Mar 7, 2010 | Innovation, Marketing
The emerging generation of E-readers, Amazons Kindle, Barnes & Nobles Nook, and now the Ipad are as disruptive a technology as the invention of the printing press by Johannes Guttenberg in the early 1400’s.
Guttenberg’s invention of the printing press was in fact a number of innovations put together from a range of skills, some of which he had developed as a goldsmith, applied in an entirely new way.
Sound familiar?
Most innovations take bits of seemingly unrelated technology or behaviours and combine them in a different way, creating value for the user.
The ability to see possible connections, and synergies between seemingly unrelated technologies and circumstances, and see them before anyone else is the essence of innovation. Steve Jobs did not invent the technologies that made the ipod, he just saw a number of unrelated bits of technology and put them together, and then single mindedly marketed the outcome. The whole exercise has been about changing mind sets, seeing options others are not seeing, connecting the dots, and being in there first.
Mar 3, 2010 | Innovation, Management, Strategy
The great pressure for “innovation” comes at least partly from the buy in of senior executives in the notion promulgated by numerous thinkers that the only really sustainable competitive advantage is the capability to out innovate the competition.
However, in the rush for new products and processes, some have forgotten the real outcome of successful innovation is cash, and common sense, discipline, and experience get thrown away in the rush for the newest thing, that more often than not adds little value to the customer experience.
Feb 25, 2010 | Change, Innovation, Personal Rant
It has been interesting listening to the “debates” over the last week or so on two different topics, the latest of the seemingly endless versions of a NSW transport plan, and the redevelopment of the area of Sydney harbour now called Barangaroo
On both issues, it seems if talkback radio is any indication, that everyone has an opinion, and wants everyone else to hear it.
It also appears that the conversations vary from loud opinions based on fluffy thinking at best, to sensible opinions based on a series of assumptions that even if you choose to disagree with the opinion, at least the assumptions upon which they are based are transparent. There appears to be some correlation between the level of noise and the ignorance of the mouth from which the noise emanates, particularly when responding to an opinion leading view expressed aggressively, as Paul Keating has done on Barangaroo.
It seems to me that if you are going to be taken seriously in a debate, any debate, about the changing of the status quo, you had better have some facts, transparent assumptions, and a vision of the preferred outcome in order to be taken seriously, and to have a useful role in the debate.
Making noise just distracts from the real work of driving change.
Feb 24, 2010 | Branding, Innovation, Marketing
It seems that most innovation is aimed at getting more of the same for the same price, rather than making the experience with the product better.
Every time I see an ad for a new car, it seems to have more airbags, more electronic gizmos to go wrong the day the warranty ends, but who really needs it all to get from point A to point B reliably, comfortably, at a modest cost, which is the point of having a car.
Surely it is time to innovate backwards, do less, strip the glitter, simplify.
I used to shave with a single blade, now I am a poof unless I shave with five, my stringy beard is not five times tougher than when I was 21, just a bit more gray worked its way in.
Two businesses, Gillette and Intel have led the way in adding features that they think will give them a marketing advantage through differentiation, and then turning them into benefits.
For a funny, sarcastic view of the trend to complication, follow the link to the Onion site, and have a laugh.
Feb 23, 2010 | Change, Innovation, Marketing, Strategy
How often is the “next big thing” hiding in your organisation without you knowing?
Fairly often is seems.
Probably the classic example, is the development of the first digital camera by a Kodak engineer , Steven Sasson in 1975.
Kodak, with a totally dominant position in the film market had a huge amount to lose with the development of an alternative, and ironically, many of the adjacent inventions such as advances in storage volumes, which enables the digital photographic technology to be realised, and which also made the computer industry as we now see it possible, were also developed in their labs, but put aside, as Kodak commercial management saw little of interest to their business.
Way after the digital camera market had been populated by the likes of Sony, Kodak woke up, but way too late to preserve their market dominance, or even have a role in the shape of it.
Meanwhile, the inventor toiled away inside Kodak, watching others commercialise the technology he initiated.
The lesson here is that you need to creatively engage with all stakeholders, whilst seeing the opportunities through eyes other than those that restrict the view to the status quo.
Feb 14, 2010 | Change, Innovation, Management, Strategy
Much of what we read encourages us to experiment, test, and adopt and adapt the better ideas as they survive, and evolve. I am a great advocate of this approach, but the downside is that an apparent ad hoc mindset, a lack of planning discipline, may allow the basic performance measurement disciplines of to fall away.
It is another management paradox, you have to be flexible and agile or “loose” to succeed, but to succeed you must have “tight” management to ensure the choices made have the backing a data, and strategic fit, not just the result of somebody’s good idea when they woke up that morning.
