Innovation Strategy

10 Best Board Practices on Innovation Governance – How Proactive is your Board?

All global business and technology trends point in the same direction: there is a need for more proactive and far-sighted management of innovation. Innovation for business reinforcement and growth – and for transformation in particular – are, of course, the prime responsibility of top management. Innovation governance – a holistic approach to steering, promoting and sustaining innovation – is thus becoming a new management imperative.

Ideascale2021-12-07T15:26:37-08:00October 19th, 2015|Categories: Leadership, Strategies|Tags: Best Practices, company-wide innovation, decision making, goal setting, in-depth article, innovation champion, Innovation Culture, innovation governance, Innovation Leadership, Innovation Management, Innovation Strategy, Jean-Philippe Deschamps, Organization|

How Do You Measure Innovation Fitness?

The human body serves as the perfect metaphor for understanding the innovation challenge facing today's organizations. The body is built to adapt and respond to demands that are placed upon it. The greater the demand, the stronger the response. If you and your organization are going to thrive in this world you must build and keep your innovation muscles strong. We know that only the fittest survive.

Ideascale2019-10-15T15:21:02-07:00July 7th, 2015|Categories: Idea Management, Organization & Culture|Tags: accountability, adaptation, collaborative innovation, Communication, Employee Engagement, enterprise innovation, Ideation, innovation challenge, Innovation Leadership, Innovation Management, Innovation Strategy, innovation tools, innovative people, inspiration, measure innovation, measuring innovation, Open Innovation, Stakeholders, Success, training|

10 Guidelines for Business Model Innovation in Established Companies

Leading CEOs worldwide expect major changes to their company’s business model until 2020. As a consequence, organizations are currently about to realize that, today, business model innovation has become as important as technological innovation. However, developing new and viable business models still represents a serious challenge for large incumbent firms despite their resources, know-how, and key technologies. This article provides 10 guidelines for mastering business model innovation challenges in established companies.

Ideascale2019-10-15T15:21:05-07:00June 11th, 2015|Categories: Strategies|Tags: analogies, business innovation, business model environment, Business Model Innovation, business strategy, Collaboration, company culture, Failure, innovation process, Innovation Strategy, leadership, management, organizational learning, priorities, strategic innovation, top-down innovation, uncertainty|

Systematizing Breakthrough Innovation: Study Results

Most companies recognize the need for breakthrough innovation – it can change the fundamental bases of competition, “rewrite the rules” of an industry and transform the prospects of the successful innovator. There is no one-size-fits-all model for how best to respond to this challenge. Arthur D. Little surveyed over 80 large organizations to explore how to deliver a consistent pipeline of radically new products, performance features, business models and market space.

Ideascale2021-12-07T15:14:40-08:00May 27th, 2015|Categories: Organization & Culture, Strategies|Tags: accountability, breakthrough innovation, business model, Business Model Innovation, ecosystem, Failure, implementation, in-depth article, Innovation Strategy, intrapreneur, leadership, lessons learned, Product Development, radical innovation, report, strategy|

4 Tricks to Building a Successful Open Innovation Program

One of the most critical professional challenges that employees face today is being able to successfully manage positive change within their organization. Innovation has become a watch word, with so many divisions not being able to find enough valuable ideas and then successfully manage those ideas into a commercial offering that sometimes companies even respond to customer tickets and bugs and simply label those results as “innovation.”

Rob Hoehn2021-12-07T15:14:46-08:00May 20th, 2015|Categories: Idea Management, Open Innovation, Organization & Culture|Tags: brainstorming, Crowdsourcing, Failure, Ideation, incremental innovation, Innovation Management, Innovation Strategy, Open Innovation, scaling|

The Rise of the Chief Innovation Officer

Questionable or confusing job titles have long provided fleeting office lunch-break entertainment. A quick search online brings up innumerable lists, featuring classics such as: Senior Information Adviser (otherwise known as a librarian), Wet Leisure Assistant (lifeguard) and Ideation Director (advertising). In this article Harvey Wade, Director, Innovation Strategy at Mindjet, discusses why a job title formerly found at wannabe creative companies is now playing an increasingly recognised and integral role in business.

Ideascale2021-12-07T15:14:47-08:00May 18th, 2015|Categories: Leadership, Organization & Culture|Tags: c-suite, chief innovation officer, Collaboration, Crowdsourcing, Innovation Culture, innovation leader, innovation program processes, Innovation Strategy, motivation|

Innovation: Force Fields for Change

This article relates selected multidirectional patterns of change—“force fields”—in the business environment to innovation strategy within the context of Zen philosophical principles. Three force fields are selected for brief evaluation: 1) domestic vs. global markets, 2) economic growth vs. environmental quality, and 3) entrepreneurs vs. customer base. Given the omnipresence of force fields in the 21st century, businesses should maintain flexible structures for innovating both incrementally and radically. They also need to engage in collaboration at all institutional levels. Collaboration can facilitate the Zen objective of integrating conflicting ideas, a key feature of innovation over the long run.

Ideascale2021-12-07T15:09:09-08:00March 31st, 2015|Categories: Organization & Culture|Tags: asia, business model, business philosophy, Change Management, Collaboration, collaborative innovation, economy, entrepreneurship, environment, global market, globalization, green innovations, Innovation Culture, innovation philosophy, Innovation Strategy, jugaad, strategy, sustainability, Zen, Zen philosophy|

Outside / Inside Innovation: Combining Open Innovation with Employee Networks to Drive Success

As business leaders seek additional impact from Innovation Programs, new ways to leverage and scale existing resources are being explored. One approach is to link externally sourced ideas with networks of innovation-minded employees, to generate additional business impact.

