digital technologies and innovation - Smart Agility Intelligence

Reducing today’s Volatility with Innovation Ecosystem Thinking and Design

Innovation ecosystem thinking and design, our growing need

Much of business today is caught up in managing short-term change that is growing in complexity and challenges.

So the challenges in the past year have been highly focused on supply chain disruptions, plugging gaps in technology solutions that can provide a higher flexible, agile, and advanced planning and production environment and continue to keep moving towards securing a more sustainable future that reflects the need to become carbon neutral, net zero.

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

Today’s systems are highly stretched and have been designed and built for a steady, repeating business, the era of yesterday. Flexibility, agility, and adaptability have yet to be addressed sufficiently in design or mind shifts for our present and future operations to provide a different, more agile operating environment. Consistently has been the norm, whereas today it reacts to constant change coming from multiple, often unpredictable situations.

We need to change how we operate.

Unlocking New Innovation Value through Collaborations

I believe that innovation ecosystems transform how we approach and manage innovation. The value is in developing them out and here is why

By embracing the power of ecosystems, we can tap into the collective intelligence and resources of diverse partners, leading to breakthrough solutions and sustained growth. This document will explore the key aspects of innovation ecosystems and their value proposition.

Opening up our thinking toward ecosystems has a powerful effect: As we shift our mindset to embrace ecosystems, we experience a profound shift in our perspectives. Engaging different partners fosters emergent thinking and evolves our approach to managing relationships within these ecosystems.
Increased interactions and tightly controlled activities drive synergies: Ecosystem designs require enhanced interactions within the community. Activities within the ecosystem need to be tightly controlled to unlock the synergistic effects. Effective relationship management becomes crucial in driving innovation and adapting to the evolving ecosystem concept.
Agility and strong orchestration are essential for new business models: Ecosystems that give rise to new business models require a high capacity for agility within participating organizations. The dynamics of these ecosystems stretch internal capabilities and competencies. A strong orchestrator is needed to manage the challenges and cultural biases that can hinder progress.
Aligning partners based on needs rather than organizational priorities: Aligning partners within an ecosystem is different from aligning them solely to one organization’s needs. In the past, we adapted to the requirements of dominant organizations. In an ecosystem, partners align based on the platform’s needs, requiring a shift in perspective and a collaborative approach.
Nurturing the health of the ecosystem: The health of an ecosystem depends on three fundamental aspects: a. Recognizing the value each participant brings to the ecosystem, even if their values differ. b. Achieving critical mass within the ecosystem enhances robustness and maximizes combined effects. c. Fostering continuous performance and improvement through joint learning, leading to optimization effects and increased relevance.
Assessing partners’ capabilities and managing strategic questions: Assessing partners’ ability to deliver their commitments is crucial, as it is often an unknown factor. Strategic questions need to be addressed, such as measuring the offering’s value within the ecosystem, understanding dependencies, managing risk, and estimating the timing for adoption.
The value of collaboration in tackling complex challenges: Innovation ecosystems offer significant benefits when addressing complex challenges that no single organization can solve alone. By fostering collaboration, knowledge exchange, and discovery, these ecosystems enable the development of innovative solutions that leverage diverse expertise.
The power of digital platforms and ecosystem design: Digital platforms play a central role in enabling collaborative environments within innovation ecosystems. Ecosystem design relies on building networks and relationships around valuable focal points, allowing for continuous interactions, knowledge sharing, and co-creation.
Benefits of innovation ecosystems: Participating in innovation ecosystems offers several advantages, including a. Access to a broader range of resources and expertise. b. Increased collaborations and co-creation opportunities. c. Scalability and speed in innovation efforts. d. Flexibility and adaptability in response to market changes. e. Potential for sustainability and social impact.

Conclusion:

Innovation ecosystems provide a powerful framework for driving collaborative innovation and unlocking new value. By embracing these ecosystems, organizations can tap into the collective intelligence, resources, and diverse perspectives necessary to tackle complex challenges, achieve sustainable growth, and make a lasting impact.

