comes to business growth. Many organizations, from Polaroid to Sony, have become victims of their own success: they achieved enormous growth by introducing new products – the Polaroid camera, the Sony Walkman – but as the marketplace matured this growth slowed and they were left looking for alternative paths.
To Focus Employees on Innovation, Align Their Goals and Compensation
The ability to deliver new value requires systemic evolution in business strategy, culture, organizational design, and customer awareness. Employees can and will deliver new customer value, but the way they are paid and directed must change first and then the results will follow.
Use co-creation to drive public sector innovation
Creating new solutions with people, not for them, can help drive radical innovation in the public sector. By focusing on citizens’ own experiences and resources, co-creation can help identify truly valuable services. Public managers should embrace co-creation to deliver better services and outcomes at less cost.
Strategically Engaging Your Organization
Strategic management today must focus not only on meeting short term targets and budgets but also on building an organization prepared to succeed and lead into the future. This is obvious, you may say. But how is this simple reality reflected in how we strategically lead and engage our organizations? Read more in this article by IMD Professor Thomas Malnight.
15 Foundations for Facilitating Creativity in the Workplace
Here are lessons learned from 12 years of creative facilitation in business, from creativity expert Michelle James.
Clues to Innovation Risk Management
In today’s societies where science and technology are becoming more and more important, risk is seen as inevitable. At the same time risk has negative connotations and creates anxieties. It must be managed in order to achieve desired goals and for companies to survive. But how can you do that? Read more in this article that gives you some clues to innovation risk management to achieve sustainable innovation.
How do Innovation Intermediaries Help you to Implement Open Innovation?
Up to now, several innovation intermediaries have assisted managers to transgress the boundaries from closed to open innovation and facilitated the access to opaque and highly difficult to connect technology markets. Examples such as NineSigma, Innocentive, Innovaro and Yet2.com have been specificaly helpful for technological problems requiring solutions fromom distant and distinct innovation actors. This work aims to address the lack of continuous effort to study the content, structure and governance mechanisms of these intermediaries as well as other less publicized forms such as incubators, innovation agencies, science and technology parks that further complement innovative practices. How do innovation intermediaries help you to implement open innovation?
Innovation Strategy: Hurdles are for Leaping Over
The biggest hurdle to innovation is probably allowing hurdles to become insurmountable. The thing to remember, however, is that hurdles are for jumping over. The best method of jumping over innovation hurdles is through creativity and innovation.
Discover New Possibilities with Reverse Innovation
Before the radical shifts in technology disrupt the industry fabric, there exists a great potential to appropriate value from the market through incremental product and business model innovations. The less intense the competition, less matured the market - larger is the potential. The emerging markets of the world the BRICs (where s could stand for the plurality as well as South Africa), have long been projected as the markets to invest in.
What does luck have to do with innovation? More than you think
Luck is more than just being in the right place at the right time. It's an essential part of successful innovation. The good news is that luck can be cultivated.
Fundamental Principles for Innovation – What’s Your Opinion?
In this article, Heinz Essman, contributing editor from South Africa, introduces a set of proposed fundamental principles for innovation. It is indeed a proposal and we are very interested in hearing your views on this. Welcome to read and then visit the InnovationManagementForum.com to share your views and discuss with like-minded.
Unleashing Innovations for Sustainability: An Indian Perspective
In this article, Professor Archana Patankar takes an overview of innovations for environment in India, with specific focus on innovative ideas, technologies and programmes in the water and energy sector. It also brings forth the fact that environmental/green innovations are absolutely necessary to move towards the sustainable development pathways.
The Basics of Creative Problem Solving – CPS
Creative problem solving isn't just brainstorming, although that's what many people may associate it with. It's actually a well-defined process that can help you from problem definition to implementing solutions, according to Jeffrey Baumgartner.
How to Manage in the Age of Turbulence
In times of global turbulence the role of innovation is more important than ever. InnovationManagement spoke to global strategist John Caslione who, together with marketing guru Philip Kotler, recently published their new book CHAOTICS: The Business of Managing and Marketing in The Age of Turbulence.