Perhaps I have fallen into the very trap I have campaigned about in the past, in recognizing and resolving the disappointing results we achieve from all the work we put into the front end of innovation. The “warm and fuzzy” front end of innovation can make us all a little grumpy.

Let me explain. I recently wrote out a newsletter – termed a thought or two – to my innovation network. This network is split between the advisers and consultants delivering into clients and the clients themselves, that I have a connections into that have built over the years. These are mostly through knowing them, working with them, exchanging or simply connecting in LinkedIn. The subject was the changes occurring at the front end of innovation.

My argument was the results we have obtained from a disconnected set of front end activities was poorer than they should be, and this needs changing. I feel there is a real shift potential happening today through connecting technology and connected solutions to ‘transform’ this front end. My feeling is the front end is often “warm and fuzzy” and it needs to be radically redesigned. I wrote about “hearing all the voices of ideas at the front end and the “two distinct parts of the innovation funnel” building from my original post “the new extended innovation funnel“, written in 2011.

Well I delivered the “warm” in this latest “heads up newsletter” and yes I received back some nice compliments on my thinking, as “nicely put”,”completely agree” “confirmed my thinking for a several years”, one I loved “idea driven innovation does not work.”

I even had a few coming back fairly strongly in delivering ‘grief’ around: “you seem to be telling only half the story” or “did you pay attention to what I have said before” or finally even one suggesting their solution, presented over many years, was really the one to answer my piece, not  provide even more new ones.

So far these comments have come from those advising into clients, not (potential) clients themselves, that are clearly far to busy managing the fragmented front end they are responsible for. I often find it takes time to percolate down breaking those different ideas into organizations, it often tends to be a “wait and see” or what is best practice on this? Then they get ‘caught out’ and chase for instant answers on this or that. I often wonder why that is so? No prizes being offered!

So, some ‘grief’, some compliments, and I ended up feeling ‘warm’ but a little chastened, as I had failed in clearly raising the level of curiosity intended in my mail out for a greater, deeper engagement that I was attempting. A view to prompt the thinking about the front end differently, perhaps I left this maybe far too “fuzzy” for many and not with a clear enough a value statement to build from by engaging me more on a direct, more consultative basis. Partly my intention as I’ll explain here.

Moving from warm and fuzzy into bubbling to the surface.

Clearly in the ‘heads up’ newsletter I was not as specific as I should have been, it got a little buried in the build up, the context setting. So I need to spell out a little more on that I am seeing / appreciating a greater clustering of software solutions that feed into and out of the idea management process and I’ll start this a little more here.

The ‘thing’ that is new is the technology is beginning to really link all this external and internally generated knowledge or insights, and this is coming from software solutions. I am not claiming ideas from outside, roadmapping, technology search, idea relating are new in themselves, it just has not been CONNECTED as it can be now – that is the new part.

That inflow and outflows makes it more dynamic, structured and capable of getting ideas that have potentially greater impact and relationship – relationship to people engagement, to criteria set or defined and alignment into the goals / objectives of the organization with its innovation.

Providing the ‘heads up’ newsletter here. It builds a common story on our failing at the front end of innovation

So let me provide the newsletter here also, it still does build the argument for change even if it seems “warm and fuzzy” for a number of people within my network. The software solutions I allude too, well those clients interested or curious enough can contact me. The consultants that want to know, well they will equally find out soon enough.

So here is the newsletter, I will be explaining the impact and change potential that can be made in a future post.

The front end of innovation is undergoing considerable change, is it for you?

Ideas need to be even more connected both within the organization and outside coming in. Why? With all the multiple forces at work that seem to be challenging and transforming so much in this age of increasing disruption, we are requiring a bolder set of innovation solutions than ever before.

The need to see beyond incremental products as the ‘safe’ solution is being questioned today, ever-more so and that is driving the big shift at this front end. Innovation needs to deliver far more.

The value of ideas is not valuable unless connected.

We are long past “ideas for ideas sake” although I’m still told I’m very wrong here with all the continued calls to create those ideation ‘hotspots’ as that seems to engage those within organizations or so many think.

