Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace 10 questions manufacturing businesses should think about Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

“The new idea either finds a champion or it dies. No ordinary involvement with a new idea provides the energy required to cope with the indifference and resistance that change provokes...” Tom Peters Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

Prof. Simon Bolton Associate Dean (Research and Enterprise) 21st June 2013 Who... Focus: Bringing together design, management, and technology to generate and deliver ideas that create business growth Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

15 million people a week What... Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

£1 bn What... Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

Who... Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

To stimulate new thinking that could lead to growth... Purpose of my talk... Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

broke the rule: hand dryers that dry your hands Ideas that changed the game Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

broke the rule: touch screens can be used anytime Ideas that changed the game Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

No silver bullet solutions... Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

Changing world... Savvy Consumers European Melt-down Global Competition Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

Assumption... You are all good at something! Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

Nurturing innovative ideas can help accelerate growth important questions Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

How committed are top management to developing new ideas? Nothing happens unless it has top management support and action!!! Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

How well do you reframe challenges? The inability to define and redefine the actual problem is a key failure of ideas (un-differentiated, me-too-solutions) Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

How well do you manage ideas? Ideas generation is often an informal ad-hoc process and frequently occurs through serendipity rather than deliberate management - Desouza et al., (2009); Barczak et al., (2009); Murphy and Kumar (1997) Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

How systematically do you develop new ideas? Effective idea management can increase new product sales by 7.2% - Innovation Excellence Study (2005) Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

How well do you support people to develop ideas? A common mistake is a lack of support for ideas and the people developing them, which results in missed opportunities - Conway and McGuinness (1986); McGuiness (1990) Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

How well do you allocate time for generating ideas? Most organisations greatly under estimate the actual time needed to generate ideas, resulting in re-work, missed opportunities and increased costs Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

How well do you facilitate collaboration? Successful companies collaborate both internally and externally, increasing capability, resources and creative input Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

How effective are the tools and methods you use to generate ideas? There is often an over reliance on basic brainstorming workshops. This results in idea fatigue and a lack of differentiated and aligned ideas Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

How well do you select good ideas? A lack of clear process and criteria for determining a good idea is a common mistake, other than its ability to achieve ROI Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

How well do you differentiate between incremental and radical ideas? Companies often do not understand the difference between incremental versus radical ideas (internal breakthrough may not be radical in the market) - Davila et al., (2006) Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

Important issues... 3 Things to remember Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

Quantity versus Quality Avoid focussing on generating as many new ideas as possible, focus instead on maximising the number of good quality ideas which feed into your NPD pipeline Goldenberg et al., (1999); Koen et al., (2001) Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

Internal versus External Increase the importance of sourcing and implementing external ideas, particularly through collaboration with customers, suppliers and partners Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

Ad-hoc versus Systematic Ideas that are closely aligned to strategy and formalised, are more likely to lead to a commercially successful product for the marketplace Desouza et al., (2009); Barczak et al., (2009); Murphy and Kumar (1997) Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace

Idea Generation Success Factors Build idea chains Ensure strategy alignment Utilize highly networked individuals Involve lead users All factors published in conference paper; Chinneck & Bolton, (2013), ICoRD’13, Chennai, India.

Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace Idea Management Success Factors Use a systematic process Give available time for idea generation Establish a clear business purpose Continual idea commitment All factors published in conference paper; Chinneck & Bolton, (2013), ICoRD’13, Chennai, India.

Nurturing Innovative Ideas in the Workplace Thank You... Professor Simon Bolton BIAD Camille Chinneck BIAD