6 steps on How to Achieve Innovation in Outsourcing
There has been a huge amount of growth in the outsourcing industry over recent years, so much so that it has become engrained in the way many large enterprises run their business. As the industry matures and the range of outsourcing services extends to higher value activities, client firms raise the bar regarding their expectations, seeking the delivery of high impact innovation from their vendors.
The Innovation Obsession
Forget the buzzword, what is true innovation? How should it be used and how does it affect our everyday lives? Harvey Briggs takes a critical look at how the concept of innovation is used today, and what it should be.
Boom Time for Robots, but no one Else?
Is the current jobless recovery in the USA a foretaste of what the growing capabilities of robots could inflict on the workforce and the economy? Are we seeing the early indicators of the need for an economic rethink?
For Innovation to Happen it Makes Sense to Sensemake
The level of innovation capability within organizations is connected to the ability of making the right sense of collective experiences, especially in uncertain or ambiguous times. In this post Susanna Bill delves deeper on the importance of sense making and the effects it has on the level of innovation capabilities. And addresses a personal dilemma.
Best Practices and Common Pitfalls Associated with Suppliers Involvement in NPD
Involving suppliers in new product development provides organizations with a range of benefits, including shorter development time, better quality products, and lower cost of development. In this new in-depth article Dr Sanda Berar delves deeper into some of the best practices and the most common pitfalls associated with suppliers’ involvement in NPD.
Pulp Innovation Chapter XLIII: A Welcome Distraction
As Marlowe struggles to define the requirements for Accipiter's open innovation community, he is interrupted with the news that the newly hired consultant has just arrived for her first day at work. Perhaps this distraction is just what Marlowe needs...
How to Break Out of the Commodity Trap: A Lesson from Mickey Mouse
Look at almost any industry and you will see companies struggling to differentiate what they have to offer from everything else in the marketplace. So it’s hardly surprising that one of the most common complaints I hear from senior executives is “My product is becoming commoditized. Is there a way out?”
Innovators Look for Problems
A brand new innovation often requires changing a person’s behavior or habits, which can be a nearly impossible task! So why not approach innovation by looking at existing problems? Gijs van Wulfen looks at 10 practical problems and innovative new products or services solving them.
Rising to the Challenge of Peak Population
In 2011, world population passed the 7 billion mark. While growth will continue, total fertility rates are falling fast and will result in slower population growth and possibly, according to some, declining total population. Lower fertility rates may bring a demographic dividend, significant opportunities but also challenges. Or, we may be doomed, as others would suggest.
Sourcing Crowds for Out of the Box Ideas
People who practice collaborative innovation at times seek out of the box ideas for a given challenge. In this article, innovation architect Doug Collins applies work from Nobel Laureate Daniel Kahneman by way of offering insights on selecting crowds that can achieve novelty.
Don’t let Market Research Myopia Distract you from Innovation
Customer and market research, competitive benchmarking, and focusing on market share could be detrimental to your organization's future performance. These approaches are critical improvement tools. Top performing organizations have turned them into a disciplined and useful science. But they can also lead to "me-too" followership or - even worse - commodity products and services that compete only on price.
Christensen and Eyring: Students Will Win When Disruption Hits Higher Education Sector
In their new book The Innovative University Clayton Christensen and Henry Eyring explore why higher education is heading for disruption. As budget deficits and healthcare costs squeeze government support for higher education, enrollments at traditional institutions will steadily shrink. This will force the education sector to major changes and the students will come out winners, as is typical when disruption reshapes an industry. InnovationManagement asked the writers to elaborate on trends in higher education and the way education is delivered to students.
Pulp Innovation Chapter XLII: Establishing an Operating Model for Innovation
Accipiter needs to establish the “rules” and expectations for innovation, and provide the programs and procedures to reinforce those programs, so innovation remained true to the goals of the organization. Marlowe takes the first steps to lead them in the right direction.
How Human Behavior Can Skew Innovation
A variety of human group behaviors can undermine innovation. For best results, we need to be aware of them and mitigate those that can derail innovation efforts.
Clayton Christensen’s New Book on the Disruption of Higher Education
Higher education is heading for disruption. In the new book The Innovative University: Changing the DNA of Higher Education From the Inside Out, Clayton Christensen and Henry Eyring explore why this is inevitable and what traditional universities and colleges can do about it. Professor Bill Fischer, himself an avid believer in disruption, reviews this book covering an extremely timely subject.
How to Make Open Innovation More Open
Here are some common-sense suggestions to improve everyone's experience when implementing open innovation initiatives.
How to Implement Radical Business Models
To be successful in radical business model innovation requires companies to go beyond the traditional modeling: ideas are only one part of the innovation equation. Business model implementation requires structural changes in your organization; otherwise, you will just get stuck with a beautiful model on paper.
Innovation’s Silent Killer
If they want to compete successfully in the future, companies should hold off on rapid ideation and faster commercialization until they take an unflinching look at what is truly stifling breakthrough innovation. In this article, Soren Kristensen provides insight on how honest self-reflection can free you from your biggest impediment to growth.
Social Product Innovation Challenges: Business Processes
Recent data from the Industrial Research Institute (IRI) shows a sharp rebound in planned R&D spending. After the past few years of operating with reduced budgets and staff, companies are finally starting to make the R&D investments they need to ramp up the innovation and product development activities that will help them achieve their growth goals.
Pulp Innovation Chapter XLI: Looking for Lost Pieces to the Innovation Puzzle
Marlowe’s concerns about Accipiter’s new innovation initiative continue to grow. How does one build an effective innovation platform without understanding the key strategic goals of the company?
What is Business Model Innovation and How Can you Implement it?
Business model innovation is a potentially powerful strategy for growing your business in the current recessionary economy. In this article, Jeffrey Baumgartner provides a helpful overview of it, and outlines some ways in which your organization may be able to leverage it.
Use Ben Franklin’s technique to become more creative
In Robert Allen Black's creativity book, Broken Crayons: Break Your Crayons and Draw Outside the Lines, the author shares an intriguing story from the autobiography of Ben Franklin that you can adapt to become more creative.
Engaging Collaborative Innovation’s Losers
Change benefits some more than others. The practice of collaborative innovation, which by design offers transformative change, is no different. In this article innovation architect Doug Collins advises campaign teams on engaging people who find themselves on the losing end of the practice. Ignoring their concerns jeopardizes the initiative.
How Design Thinking Can Enrich Business and Marketing Innovation
Design empowered innovation combines the best of right and left brain thinking. It has the capacity to deliver better ideas, with more relevance, realized earlier. By focusing on individuals, moments and journeys in ethnography, insights become deeper. By embracing chaos and play in brainstorms, creative teams can explore further. By iterating and early prototyping, ideas become real and develop more rapidly.