In the early 1990s, large corporations started moving, slowly and almost imperceptibly at first, away from the kind of broad scientific research that led to such inventions as Nylon and the graphic user interface (GUI). GUI transformed personal computing by enabling users to, for example, simply drag a document into a folder instead of typing […]
Read More… from Will Corporations Leaving Basic Scientific Research Kill the Golden Goose?
The best companies are forward-looking. They are not only concerned with what customers want to buy today, but what they will want to buy in the future. A company’s ability to project future customer needs is usually tied to factors such as how much a company knows about its customer and the extent of customer […]
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Crowdsourcing and social media channels have largely replaced the private channels between a lone individual and an organization with a public debate in which external contributors not only submit suggestions but also vote for and comment on suggestions made by others. In the best cases, these interactions evolve into a vibrant initiative, granting the host […]
Professionals in an organization — technical experts in a service organization, for example — will acquire best practices, solutions, resources, ideas and other knowledge as they develop responses to the needs of their clients. In organizations where professionals work in a single location, the professionals will gather regularly to discuss what they have learned about […]
Read More… from Launch Intentional Communities of Practice in Global Companies
Traditional closed business models still dominate in today’s business world, but more and more companies are looking at the opportunities created through open collaboration and exchange with business model partners. Pioneering companies such as SAP put themselves at the centre of a vibrant ecosystem of active partners. The question for corporate executives is when to […]
Read More… from Is There an Open Business Model Right for Your Company?
It is hard to resist the pull of emerging markets, such as India and China. Given the immense population in such countries, even the small percentage of the total population that can be considered ‘middle class’ represents huge markets for companies in developed countries. And this new emerging-market middle class is only growing. Succeeding in […]
Read More… from Three Product Innovation Strategies for Emerging Markets and How to Choose
Innovation through collaborative teams can succeed or fail in large part based on resources dedicated to the venture. While many factors may ultimately impact success or failure, all else being equal, if more resources are allocated to a project, the risk that it fails is less. Whether or not managers are willing to dedicate those […]
Read More… from Balancing Incentives, Risk and Tolerance of Failure for Collaborative Innovation
Generalist CEOs are CEOs who have worked in different organizational areas, for a number of different firms, in different industries, or even in a conglomerate firm. Former IBM CEO and Chairman Louis Gerstner is a typical example. Before joining IBM, he had been a consultant at McKinsey & Company, had held senior positions at American […]
Read More… from Generalist CEOs Not Specialists Spur Innovation
Increased emphasis on continual innovation — and increased awareness that it demands knowledge beyond the confines of a single organization — means research partnerships have become a more common and more important strategic tool. These inter-organizational arrangements fall broadly into two camps: the tightly coupled partnership; the more loosely coupled alternative. The former is characterized […]
Read More… from Innovation Partnerships-Loosely or Tightly Coupled?
Entrepreneurial spawning — whereby an existing company gives birth to another company, founded by former employees — is prevalent in many new industries. (California’s Fairchild Semiconductor, for example, is ‘mother’ to a great many Silicon Valley semiconductor firms.) It’s also been the subject of numerous research papers: everything from the rationale and triggers for spin-outs […]
Read More… from Mothers of Invention: Companies that ‘Spawn’ New Enterprises
