Soft is Hard to Change: The Challenge of aligning HR with Open Innovation
The fourth theme addressed by MOOI is the relation between Open Innovation and Human Resource Management. This article delves deeper into the few articles that have arisen on HR and OI in the academic and professional literatures and the lessons that can be drawn from these existing sources. It also shares some of the take aways from the MOOI-forum discussions on this particular topic focus.
Organizational Processes and Structures Supporting Open Innovation
Open innovation cannot be implemented in companies without the right organizational structure and processes supporting it. What are these organizational structures and processes that facilitate open innovation in companies? They determine the success of open innovation practices and, therefore, this theme clearly deserves more attention from managers. It is surprising that very few academic and professional articles have been written about this topic.
For all Departments: How can IP help HR, R&D, Sales & Marketing, Production, Finance & Purchase, CEO or Owner?
The patent database, with its 69 million documents is one of the richest resources of knowledge worldwide. The real key to its application is the refined ways to distil the relevant information. This article will highlight novel patent research, and its relevance for each department of a typical company.
Pushing the Boundaries – Part 1: Understanding the Different “Faces” of Open Innovation
The MOOI-forum is in its 4th month now, focusing on Human Resources Management and Open Innovation as monthly theme. Every month, great discussions emerge on the forum. One topic that came back each month but remained somewhat in the background is what we could label “the different faces of open innovation”.
Measuring Open Innovation – a Metrics-Based Management Toolkit for Successful Innovation Teams – Part 2
How to apply metrics to open innovation (OI)? That's the question we often get from our clients when they start to develop their open innovation capabilities. In order to provide an answer to this critical question, the following article will focus on the key findings of our Open Innovation KPI 2012 study. Based on this study, a metrics-based management toolkit has been developed, which provides the most relevant key performance indicators from the perspective of innovation managers, subject matter experts, and consultants.
Placing Time on Your Side for Collaborative Innovation
Time represents the persistent, substantive constraint to being effective within an organization. Can you have a moment of a sponsor’s time to share the benefits of collaborative innovation? Does the sponsor and challenge team perceive you as respecting their time once you persuade them to pursue the practice with you?
The Industrial Menopause and What to Do About It
It seems to be more or less a fact that the more mature a company is, the harder it is to produce something totally new that deviates substantially to what has been done earlier. In order to understand this phenomenon better Bengt Järrehult makes a comparison between human and industrial life, trying to elucidate the similarities and differences between the 2 worlds.
The Dirty Maple Flooring Company Enters the Digital Age: Part 13
Part thirteen of the series finds our leader Charlie Bangbang at a crossroads. The Idea Mill Program for Collaborative Innovation has gone well. The Dirty Maple Flooring Company has already seen—or has perhaps felt—at this early date the effects of positive change, as people begin to express their potential for leadership in new and compelling ways. What possibilities are worth pursuing now?
The Role of Top Management in Open Innovation
Implementing open innovation requires a shift in mindset and a change in culture. It requires individuals to be open for external ideas and to share knowledge. This is not the way innovation is managed traditionally. For individuals to behave in a way that fosters open innovation, support from the top management seems to be crucial. Is this really the case? Or are top executives too far away from the action when it comes to innovation and open innovation?
The Dirty Maple Flooring Company Enters the Digital Age: Part 12
Part twelve of the series finds the Idea Mill Program for collaborative innovation bearing fruit in authentic, unexpected ways. Do we have the courage to nurture the right environment in the knowledge—the faith—that good outcomes will result? That people will see the chance to realize their potential for leadership, and take it? Lastly, is it wise, ever, to order the vegetarian special menu for lunch at the local watering hole that features scenes from the hunt on its walls?
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.
Two Ingredients for Pursuing Externally Focused Innovation
Organizations increasingly seek new forms of innovation—and, for themselves, transformation—by engaging in co-creation with the suppliers, clients, and consumers that comprise their value streams. What insights might be gained from organizations that have begun to realize their potential for leadership by embracing openness as a core element of their charter? In this article innovation architect Doug Collins reflects on the progress that the Beijing Genomics Institute (B.G.I.) has made on this front. What lessons does B.G.I. have to teach organizations that decide to paddle with the Digital Age currents as opposed to against them?
