Focused on communicating to and influencing leadership (ex: “How do I get funding for this project?”)

How creativity is revolutionizing the book business: Corey Michael Blake

Corey Michael Blake is president of Round Table Companies, a firm that works closely with authors to develop graphic novels. In this interview with Michelle James, he explains how the book business is being transformed today, and the central role of creativity in all parts of the revolution.

Five Lessons to Boost Your Innovation Practices

Innovation ain’t what it was. It was once the province of a department, with a clear remit: new product development. Today, it’s everywhere. It concerns not only products and services, but also processes, technologies, business models, pricing plans, and routes to market, even performance management practices – the whole value chain in fact.

The future of creativity is relational

The future of creativity is relational, based upon engaging and connecting with others, according to author and consultant Peggy Noonan.

How to Create a Culture that Supports Innovation

Innovation is actually easy – when the corporate culture is supporting it. Unfortunately today many companies show ”excellent” practise killing the innovative spirit. In this new in-depth article Dirk Loop explores the opportunities every employee – not just executives and innovation managers – has to enhance a culture of innovation. He gives a brief overview on common weaknesses within corporate process frameworks and shows hands-on solutions.

The Benefits of Pursuing Collaborative Innovation with Your Customer Advisory Board

Many organizations have committed to developing deeper intimacy with their most important clients by establishing customer advisory boards. The most compelling, worthwhile forms of engagement within this structure occur when board members and stakeholders from the sponsoring organization explore possibilities for helping one another realize their respective visions. In other words, they collaborate and innovate on what a shared future might offer. In this article community architect Doug Collins makes the case for supplementing the board meetings with a virtual community focused on collaborative innovation to improve the continuity of the dialogue and formation of the ideas that arise.

Boosting Innovation by Integrating a Gender Perspective

Why does gender diversity matter when it comes to product and service innovation? What has research shown? And what does hard-won experience tell us? This article shows how businesses gain a competitive edge by integrating a gender perspective into their innovation work – a much needed boost as global competition becomes increasingly tough.

How to Communicate the Value of Idea Management

The success of an organization's idea management program is at the mercy of its supporters - the employees. The innovation team and top management must effectively communicate their goals to employees so they understand what's expected of them and feel confident that their ideas will be taken seriously. Enno Scholz walks us through this communication process.

How To Foster Greater Collaboration Between Innovators and the IT Department

Success in innovation requires greater collaboration with the corporate IT department, yet in many cases friction between the two leaves innovation managers with tools they don't want to use or IT managers with tools they can't support. How do you get this critical relationship right?

Chris Thoen on Open Innovation -Part II

Chris Thoen head of Procter and Gamble's Open Innovation business has been talking with IM about what it takes to achieve excellence in Open Innovation. This week Chris touches on staffing and the culture of Open Innovation.

The State of Open Innovation

How successful is Open Innovation as an innovation method? For leaders like Proctor and Gamble the answer is obvious but the same can't be said for the vast majority of enterprises taking this route. Doug Berger takes the soundings.

From Product Development Manager to Chief Innovation Officer

Do large companies need a Chief Innovation Officer? First they need to think more clearly about the range of issues they can innovate their way through and those that they cannot.

What types of leaders can support a creative culture and organizational innovation?

A recent article in the journal Academy of Management Perspectives provides insight into senior leadership traits that are necessary to inspire the people in a business and support a creativity and growth-oriented culture, key ingredients for expanding a firm's innovation capabilities.

How to Create a Culture of Leadership (where everyone plays their part)

How do you create the right conditions for your co-workers to mutually reinforce their commitment to your goals? Doug Collins looks at the four cornerstones of that process and how you can go about fostering them in an innovative workplace.

Reclaiming the Co-creation Process from the Public Sector

Public sector innovation is a necessity, if we are to reduce public spending and address changing demographics. The public sector is lagging behind the private sector in transforming ideas into innovation, which made me question whether we are pursuing the wrong approach. This is not to say that I am questioning the abilities of people working in the public sector, but merely provoking a dialogue with the reader. You are all invited to join in!