@paul4innovating - Building Your Innovation & Ecosystem Intelligence

Dealing with growing complexity needs innovation ecosystem thinking and design

earth globe with googly eyes on gray background — *Photo by Anna Shvets on Pexels.com*

Much of business today is caught up in managing short-term change that is growing in complexity and challenges across the business world globally. There is growing leadership and employee fatigue in managing rolling crises and not being able to adequately focus on the longer term, have that space to renew and in enough time as ideally liked. Disruption has been a constant at all organisational levels to adapt and adjust to worldwide events totally out of that organization’s control.

Following the pandemic, it has been hard to regain consistency due to staffing discontinuities and displacements, sourcing of raw materials, especially from China, their intermittency in availability and the general disruption of world trade. The war in Ukraine has only added more short-term crises in switching fuels, sourcing difficulties, changing supply chain dynamics, and generally readjusting the business operations in Ukraine and Russia to highly constrained operations or the loss/withdrawal need required by sanctions.

So the challenges in the past year have been highly focused on supply chain disruptions, plugging gaps in technology solutions that can provide solutions that can offer higher flexible, agile and advanced planning and production environments. The continued needs to keep moving towards securing a more sustainable future that reflects the need to become carbon neutral; net zero has needed a far more agile and adaptive approach.

As well as encourages thinking that is building a more robust circular economy to offset the immediate shortages but builds out a waste reduction mentality and recycling approach.

Yet disruption is increasing; we are in a volatile world of constant change.

Why Innovation Ecosystems?

*Reaching out for a new design built on collaborative building blocks of design*

Following on from a series of posts on innovation ecosystems, especially a recent one, “Seeing innovation differently through ecosystem thinking and design” I outlined a need for a profound shift in the business landscape; well in my view, that time is rapidly approaching.

Why do we need to make a really necessary change?

Our present economic models, certainly in the West are so heavily debt-laden, from the effects of over-spending, supporting the Ukrainian war, and the Corvid crisis, and rightly supporting those in economic need and business difficulties.

One of the problems in economic distribution is that applying this in a top-down way is it can often not determine those in need from those who simply gain or are unable to deliver to those the adequate or appropriate support they require.

Our models of economic distribution are simply outdated or built on self-interest or self-promotion or simply enabling preservation for individual benefit and not for the ‘greater’ community.

The next few years are going to be very painful in further adjustments and polarization.

Our politicians continue the hackneyed phrase or idea, said or used so often that it has become boring and has no meaning, of the need for growth and prosperity.

I cannot see this way forward if we remain “locked” in the existing systems of self-interest, benefits being given to selected groups as rewards for support or simply to maintain the status quo.

The necessary Plumbing, Pipework and Pumps for the Industrial Metaverse

*The stages of building out the Industrial Metaverse taking a three-horizon approach*

I had the pleasure of attending the Nvidia GTC22 event recently. Over four days, they did a good job of scrambling my brain. Take a look at some of the sessions that apply to you- amazing stuff.

I focused on the Industrial Metaverse and where it is going. It is only at the beginning of its journey, but the feast of predictions, future forecasting and bold, clear visions on this was impressive.

Jensen Huang, the NVIDIA CEO gave the keynote where he took us into that opening understanding and a closer look at the game-changing technologies that are helping us take on the world’s greatest challenges. I really had to break this nearly two-hour keynote into “bite-sized” segments to absorb all the releases, updates and the speed of development that NVIDIA are undertaking.

Rev Lebaredian, VP within the Omniverse group, gave us a clear view of how and where the Industrial Metaverse can head. NVIDIA Omniverse is the platform for future building.

The Omniverse platform is for creating and operating metaverse applications.

Seeing innovation differently through ecosystem thinking and design

*Thinking of innovation as an innovation ecosystem in design*

We need to re-think innovation and provide a new level of innovation integration and optimization.

What we see increasingly is the need to change to a different thinking, one of what “innovation ecosystems.” can provide.

In designing these innovation ecosystems, we might have the potential answer to overcoming and giving innovation that chance to be more central to the core of the business. It might offer us the ability to connect much of the rich internal knowledge with that outside one, that other organizations and individuals can provide, in diversity, or thought or contribution.