How mistakenly wrong this call for simply ideas really is. Failure remains still as high as, or even higher, than ever where precious resources get consistently side-tracked. Most of this “cause and effect” you can point towards as being purely internally created, in generating the innovation without that real market awareness or client understanding. Broader engagement in innovation creation is presently hampered by this narrow view. One solution is that we need to deepen the front end of understanding and I believe solutions are in plain sight.

Having an Idea Management system, as a stand-alone, is fine for incremental innovation but if your organization is really looking for industry spanning outcomes that yield radical, more distinctive and sometimes disruptive innovation, this does require a greater commitment well beyond aspects of open innovation, selective crowd-sourcing or hackathons. It needs greater front end connection than just relying on purely internally generated ideas, ones that seem so often provided to fit specific and narrow agenda’s. Many innovations emerging from this internal orientation are lacking real market and customer awareness.

Resources within innovation are often highly constrained and can get so easily distracted due to poor scoping or disciplines or chasing idea rainbows. We have so much wasted effort, demoralizing and counter-productive inputs and outputs generating poor final outcomes that don’t fit the current needs of customers, or transform the landscape sufficiently by picking up all the signals that are all around us.

There is a real need to challenge what we have been doing and re-evaluate it. We have come a good way towards more strategic innovation, less operational necessity as this point of time.

The big shift potential at the front end of innovation

The big change in my mind is that organizations need to shift from idea generation being simply generated from inside the organization as the starting point. For me the shift to trends and market signals coming into the organization to kick-start the internal generation, to connect the dots, develop far more cross-industry awareness, this is becoming the real and current ‘buzz’ and enabler to getting closer to finding innovation, that can offer a higher impact and return.

It is within the clustering of software solutions around idea management that changes the dynamics, enables greater engagement, higher quality and relevant inputs and provides the outcomes to be more structured and impactful.

Coming from the outside-in offers so much fresh stimulus yet it is recognizing those signals as value is become the innovating challenge, translating these into innovation deliverables.

How do you organize around all the changes that are coming from cross-industry awareness, determining the trends that taking place before our very eyes as the potential dots that might connect with the internal thinking? Yet we remain stubbornly blind to them while we conduct internal idea generation as our starting point and then go outside. We need to rethink the front end totally differently.

Today we need outside-in first in organized, structured ways, before we internally generate and then either go back outside or develop from within. A greater need for engagement and enablement requires different solutions at this front end.

We need to open up to what is going on all around us, daily and allow that ‘greater’ external thinking in prior to idea management, so we can relate the ‘known’ from within, with the becoming-known or the “we were unaware,” the unknowns, from outside to connect the unconnected for some dramatically different innovation outcomes.

Are you changing your front end of innovation?

You should be redesigning your front end radically differently from today. Why don’t you talk to me on exploring this shift taking place, before your very eyes, a little more to relate or clarify these changes? The front end is shifting, are you making plans? You should be. I am an email or phone call away.

In summary here within this post.

I got some grief, I got some compliments on raising the difficulties that we still struggle with, at this front end of innovation, one or two got annoyed that I was not providing them the solutions I was alluding too.

Did I fail in communicating a growing shift at the front end of innovation – no!. Sure I’m going to gift wrap the whole story am I not? Yeah right! I need to live and through my research, and work through Agility Innovation Specialists I’m around to provide my innovation expertise and service in my advocacy practice.

I come back to a lovely comment made by a good friend and inspiration thinker I knew in Singapore, Dilip Mukerjea and his brain dancing thinking:  If you wish to have value for money would you give money for value?

So there is a shift. Connecting the front end through software that integrates the inside, the outside, the capturing process, the translating process, the registering and the plotting going forward process I think is different, radically different through its connecting possibilities. If we can replace more of the ‘fuzzy’ at the front end that it is beyond the simple fact that the front end is all about needs, insights, different perspectives, it is about breaking down and connecting up all the silo’s that have held the front end up, we might achieve a greater connection and engagement, that can deliver better results.