Through digital platforms and strategic partnerships, we can shape the future of innovation and create a more connected and prosperous world.

The benefits of participating in cross-sector innovation ecosystems

I can remember getting completely “hooked” on Business Ecosystems by a series from Deliottes and one specific report, introduced and coordinated by Eamonn Kelley, with many contributors including Kelly Machese, Anna Muoio, John Hagel, and Larry Keeley. It was called “Business ecosystems come of age” and maybe it did not change my life, but it gave it a clearer focus- innovation ecosystems. Take a read, it is well worth it, its value then, 2015 has only matured in my mind.

I was also looking at another great piece by Deloitte on tapping into the Silicon Valley innovation ecosystem under a report called “How to Innovate the Silicon Valley Way” that came out in 2016. Another great motivation for focusing on innovation ecosystems.

One question asked in the Silicon Valley piece was “Why should enterprises give up transactional approaches in favor of dynamic, ecosystem-led innovation?

Today I would reverse that question “Why would any company still be locked into transactional approaches only functioning on its own resources?”

Today the struggle is to deal with increasing complexity, undoing the “knot” of difficult challenges and these cannot be undone or solved without collaborations outside one organization’s walls. We need to push this even further and totally accept that the hardest but best collaborations come from being involved in cross-industry or sector innovation systems.

Unlocking the Power of Innovation Ecosystems: A Pathway to Sustained Growth and Impact

Introduction: Innovation ecosystems have emerged as powerful catalysts for driving transformative change and fostering collaborative solutions in today’s complex and interconnected business landscape.

As organizations open up their thinking and embrace ecosystem approaches, they experience a profound shift in perspective, recognizing the value of diverse partnerships and the need for new management models.

I have written about the value of innovation ecosystems in thinking and design. Over a series of posts, this has built up different arguments or points of value.

Here I am attempting to summarize my thinking today.

I have put them into two parts, both shared here; each highlights a different emphasis on the value of innovation ecosystems but has several cross-over points, seen in different ways.

Cross-sector collaboration for Innovation Ecosystems- summary of summaries

I wrote a four part series on cross-sector innovation ecosystems in April and I felt it was worth summarizing these into one, so I engaged my new office partner, ChatGPT to deliver this in a series of summaries. I can’t argue with these and decided to post these as a valuable initial referencing point on a growing area of organization need, in cross.-sector collaborations innovation ecosystem thinking.

The four-part series on cross-sector innovation ecosystem collaborations emphasizes the importance of collaboration in tackling complex challenges. The series discusses the skills, tools, and processes required for successful cross-sector collaborations, including interdisciplinary thinking, co-creation processes, project management, cultural competence, intellectual property management, and data analytics and visualization tools.

Future industry ecosystems will be highly collaborative and adaptive.

*Future connected industry ecosystems will be highly collaborative*

Seizing breaking opportunities, dealing with disruptions, and delivering on more demanding customer needs are raising the complexity of managing today in our business environments.

The growing recognition is the need to build flexible ecosystems; of partners where access to a diverse on-demand set of talent, knowledge, expertise, resources and capabilities needs a broad approach in today’s world to meet these complex challenges they seem to multiply daily.

In thinking and design, ecosystems offer a different growth path and stability than the previous “go it alone”. Engagements with partners can offer shared data, new, fresh insights, the ability to share costs, shared operation experiences, and expertise to help build new approaches to more ‘connected’ collaborative innovation.

Ecosystems need re-stating for business. Are they real ecosystems?

*Ecosystems – the need to be re-stated for Business*

What are the significant differences between Natural and Business Ecosystems? I wanted to look at this and make some observations and comparisons. Firstly what we seem to get wrong in many labelling of business ecosystems, where sustainability fits, and then attempting to show apparent differences between Natural and Business Ecosystems needs a greater appreciation of differences.