I envisage an ecosystem of working upon like-minded goals and ambitions, by collaborating for delivering a new form of innovation value. Collaborating in ecosystem thinking and design I would suggest opens up significant potential and combinations, that provide added value and significant opportunity for improvement on the existing offerings.

Approaching innovation on a common, shared technology platform can significantly enhance the discovery, experimentation, exploring and exploiting diverse skills and expertise through to commercialization.

Governance within Ecosystems

Managing Governance within Ecosystem Designs

Governance needs to constantly “account” for change. Here is a handy reference or reflection of its capacity to deliver:

You need a living environment, one that evolves constantly

+ Here, you must establish a relational, institutional and coordination set of strategic and operational approaches. The “living” document needs to reflect on the constant reshaping of the ecosystem as it evolves and recognize that this is a constantly evolving design.

+ Governance needs to articulate the influencing and coordinating mechanisms, their different levels, and the protocols and procedures to resolve any disputes or pathway directions all would need to follow and adhere to.

+ It needs to determine the boundary conditions and if and when these change, which they are most likely to, there is a mechanism in place to recognize this and determine any new scope, direction or design to be accepted going forward.

+ A governance document must have built into it sufficient commonality and be transparent in its spirit of amiability to coordination and decision-making.

+ It needs to determine the critical driving forces but equally reflect on the different catalyzing forces in tensions and design that individual members will attempt to impose, so there needs a resolution method to be able to go back and refer to.

The difficulties of adoption for the business platform

I want to relate adoption back to business platforms and anchor it in the process.

Today business platform adoption is a struggle. It needs a clear revisiting of the theory of diffusion and adoption to extract the relevant points of necessary practice.

What is vitally needed is the recognition that deciding on adopting a business platform approach has five stages or decision points to go through.

So often, platform providers automatically go to the assumption that their platform will be adopted. It simply will not without working through and gaining confirmation the five stages of adoption are clarified.

Continue reading “The difficulties of adoption for the business platform”

Exploring points of value in adopting Business Platforms.

Business Platforms provide the backbone of the Network.

Today we are still caught up in the validation and relevance of managing a business through platform thinking by making the business case of its value and impact. We should not be; it is time for you to hop onto the train.

The ability to present a compelling business case for the use and application of platforms is overwhelming. I think I have well over 100 plus arguments for their use, value, impact and application.

For me, platforms are needed as we face a very different economic landscape.

We need to choose where to focus in the future, where to concentrate our resources and attempt to bridge the fragmentation that is occurring. The world of collaboration, where we can find partners to share and reinforce what we do, is leading to new dynamics of combining.

Platforms are more viable and relevant.

Platforms allow you the opportunity to innovate in very different ways. They can add value through collaborations that can add more to the internal efficiency options through learning and sharing. Platforms help manage the difficulties of transitions we are all undergoing and change how we see the world through a broader collaborative set of lenses. Continue reading “Exploring points of value in adopting Business Platforms.”

Transitions towards Innovation and Business Ecosystems

I am a “transition advocate” for innovation, ecosystems, energy, and sustainability. I explicitly focus on the industrial and energy systems that are radically changing our world, which provides me with a platform to understand, build, and recommend many dramatic changes taking place that are relevant across all business environments.

Transformational insights are seen at the front end of the transitions that we are all undertaking where innovation drives these changes. These observations are providing the “fuel” to underpin my supportive advisory & mentoring services to a client. This dynamic environment nurtures my understanding of what is evolving and what impact and growth opportunities this has for a business to explore and exploit by taking the innovator’s perspective into the assessment of the need of a client’s energy and industrial transition as my areas of focus to validate the value and worth of Ecosystem thinking and design.
My primary role is advising and coaching in building innovation and ecosystem capability and capacity. The principal focus then is to support and build internal capacity and develop the external capabilities to undertake any transformation journey and make the undertaking sustaining, built on future-orientated approaches.
I break my business out into dedicated focal topics into “big transforming” points of impact, applying understanding and insights that are in my mind complementary, synergistic or clarifying new emerging intersections, for growth potential that has value-adding impact and business model change.
The combination of innovation within ecosystem thinking and the design approach has arrived, capitalizing on the value points of digitalisation combined with technology and human ingenuity; both in the Industrial IoT world and finding a growing place and pace in the Energy Transition, each is having, in my view, a very different combination effect for value creation and business impact.