I believe is absolutely necessary for innovation to fulfill its promise and be more central to our growth plans within organizations and we, it seems are getting closer, in terms of creating an integrated end2end innovation system as something that is finally beckoning, at least at the front end initially!

That is the ‘breaking’ story – warm and fuzzy but connecting the front end of innovation. More will come soon.

The post Warm and Fuzzy at the Front End of Innovation first appeared on Building Your Innovation & Ecosystem Intelligence.

The post Deeper read or quick summary? Depends on the time we have. first appeared on Building Your Innovation & Ecosystem Intelligence.

Deloitte has set up different thinking tanks. An exceptional one is Deloitte University Press who publishes some really good original articles, reports, and periodicals that provide insights for businesses, the public sector, and NGOs. They break down their topics into these:

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How often do you pause for thought, testing yourself, questioning even simply for ‘just those few minutes,’  to allow yourself to openly challenge where you are and what you are attempting to do?

We keep relentlessly moving on, like a wandering herd of buffalo, always looking for fresh pasture, those new feeding grounds. It’s not good.

Of course, I often get caught up in this restless pursuit of gathering more, when I spend a growing amount of my time researching innovation. I keep coming across so many things that ‘trigger’ the thinking, pushing me on.

Do you let them go, ignore them, quickly pass over them, or attempt to capture the issue as something well worth investigating further at a later stage, or just get them simply behind you in the here and now.

I think I must be reverting back more into a hunter-gatherer, in my case upon innovation insights; collecting the raw material that I am looking to eventually translate and distribute as this growing knowledge stock.

The outcome  I trust is moving me slowly towards becoming an innovation curator, hopefully, valued by others. Well, it’s a goal.

I also regularly need what I call my ‘walkabout’ moments to chill out and regroup.

Walkabout is best known when an Australian Aborigine undergoes a journey, wandering in the wilderness for periods as long as six or so months.

This wandering mostly becomes a rite of passage, in my case my walkabout’s are aimed to move my innovation understanding from one state to another, hopefully improving by what I have learnt and gathered.

I have so often to force myself to stop being a collector of ‘all things new’ that is written about innovation. I keep attempting to put as many of the existing pieces together, searching for the patterns and insights, trying to make a different sense to them, with the aim to add further to the innovation stock and innovation capital.

Presently I am in the middle of a digital and paper clear-up ready for another walkabout

Either the mass of papers that I confess I’ve printed out so I can highlight, scribble over and allow these to ‘fester’ a little longer, so the ideas permeate through my thick skull or my digital collection all need shaping differently. I’m been busy working through my digital library, whipping this back into a decent shape after a heavy collecting period of interesting articles that all need to be referenced for future use.

There is so much to explore, it does get overwhelming and this is why these ‘walkabout’s help clear my brain (and my desk). I also use mind mapping software to capture much so the different patterns and connections can become a little more coherent, well for me at least.

Craving for the innovative open road

I do like the idea of an open road on where we can go and what we might explore but we actually do need to take some time to choose the routes, even when much of it can be serendipitous, as it has to contribute ‘just’ beyond knowledge into something valuable.

In our investigations we need to watch out for all the signs (not necessarily signposts)  along the way, those signals, patterns and emerging trends as we both search the horizon but equally in fully appreciating what is all around us, as we travel building our understanding on that journey.

I often feel I am a journey man and I’m certainly comfortable with that.
I have to admit, I am a happy man playing in my innovation sandpit, linking these thoughts into emerging solutions to tackle some client problems, move innovation along or answer some questions posed.

I work on these for others on given value propositions around the following: “you need someone who can put clear coordinates into the innovation world“.

I keep moving towards this concept of being a curator of innovation, collecting and distributing it, interpreting it, re-ordering it to meet specific needs. To do this I need to keep up a given rhythm, filtering and funneling, dampening or magnifying this growing knowledge around innovation.

I enjoy this but it does take up more time than I can sometimes really afford. I think I need an investor who see’s value in structuring this into an innovation knowledge platform, until then, if ever, I travel my path.

