Apr 11, 2014 | Change, Collaboration, Innovation, Small business
courtesy respectserendipity.com
At first sight, “Organised” and “Serendipity” are at opposite ends of the scale, almost mutually exclusive.
Serendipity occurs by chance, when the stars align, the unexpected happens and not by any organised process, or so we are led to believe. Organisation by contrast removes by its nature the chance occurrences, random relationships, and inconsistency that make serendipity possible.
As collaboration increases and we recognise and seek to harness the intellectual capital of individuals by what is often called loose/tight management, the opportunity for serendipity increases, simply because the processes that run our lives are looser, more inclusive rather than exclusive. The use of technology to facilitate collaboration and recording process has increased the opportunity for those serendipitous moments and insights that just used to occur at the water cooler, and in the lunch room.
It follow then that setting out to organise in such a way that the chances of serendipity are enhanced is both logical and indeed, is a competitive necessity. It is after all where the insights that lead to innovation and its rewards are born.
Are you organised for it?
Mar 11, 2014 | Change, Governance, Innovation, Personal Rant
Comment on possible changes to the cross media ownership laws is emerging, again. Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull reopened the conversation in an interview with Sky, reflecting that the media landscape had changed dramatically, so it makes sense to change the rules that govern the ownership that were set up before the changes occurred. It seems pretty sensible to me.
However, here is the paradox.
The traditional media is commercially stuffed, as the advertising has been drained away by the “new media” of the internet, but never have they been so powerful. Just look at the role the Murdoch press, and the so called “news” programs on commercial TV at prime time in the evening, played in the recent federal election.
“New media” outlets are popping up all over the place, previously unpublishable individuals (like yours truly) can have their say, amongst comment and analysis by serious groups like the Guardian , and new collaborations like that represented by the Conversation . However, the agenda is still being shaped by the newspapers and evening TV “news” programs.
Occupying a core place in the system is the ABC, seemingly reviled by both political persuasions when in Government, so they must be doing something right. However, the future of the ABC is consistently under question, and the economic argument is a solid one. The demographics of the ABC are heavily skewed towards the top half of the population, 70% of the population never engage with the ABC over the course of a year, and yet we all pay equally, effectively a regressive tax. As the argument goes, those who want the ABC can generally afford to pay for it, or have their viewing/listening interrupted by ads which pay for it, and those who do not ever listen/view it should not be expected to pay.
The media landscape has changed beyond recognition in the last decade, and the rules that govern that landscape should evolve as well to better ensure a competitively and commercially healthy system, as we are all best served by diversity, competition and innovation. Just what that evolved regulatory framework means is under debate, and some pretty smart people are putting their views, amongst them Marc Andreesen, an investor who gets it right more often than he gets it wrong, with this terrific post on the future of news.
Any change will impact all of us. How we obtain information, analysis, and opinion, wrapped up as “news” in my humble view, is crucial to the way we interact with the world, and we should all be engaged in the debate about the changes.
Mar 4, 2014 | Customers, Innovation, Marketing, Strategy
Innovation is a process, mostly it is managed for better or worse with some sort of stage-gate process.
Sensitive project management of innovation is vital, the context of the project, the culture, management engagement, business model, the source of resources used, funding, and all the rest are critically important, and blend into a system.
However, one vital consideration often under-considered, or missed, in development projects is the evolution of the Customer Value Proposition.
Concentrating on the product, its specifications, the technology, operational considerations, design and engineering, and all the rest are vital, but ultimately, it is the customer who puts their hand in their pocket, and allocates, or otherwise, their scarce resources to your products. They will only make that choice in your favour when it is in their interests to do so.
Why is it then that the foundations of the value proposition, the identification, characteristics, interaction, and measurement of the drivers that will deliver customer value and therefore sales are often ignored, or glossed over? In my experience, it is usually because the developers fall in love with their products and designs, not really considering them from the customer perspective.
The value proposition usually evolves during the design and pilot process, but only if it is allowed to.
Sensibly, there is a second stage gate process, one that is parallel to the product development, the value development process which critically translates the product features into customer value as they evolve.