My Innovation intent has been central to this period in consulting, mentoring, coaching and advising business entities, start-ups, not-for-profit and government agencies. This intent has progressively ‘funnelled down’ into recognizing the value of ecosystems as the business design for innovation in the future to thrive and deliver more significant value creation, especially in the Energy Transition underway. I run a specialized advisor and mentoring business called Agility Innovation based in Switzerland. It has an intense focus on its clients’ needs and is always looking to contribute to their specific journey. Consistent contributions from my posting sites, paul4innovating. com and ecosystems4innovating.com, provide much of the “creative” fuel in my contributions and worth in advisory work.

https://paul4innovating.com/about/

Agility Innovation Specialists are presently based in Switzerland Paul Hobcraft’s profile can be viewed on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-hobcraft-innovation/ Contact Paul Hobcraft on his email: paul4innovating@gmail.com

Achieving Growth and Impact from Business Ecosystems

Innovation has been central to my work in the past twenty years, in coaching, advisory, consulting, and mentoring roles building sustainability through evaluation, growth impact, and value creation alternatives. A depth in research and analysis, with a continued curiosity of change and exploring transitions, has built my understanding in thought leadership, and the recognition of the major shifts to ecosystem designs, to integrate into future business designs leading to focusing on how innovation impacts the Business Ecosystem in thinking and designs

Agility is deeply committed to your success for innovation.

“Our objectives are to help identify promising business opportunities, develop innovation expertise and competencies, create value, and grow competitive and profitable businesses alongside you by being 100% focused on providing dedicated innovative support.”

Agility Innovation Specialists offer a real “intensity in innovation and ecosystem building in thinking and design” at its core.

The focus on Ecosystems in design and thinking is central to the offerings made

We constantly aim:

– To find ways to disrupt the accepted, to reduce the barriers to innovation understanding, to achieve a greater adoption.
– To constantly challenge your current practices so as to provide a fresh, possible alternative set of outlooks and alter those perspectives that can potentially lead to increased value.
– Sometimes, we push into uncomfortable territory but always with a clear purpose of searching for improvement, not just for the sake of it.
– We seek out customers’ unmet needs and unexplored opportunities to give new diversity to any idea and accelerate its realization.
– We aim to strengthen your business’s core and extend its potential by exploring its adjacencies and white spaces.
– To provide clear superior results that will give you fresh growth options and more substantial innovation outcomes.

We welcome enquiries; please contact paul@agilityinnovation.com

Agility’s extensive work in innovative framework-building

In terms of reach and recognition, Agility’s client work has been broad and extensive across business and government sectors and globally.

Agility’s innovation work focuses on identifying today’s challenges and supporting the changes needed to build a sustainable future based on establishing a solid innovation core.

We look to provide leading-edge advice on building innovation capabilities.
The focus is all about bringing new forms of innovation competency into the world of everyday thinking through framework designs.
We look to deliver a clear impact and returns on the investments made.
We deliver a broad, more holistic understanding of what is required in innovation, unique to each client.

Client work, the industry area and geographical focus

We build frameworks that reflect today’s business needs and realities

Sector consulting experience has included advising into:

Electronic Contract Manufacturers, Telecommunications, Utility providers, E-business ventures, Restaurants & Food Service, Retailers, SME service advisors, Executive Recruitment firms, Government Statutory Boards, Publishing, Consumer Products, Alternative Energy providers, Not-for-Profit Institutions, Integrated Facility Management and Logistic & Supply Chain integrators.

Part of the practice has been a subcontractor of choice or consulting associate to other solution providers, often in back-office roles providing the specialised inputs critical parts of innovation, resource development and change management.

Geographic focus:

This has been mainly in Asia and Europe, but working with many US Corporations within these regions as well as large Asian and European organizations. Paul Hobcraft has lived and worked for 15 years in Asia and initially consulted and advised under an associate practice and then moved back to Switzerland to build and develop different networks and experiences all evolving out of the innovation focus.

Today Paul is based in Ticino, Switzerland and continues to work where the client requires their solutions globally to be designed and executed but increasingly recognizes that staying “put” and working more remotely is saving valuable time, money and travel but achieving a new engagement model that delivers, often, a more focused impact through technology touchpoints and targetted outcomes “*on-line” and at clients adaptable needs.

Paul Hobcraft can be contacted at +41 91 751 4350 or by email: paul@agilityinnovation.com