Innovation is becoming increasingly popular. People seem to think it is the key to successful growth. Yet Jim Collins most recent book Great by Choice, which is definitely worth reading, shows that this is not the case.
Let us stand back and ask: “What do we really mean by innovation?”. Is it:
• creating something new from scratch for the sake of invention or
• taking an existing invention and adapting it to meet a real market need better?
If, like us, you are only really interested in business growth, presumably you do not really care as long as customers buy in droves? Yet that is not what most of the conversation about innovation is actually talking about.
Let us go back to Jim Collins’ book. He explains that while the businesses that excel, even during economic times of chaos and uncertainty, do innovate, they do not innovate as much as their less successful competitors. Then let us consider Apple. Although they are heralded as one of the most successful leaders in innovation of the past few years, they are not actually pioneering new innovations. They are taking products and concepts that already exist and making them really work for the market.
If you think about it, it all makes really good sense. The statistics of finding a brand new innovation that happens to hit the market’s sweet spot, are horrifying low.
It makes much better sense to use 1 or more elements that other companies have already put to the market test, learning from and improving on them to develop something even better. It is almost like edging forward, inch by inch, feeling your company’s way to success.
The other day I listened to a webinar purporting to show the way on innovation. It talked about systems and processes. Now, while I can believe that systematising parts of the innovation process is useful, this is just not the crux of the innovation puzzle.
I recently wrote a white paper on what really is driving innovation success. If you would like a copy click here.
In the meantime, if you have any real live examples of innovation that is driving business growth, do please tell me about it below.
