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Innovation is usually associated with increased risk, and increased investment. In recessionary times many business managers shrink from risk, and avoid any discretionary outlays of cash. As a consequence a lot of business managers automatically stop thinking about innovation, and focus on cost control. They simply assume innovation brings risk and wasted cash. But some astute business leaders realize that if you can figure out a way to do it, now is the time to hone your problem-solving and innovation talents. Most of your competition will have their eyes off the ball. The question becomes, ‘how can we innovate and reduce risk and spending’?
The answer involves three different activities.
Businesses use two different approaches to innovation. In one, we tackle a known problem, clearly define it, and come up with a solution either through experimentation or through mental synthesis. In the other, we gather a group of thinkers around an open idea like “how can we make nuclear energy completely safe?” This is how Nathan Myhrvold and his company Intellectual Ventures comes up with many brilliant ideas during ‘invention sessions’[1]. Obviously the second approach is a lot of fun, but tends to come up with ideas which are bigger, riskier, and often require substantial further research and investment.
Successful innovation ultimately solves a customer problem. Embracing this obvious statement is crucial to innovating successfully in recessionary times. Innovation is problem solving. When resources are tight, and you want to sustain your competitive advantage you must focus on problem-solving disciplines that deliver excellent solutions. They are simply:
And to do this well it’s essential you put together the right team and use them in ways that preserve the day-to-day operation. WBurnett LLC’s expertise is in managing innovative talent, constructing superlative teams and managing the process to deliver solutions, which the competition cannot beat.
Bill Burnett has more than 25 years of experience as a proven leader. He has a track record of solving problems and leveraging opportunities by building and leading innovation teams at both the global and local level; establishing the right environment, and delivering leaps in performance in Product, Customer Service, Operations, Network Infrastructure, Systems Functionality, and Policy Management. Bill has traveled to, and worked with businesses in over 65 countries.
The innovation blog is now listed on Guy Kawasaki's Alltop for small business