We label far too much as Business Ecosystems.

Applying the label of “Ecosystems” to everything degrades the understanding of its true intent. Ecosystems need to be appreciated as vital and recognized as radically different in how they function and operate.

We call something an “ecosystem, ” which simply provides a rubber stamp of being politically correct, showing the day’s currency, and trying to represent what this means provides additional value or impact. Ecosystem thinking and design are fundamental challenges to how existing organizations go about their business.

Many businesses are claiming “ecosystem” but are, in fact, extending their present, established open innovation activities and placing a greater emphasis on open networking to seek out diverse ideas. This extension alone is not new Ecosystem thinking or design; it is existing thinking.

Tackling interoperability is critical to resolve

For nearly all business entities, the ability to fully connect up the organization across people, processes, design, structures and strategies is always a work-in-progress, never worked upon to the fullest extent and rarely achieved without the most radical transformation.

I come up against the barriers to change caught up consistently in this lack of interoperability. So I have to bring it into this exploring ecosystem and platform designs posting views.

What do we miss in not having that connectivity? Recognizing silos of unconnected knowledge needs changing; we need to leverage all of our diversity and expertise. Do you really know your capabilities, competencies and capacities?

Focusing on making technology work across organizations, internally and externally, with partners that share a common purpose. Our need is to find new growth engines and, more, sustaining. business value. it is our understanding to make exchanges work to enable creativity, and we need technology across processes to talk to each other- called interoperability.
Uncertainty, fear of the unknown, reluctance to share and partner, or to mutually “pool” intellectual property or our research know-how in a shared collaborative effort is hard. We often hold onto our knowledge as our “source of power”, this we need to let go of and embrace a new way of believing, trusting and collaborating. We will gain far more than we lose.
We must ask the important questions and fully recognize the answer to “what do we do well? How can we leverage and build out from this?” Are we investing enough time in networking, exchanging insights or building relationships? Knowing our core capabilities, competencies, and capacities is essential.

Let’s tackle one tough one- interoperability makes or breaks much of what we struggle to do -exchange knowledge.

Leveraging the core of what we already have

*The need to leverage our existing core first in any change*

Embracing our core and leveraging these to the best of our abilities is a great place to start undertaking and preparing organizations for necessary change. This begins a journey so it is not simply efficiency we are looking for but achieving a much higher level of effectiveness to be ready to make changes ahead less disruptive.

Do you really know your capabilities, competencies and capacities?

In most cases, an organisation has a capable, familiar core – and improving the performance of this core will contribute a significant value at a lower cost and faster than introducing new tools, but the need is to understand the how, where and what.

Existing tools don’t often require being replaced by new technologies, but knowing the data flow and having greater analytics needs changing, updating and improving. Changing and improving existing processes can be much faster than introducing new approaches and tools requiring new skills.

Is this the early adopter stage for shifting towards a new Ecosystem design? Build on what you have first and then make a staged, purposeful move towards a change that is transformational, partly gained from learning from the existing first.

Discussing with ChatGPT about Business Innovation Ecosystems, their value and progress

*ChatGPT supports extracting human knowledge through AI learning*

I decided to find out what ChatCPT had as “thoughts” on both Business and Innovation Ecosystems. So in a short set of questions, these were the replies.

I have focused on Ecosystems and technology Platform understanding since 2016. I have written much of my learning here on this posting site. So far, these insights have built over 100 posts on related subjects or side issues with different degrees of influence over understanding ecosystems and platforms in their design structures and how to build them.

Business Ecosystem understanding is still emerging in the collective understanding of many business organizations. I hope, by default, they do not revert to small experiments unless in a very selective and focused way to understand certain parts of the differences that ecosystems bring.

These chats with ChatGPT are not bad; they provide a good sense of the logical structure and value of Ecosystems that I wanted to share here as a good starting point or reference for those looking to understand some of the basics around business and innovation ecosystems.