Innovating by combining existing things in new ways at Deutsche Post DHL
Petra Kiwitt is Executive Vice President of DHL Solutions & Innovations at Deutsche Post DHL. The Group with nearly 500.000 employees in 220 countries provides package and mail services as well as comprehensive logistics solutions for customers all around the world. Petra Kiwitt’s biggest challenge is to stimulate and coordinate innovations which ultimately will lead to even more efficient logistic solutions for the customers. A new built Innovation Community brings people together, lets them share ideas and sometimes encourages them to do ‘old’ things in new ways.
How Can Design Thinking Be Applied to Government Policy-Making?
The Institute of Design held a seminar in Chicago this week to create a discussion on the role of a design-based approach to forming public policy. The premise for the discussion was that, "the prevalent perception that 'nothing works' in the public policy arena, or rather, public policy itself rarely seems to be working, challenges democratic systems at their core. Coincident to this spiraling public pessimism and partisan gridlock, foundations are turning to designers with renewed hope that their skills in problem definition and resolution can make a difference and help foster success."
Innovation and the hidden value of the primacy effect
People will remember the first and last times they interact with you. Use innovation to make sure each touch point is memorable and makes a good impression.
New book inspires by sharing stories of sustainable, green innovation
Greenovate! is an excellent idea catalyst for any organization that is looking for ways to innovate in ways that are sustainable and environmentally friendly.
New Opportunities with Metovation
The indulgent reader of my columns has already met the concepts of mesovation and exovation, and now I’m going to introduce yet another neologism: metovation. Meto- in metovation stems from the prefix meta- where I for easier pronunciation exchanged o for a. Meta is of Greek language origin and stands for the next higher level of abstraction.
Innovation: Is there such a thing as ‘best practice?’
Best practices transferred and applied without contextual knowledge can be dangerous, and is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
Now is the time to realize our creative potential, says Julie Ann Turner
Creativity in Business: Interview with Julie Ann Turner
Innovating Products, Processes and Business Models in India
Over the past few years, innovation in India as a corporate theme has constantly gained importance, becoming a prerequisite for long-term success, or maybe even survival, due to the discontinuous pace of change of the environment. Thus, innovation has now reached for some companies as a corporate priority, affecting every single aspect of an organisation.
New book explores innovation via experimentation
A new book by Peter Sims, Little Bets: How Breakthrough Ideas Emerge From Small Discoveries, explores how structured experimentation can be used to test and improve fledgling ideas, building up solutions that are more targeted and successful, rather than rolling the dice on a single compelling but untested Big Idea.
How to set up a ‘backburner’ to capture and review your ideas
Often, in the midst of a big project, we come up with ideas that we'd love to implement, if we only had the time and budget to consider them. Scott Belsky, in his new book, Making Ideas Happen: Overcoming the Obstacles Between Vision and Reality, recommends that you set up a system for not only capturing these random ideas, but also a ritual for returning to them to evaluate them.
Co-Innovating for the Future
Realising the limitations of their own knowledge, and internal R&D capabilities, an increasingly high number of companies are currently making the decision of partnering externally to develop new technologies. Companies’ interactions with their business partners or even competitors are becoming more and more frequent.
New paradigm of work requires a more whole-brained approach, says Michael Gelb
Accelerating change and complexity has resulted in ever greater demands on the individual's time and energy. To succeed today requires a balance of creative and pragmatic skills, explains creativity expert and author Michael Gelb.
New research study discovers important dynamics of innovation and collaboration between networks
Researchers from Case Western Reserve and Temple University conducted an analysis of how innovations are created among multiple parties within a project at the Frank O. Gehry architecture firm. What they discovered is that networks of people and communities of interest are remarkably adept at creating innovations through an iterative process.
Saving the Climate is Saving the Business – Aligning Sustainable and Open Innovation
''Climate change is a result of the greatest market failure the world has seen. The evidence on the seriousness of the risks from inaction or delayed action is now overwhelming. We risk damage on a scale larger than the two world wars of the last century. The problem is global and the response must be a collaboration on a global scale.'' (Professor Lord Nicholas Stern, London School of Economics, at Royal Economic Society Manchester, November 2007, guardian.co.uk)
True Innovation – The Key to Success
“There are no quick fixes and no easy answers for succeeding at innovation” says Dr Robert Cooper, senior consultant to Fortune 500 firms and top scholar in the field of innovation management (PDMA) in an interview with InnovationManagement. “It’s back to basics – an aggressive innovation strategy that focuses your businesses’ R&D efforts; effective portfolio manage to pick tomorrow’s growth engines; a climate and culture that fosters innovation in your business; and a robust idea-to-launch system.”
After Eureka: 7 Questions to Test Innovation for Profit Potential
Analytical strategic frameworks are not the key to creating transformative innovation. But a robust strategic framework is essential for shaping and developing an idea. In the battle for hearts and minds, analysis is also the only way to win over the brains of corporate sponsors, venture capitalists, bank managers and spouses. After the "Eureka" moment, it's essential to have a disciplined framework that puts a spotlight on the things that will determine the commercial potential of your idea.
What is design thinking and why does it matter?
What is design thinking, and why should innovators pay attention to it? Change by Design: How Design Thinking Transforms Organizations and Inspires Innovation, the new book by Ideo CEO and president Tim Brown, does an excellent job of demystifying this concept, and explaining why it is an important form of strategic innovation.
Making Innovation a Systemic Capability
For innovation to become a core competence and a tangible cultural value, there has to be a substantial degree of internal consistency between processes, metrics, reward structures, rhetoric, and top management behavior. But it is precisely this synchronicity that is lacking inside most companies, says Rowan Gibson.
Innovation strategy: Praise the behaviors you want to see
If you want to change the culture of the organization then one of the best ways to do it is to praise the behaviors you want to see. If you want your people to be more adventurous, more entrepreneurial and more innovative then make a point of singling out for recognition those people who are acting like that, says Paul Sloane.
Innovation lessons from Silly Putty
In times like these, many people are waiting for better times to take action, to try new things or to create change but that is not the solution. To succeed, you must act, seek and welcome change and go beyond the norm, today. Here are 8 lessons from Silly Putty on how you can "eggceed" expectations.
How to Build your Capacity to Make Ideas Happen
Coming up with a great idea is never enough. You must transform your vision into reality. Helping creative people to do that is the focus of Scott Belsky's new book, Making Ideas Happen.
Getting back on the innovation road after a recession takes time and patience
Companies that really suffered have a long road back to innovating. Rebuilding trust, culture realignment and leadership are the keys.
Achieving Competitive Advantage by Observing First Movers
‘Early adopters’, ‘trendsetters’, ‘opinion leaders’, ‘first movers’ - are the labels describing those who are ahead of the mainstream, who are keen to try out new things. But do these terms describe the same attributes – or are there subtle differences? If so, what is the difference and how can companies proactively incorporate using these groups and their insight into their innovation management process.
Reinventing Knowledge Management to Innovate
There has been a shift from the emphasis on what people called the “information value chain” to “knowledge value chain” for quite some time. The environments are shrewd and unpredictable in this world of growing competition and rapid technological progress. The information value chain just served as a database of “best practices” whereas “knowledge value chain” emphasizes on the active sense making of human beings handling business.