(Innovation as a Core Competency cont. 1)

Competitive Edge

Innovation gives its organisation a competitive edge, ie

"...Analysis indicates that those companies that generate 80 percent or more of their turnover from products and services which are less than five years old, have at least doubled their market capitalisation. By comparison, those that produced 20 percent or less of new products have remained stable or declined over the same five year period..."

from PricewaterhouseCoopers, Innovation and Growth, etc as quoted by Stephen Giugni, 2006

Furthermore,

"...every organisation - not just businesses - needs to have one core competence: innovation......and......needs a way to record and appraise its innovative performance..."

Peter Drucker, 2001

This involves a careful record of innovations in the entire field (not just in the organisation) during a given period

 "...All too often, innovation conjures up images of light bulbs and eureka moments. But this doesn't reflect the perspiration required to truly innovate. Put simply, it is a mindset. It's a process of looking at problems differently and reframing them as opportunities.

It's looking for diverse opinions and ideas, and then using experimentation and iterative prototyping to test these ideas. It's a way of thinking and doing that nurtures selfless collaboration, creative confidence and lateral thinking.

Innovation is found in systems, discipline and process as much as it is found within free thinking and new ideas. Combining these concepts to create an environment where you can hold the tension of this ambiguity in balance will put you on the path to success.

Innovators must be open to the logic of what might be - not what is. We need to develop and explorer's mindset an experiment to imagine what's possible, challenge the status quo, see opportunities in problems and continually ask why.

This requires the leadership team that understands what it means to be patient, give people time to think, reflect and iterate. This goes hand in hand with a safe space concept - safe to try new ideas, fail fast, and learn from the experience.

Business leaders need to build the hothouse of innovation to occur in, and then take your people on the journey with you. People are central to the culture of innovation.

Our team of thinkers use their technical excellence to find the best solutions to every problem. It's never about simply getting the job done - it is about the potential to benefit the whole of humanity.

Of course, we are at a time when we are now all more connected than ever before. This interconnectivity has led to a global society that is highly complex and increasingly unpredictable. Changes in one part of the world can have significant impact......

For example, changes in climate have an impact on societal values, which in turn have an impact on consumption patterns, which has an impact on how are produced, which in turn have an impact on how supply chains are organised and the business models organisations require, which ultimately changes the physical assets clients require and how they are designed.

The best projects with the most impact are built as part of a deeply collaborative process and are designed second-, third- and fourth-quarter implications in mind.

As innovators, we should look into the communities we are serving and find problems that need solving to drive a real change......some industries have disappeared overnight and others have been able to innovate and thrive in this new world.

The future is both exciting and full of opportunities, but can also be a place of uncertainty and trepidation. The key is finding a way through the disruption and making sense of our potential futures.

This requires all business leaders to challenge the notion of innovation, and imagine a better tomorrow, using whatever tools are at your disposal to solve humanity's problem - once you have solved your own..."
William Cox, 2021

There are 3 main parts to innovation, ie

i) creativity (generating new ideas)

ii) implementation (selecting, testing and commercialising the most appropriate idea(s)

iii) having the right ecosystem, ie a culture that encourages innovation and its implementation
"...You need to have a learning organisation where it is okay to experiment, to make mistakes and to come up with new ideas. There won't be innovation if it's top-down organisation where it is clear employees are not invited to come up new ideas. Your ideas have to be welcome..."
Natalia Nikolova as quoted by Alexandra Cain, 2021

For innovation to be of worth, it must have a positive impact on or be of value for the organisation or its customer; it must be desirable, technically possible and feasible, ie financially viable.

Definition of innovation

"...a change that adds value..."
Victor Dominello, 2021

It adds value to the organisation and its stakeholders like staff, customers, investors, suppliers, governments, community, etc. You need to understand what these different stakeholders want.