The Dirty Maple Flooring Company Enters the Digital Age: Part 11
Part eleven of the series finds challenge participant Carlos Gutierrez embracing his role in the global economy. How might the practice of collaborative innovation help people find their way forward in the Digital Age? How might the practice give people a voice?
Implementing Open Innovation – Making It Stick
Open Innovation is becoming an essential part of an enterprise innovation strategy. Yet, so often, companies focus on getting a narrow set of tactical activities going without thinking through the strategic and organizational issues necessary to enable those activities to have the intended impact. This brief article covers a few of the implementation challenges faced by companies seeking to establish successful Open Innovation programs.
Lessons from Public-Private Innovation Strategic Alliances for SMEs
Strategic alliances are an effective way to provide diversity of resources and gain entry to new knowledge and markets. Large corporations have entered recently into alliances with public sector organizations to support innovation in SMEs, combining private and public policy agendas. This article looks into the structure and management of these strategic alliances, their strong practices and inhibitors and how they impact the different parties involved.
Increasing Innovation Impact in the Enterprise
You would be hard-pressed to find a business leader who would question the importance of innovation not only to promote growth within their organization, but also to ensure its very survival. These business leaders have invested significantly in their innovation initiatives to support this importance. Yet a 2012 Accenture study found that more than half of corporate executives were disappointed by their innovation results and returns from their innovation investments.
The Great Wide Open
“Open innovation” is a technique that is gaining greater consideration these days. For many companies, this practice has the potential to help them quickly and efficiently harness the new ideas they need in a volatile and uncertain business environment. It also may accelerate and de-risk progress from idea to launch. To realize the power of open innovation, businesses first should come to terms with how “open” they are willing to be.
PharmaX, the CEO’s Dilemma and Open Innovation – Part 2
In the first installment, Gordon the newly appointed CEO at Pharmax is confronted with an innovation gap of 5 years. Certainly, the potential of the portfolio is high, but the risks are even higher. With market pressure breathing down his neck, Gordon tries to make sense of the options that he has and make the right decisions.
The Dirty Maple Flooring Company Enters the Digital Age: Part 02
Organizations big and small have started the journey of remaking themselves so they can survive and thrive in the Digital Age. What needs to change? What needs to go? How might the practice of collaborative innovation help them along their way?
PharmaX, the CEO’s Dilemma and Open Innovation – Part 1
We are on the executive floor of the imaginary pharmaceutical company PharmaX, it is Q3 and the top management is preparing for the annual innovation review. The year has been tough with revenue being hit by generic competition as their major products come off patent, but then it has been difficult for all the industry. This is the first article in a series of three. Parts 2 & 3 will be published in the next 2 weeks.
Open Innovation – An Integrated Tool in Siemens
“If Open Innovation is not seen as a long term capability building exercise then it will fail”. In this interview Thomas Lackner, Head of Open Innovation and Scouting at Siemens Corporate Technology, shares some of his experiences and how Siemens has evolved on the open innovation front. Thomas, who has been personally involved in many of Siemen’s innovation programs, also elaborates on some critical success factors that strongly influenced the outcome and quality of their programs.
Stakeholder Co-Creation: The firm as an orchestrator in innovation projects
Nowadays, firms simultaneously include a higher variety of different stakeholders than ever before in their innovation process. Such a diverse collective brings in different perspectives and competences, yet, also poses new challenges for firms. This article presents insight into the capabilities required for a leading firm in a stakeholder co-creation project, acting as a conductor of an orchestra of stakeholders.
How to Get the Most from your Innovation Software: Key Process Considerations
The first article in this series focusing on collaborative enterprise innovation explains how software can help engage your enterprise in innovation and shares experiences from clients as to the other key activities required to make a ‘software-enabled’ program successful over many years.
Thinking of Creating an Innovation Centre of Excellence? Think again.
Organizations create centers of excellence to distill and disseminate best practices on any number of topics. Using this approach to support collaborative innovation has certain drawbacks, however. In this article Doug Collins identifies the drawbacks and explores an alternative way to support collaborative innovation which respects the tenets of the practice by adopting principles from the Montessori Method.