Innovation Excellence The World's Most Popular Innovation Web Site

Innovation creates things that are novel, useful and successful. Something that’s novel is something that’s different, and something that’s different creates uncertainty. And, as we know, uncertainty is the enemy of all things sacred.

Today’s commercial environment is fierce. All companies have aggressive growth objectives that must be achieved at all costs. But there’s a problem – within any industry, when the growth goals are summed across competitors, there are simply too few customers to support everyone’s growth goals.

A body in motion tends to stay in motion, unless it’s perturbed by an external force. And, it’s the same with people – we keep doing what we’re doing until there’s a reason we cannot.

Evaluation of innovation efforts is a hot topic. Sometimes it seems evaluating innovation is more important than innovation itself. Metrics, indicators, best practices, success stories – everyone is looking for the magical baseline data to compare to in order to define shortcomings and close them. But it’s largely a waste of time, because..

Innovation starts with different, and when you propose something that’s different from the recipe responsible for success, innovation becomes the enemy of success. And because innovation and different are always joined at the hip, the conflict between success and innovation is always part of the equation.

Everyone says they want innovation, but they don’t – they want the results of innovation.

Innovation is about new; innovation is about different; innovation is about “never been done before”; and innovation is about preparation.

A technology without a market is as valuable as a market without a technology – they’re both worthless. At one end of the spectrum you have something interesting running in the lab and at the other you have an interesting insight around a new market. But one won’t do, and from either end of the rainbow your quest is to find the pot of gold at the other end.

If I was CEO of a company that wanted to do innovation, the one thing I’d strive for is clarity. For clarity on the innovative new product, here’s what the CEO needs.

Mind and body are connected, literally. It’s true – our necks bridge the gap. Don’t believe me? Locate one end of your neck and you’ll find your head or body; locate the other and you’ll find the other.