Ideascale2022-01-24T16:48:31-08:00February 19th, 2015|Categories: Collaborative Innovation, Leadership, Open Innovation|Tags: collaborative innovation, Communication, download, employee network, employee networks, in-depth article, Innovation Strategy, innovation training, innovtaion network, Open Innovation, report, strategy, training program, whitepaper|

Five Ways to Make Your Innovation Culture Smell Better

When it comes to fostering continuous innovation, most organizational cultures stink at it. Industry research provides some interesting statistics which highlight that innovation is not easily obtainable and that companies are not innovating fast enough to repel the unrelenting threat posed by new market entrants with declining barriers to entry.

Ideascale2020-04-01T12:14:13-07:00December 17th, 2014|Categories: Blog Archive|Tags: Best Practices, company culture, continuous innovation, goal setting, in-depth article, infrastructure, Innovation Culture, innovation framework, innovation research, Innovation Strategy, innovation value, measuring innovation, organization structure, strategy, value proposition, vision|

Five Ways to Boost Innovation Governance for Growth in 2015

Innovation governance translates corporate strategy into robust, results-driven portfolios. Who among the executive ranks would oppose that? With innovation governance, the short and the long-term innovation opportunities are balanced, resources are strategically allocated (especially people), and the organization acquires an improved ability to achieve both stretch growth goals and market differentiation.

Ideascale2021-12-06T07:35:44-08:00October 20th, 2014|Categories: Organization & Culture|Tags: accountability, business alignment, enterprise innovation, growth, innovation governance, Innovation Management, Innovation Strategy, measuring innovation, Organization, portfolio management, steering committee|

The One Word Answer to Why Innovation Fails

Innovation sounds easy, but it is not. The majority of enterprises report dissatisfaction with innovation performance. Three quarters of the CEOs of multinationals view external collaborative innovation as vitally important, but only half do it, and those only rate themselves as doing it ‘moderately well’. And remember - two thirds of organizational ‘change’ efforts fail. In case you are now asking yourself, why are these odds that low – we have a straightforward answer. It’s just one word.

Ideascale2019-10-15T15:18:56-07:00September 22nd, 2014|Categories: Organization & Culture|Tags: challenge, Communication, customer engagement, Employee Engagement, engagement, Failure, HR, Innovation Culture, Innovation Strategy, intrapreneur, intrapreneurship, management, psychology, startup|

What Is An Employee Innovation Network, And Why Should You Care?

As Innovation Program leaders look to expand their scope and influence across complex, global organizations, they are turning to the development of Employee Innovation Networks. This article examines what these networks can look like, and provides some high level overview of the value that they can generate.

Ideascale2022-01-24T16:51:35-08:00August 22nd, 2014|Categories: Collaborative Innovation, Front End of Innovation, Innovation Psychology, Organization & Culture|Tags: community, Crowdsourcing, Employee Engagement, employee innovation network, employee network, Innovation Culture, innovation investment, innovation network, Innovation Strategy, innovation team|

The Hidden Innovation Barriers: Company Culture and your Brain

When you ask Executives what they want beyond short profit and revenue growth they’ll likely say ‘more innovation’. Why? Because they face unprecedented business challenges. Let’s look back. The current modern corporation was invented about 100 years ago – at the start of the 20th century. That’s when the big companies were born like the US railroad companies, US Steel, the big banks, IG Farben. Some exist still today (GE).

Ideascale2019-10-15T15:17:27-07:00June 2nd, 2014|Categories: Organization & Culture|Tags: Change Management, company culture, Competition, efficiency, globalization, goal setting, in-depth article, innovation barriers, innovation champion, Innovation Culture, Innovation Management, Innovation Strategy, knowledge transfer, revenue growth, risk management, top management|

Innovation Governance: Why Should Top Management Care?

In its research report “CEO Challenge 2014, ”[1] The Conference Board lists the ten most important challenges facing CEOs in 2014. Innovation ranks N°3 in this survey of 1,020 responses, on a par with operational excellence. Innovation was the N°1 issue in 2012, and in 2014 it is still the N°1 challenge in China. This article (in a series of seven) looks at the theme of innovation governance from a top management angle.

Ideascale2019-10-15T15:17:34-07:00April 14th, 2014|Categories: Leadership, Strategies|Tags: Best Practices, company-wide innovation, culture, decision making, goal setting, in-depth article, innovation champion, Innovation Culture, innovation governance, Innovation Leadership, Innovation Management, Innovation Strategy, Organization|

Innovating Where the Business Cares: Developing Areas of Strategic Innovation

Almost every innovation manager can recount stories of great ideas, concepts and products that people love and yet they’re never implemented. The business case stacks up and is technically feasible, but finding sponsorship and a budget seems to be impossible. As innovators, we’re often subject to ongoing commercial restrictions. The fastest way to get ideas off the ground is to ensure they’re aligned to the C-Suite agenda in both the short and longer term.

Ideascale2021-12-05T20:51:30-08:00April 7th, 2014|Categories: Strategies|Tags: budget, company culture, growth, idea implementation, innovation challenge, Innovation Strategy, innovative companies, portfolio management, strategic innovation, team diversity|