A test of the success of the value development process is the depth of the debate about price. A successful VDP will preclude almost any debate, and certainly the most often used determinants of prices, being cost and competitor activity, will be relegated to the bottom of the pile of considerations.
Jan 6, 2014 | Change, Innovation, Marketing, Small business
Its the new year, 2014, January 6 to be exact, and I have been ruminating on the “List” every blogger accumulates and publishes early in January in the hope that they get noticed, and build some momentum for the year.
All the research tells us that headlines that include a list, like “top 10” and “5 things to…” get opened more than their non-list competitors, so that is what most seem to use, understandably. Being opened is the first hurdle, and a list helps with that, but the following wished for outcomes, being relevant, shared, and useful are just as challenging, and lists do not necessarily help.
Contemplating my list, trying to articulate the things I see happening that may influence our commercial choices in 2014, I saw a common thread. Everything I was contemplating sprang from the opportunities opening by being different, new, or looking at a common challenge from a new perspective. This seemed to hold equally when contemplating new products and technologies, emerging services, and new business models.
It seemed to me that the thread was that the real advantages and advances in 2014 will not come from doing the same things better, but by doing different things.
How different are you planning to be? what is on your agenda that is genuinely new, rather than just a rehash of something old but perhaps proven? how are you going to stand out in an increasingly homogeneous world?
Oct 30, 2013 | Change, Innovation, Marketing, Strategy
Engaged in an innovation portfolio management assignment a while ago, we struggled to define why one project should continue to suck up resources in preference to many other seemingly worthy opportunities.
We tried all sorts of models, financial and strategic, and really faced the dilemma that all were driven by assumptions, the accuracy of which was only clear with hindsight.
Not much help there.
We set about distilling all the data, assumptions, models, and diagrams we had collected into something simple, something that reflected more than the assumed commercial and strategic value of the initiatives, something we could engage with. We came up with one word, and three questions.
Value.
Who would benefit from this initiative?
Why was it better than anything else?
Why should anyone care?
Suddenly the task became clearer.
The discounted cash flows, competitive positioning, portfolio diagrams, and potential for stock exchange announcements became less important, and what become far more important was the simple notion, which of the projects we were considering was doing something important, solving a problem, adding value to someone unavailable elsewhere.
We developed a set of metrics covering these three questions we called the “Value Gap”
The value gap analysis between options to invest in new stuff became the benchmark for prioritizing projects, and we found there were only a very few from what had previously been a significant portfolio that were worth our effort.
Oct 23, 2013 | Innovation, Marketing, Strategy
Innovation takes up a lot of my time, and whilst successfully bring a new product to market is a huge task, challenging as it does all sorts of personal, organisational and financial barriers, it can nevertheless be broken down into a few, simple two dimensional components.
- Needs that are unmet, Vs needs that are unrealised. Around us, there are unmet needs everywhere, and a better mousetrap can be successful. Unrealised needs are a different beast, as users do not know what they do not know, and it is only after they have seen a solution that they realise there is a need. Again, there are examples all around us products that were launched not as a competitor to an existing product, but to a need we had not articulated. Traditional market research works well identifying unmet needs, but is ineffective at identifying unrealised needs. In that case you need a tonally different set of skills, all too rare.
- Technology driven Vs Customer driven. Customers are constantly looking for ways to solve their problems more effectively, cheaply, and quickly, seeking as they do competitive advantage through the deployment of their limited resources. Getting close to customers in this endeavour is a core part of my marketing philosophy. Technology driven innovation by contrast is almost a solution seeking a problem, to unrealised need. Digital technology over the last 15 years has unleashed a huge wave of technology driven innovation, all seeking a place to be leveraged. The classic here, in view, is Jeff Han’s amazing 2006 TED talk, where he demonstrated what we would now call a touch screen, before anyone had thought of the numerous applications now so commonplace, we do not notice them.
In my view, the key organisational challenge is to have all the components of these two simple axes in the room at the same time. Customers articulating problems, technologists articulating the developments relevant to the conversation, from whichever domain they arise, intelligent, curious marketers, and a failure tolerant, ambiguity accepting, long term thinking management culture.