 “Time starved, knowledge poor,” so when do we gain the luxury to think

When do we find the time to really delve into the necessary understanding for innovation in deeper and valuable ways. We are often just ‘reacting to daily issues’ and constant crisis as we are so focused on the delivery of short-term results.

We lack a space where we can explore thoughtful analysis, deepen our personal knowledge and make all the right connections we would ideally like. We lack time and insights that can give greater direction or answers.

We are needing those personal ‘curated’ spaces where our particular interest builds up in the required knowledge (collect, manage and apply) to then be able to build from this and move onto the next knowledge stream of value to you. We never find the ongoing opportunity to alter our innovation understanding and influence our future delivery.

What would help here? Is it innovation coaching, mentoring, providing an innovation knowledge platform, a place to go and find content-rich insights that yield impact and give a renewed intensity? What would be attractive? What would give to your understanding of innovation and its management?

How does one offer such a personal space where you can draw in the knowledge and interpret it in your way, appropriate to meet your innovation goals?

Also I’m enjoying some sparring, exchanging, and developing as ongoing.

I’m also caught up in a great discussion with my occasional sparring partner Jeffrey Phillips of Ovo, this time around in change, culture and innovation and I think this will eventually emerge as a further piece of collaborative work between us.

This will follow on from our collaborations around the Innovation Executive Work Mat , where we have been seeking out common cause and building strategic and innovation alignment, along with our earlier attempts to describe a “Collaborative innovation reference model“, published under “reducing innovation mysteries” and on its homepage.

I’ve written before about “finding our true purpose” and working the innovation space is mine to explore and think through. As I stated in that post, mine is increasingly focused upon:

“Establishing the ‘new’ often means moving beyond the already ‘known’, it is to experiment with sometimes the untried, to learn, to achieve faster and improved results, to evolve and push boundaries. This needs fresh perspectives and dedicated innovation knowledge. I attempt to offer those insights and guidance in the emerging areas of innovation”

Off on another innovation walkabout, it is about time, hopefully, the answers will keep coming from the time hopefully well spent.

*Amended on 16.04.2015

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Am I the only one getting overwhelmed in choice, underwhelmed in content value?

This is a bit of a long rant, so turn away now those who love all the free choices you currently have, don’t waste your time reading on.

Those a little more curious, as my friend Michael Fruhling always says in his useful blog “then read on, dear friends….”

What do you get of real value when it is offered free?
You are getting experts offering free webinars or short ‘tasters’ with even offers of “fly me to your destination- no fees just cover my costs”, others offering “join my (global) network” as entreaties. Then you are equally getting software providers giving their take on innovation solutions galore, with the “three lessons learnt” mantra as the takeaways.

These all increasingly add up to you being bombarded daily with their knowledge, that often you can’t really decide if it did have value or not, by the end of the hour you had invested.

Then you get the innovation community providers linking up, providing web chats, drawing in different and diverse opinions from practitioners, academics or specialists, under let’s “ask the experts”, all hosted and moved along to stay within the prescribed time period.

Yet even these are so often totally failing to get to solve your solutions, all you end up getting is their experiences or observations, in someone else’s often unrelated situation, that might even be dangerous to extract and simply apply.

Maybe this is a bad day for me.

I am getting really frustrated by this constant ‘streaming’. I know I can ignore it, click the invite off, I can simply tune out and I think this is where many of us all seem to be heading. Are we really getting the value out of these ‘free’ offers?

You can go on and add in the free mix, different academic courses being offered on innovation from one day, to three days, a week or even longer as on-line courses by providers building their brand for the future. Then you are getting the “upgrade or get left behind” messages from all these. Are these really worth the time investment or just self-promoting?

I’m constantly being told I need upgrading on my innovation skills, nudged to check out the latest software update, and enticed to participate in a debate. It simply goes on and on.

Can it stop? Should it? Will it?

Then we have conference and forum providers for anything innovation, be this open innovation, CEO’s, social innovation, digital innovation. Then you have these consistent meetings offered by the European Union or different institutions, non-profit making organizations etc., etc for half-days- are they mad in what this means in invested time, or are we simply mad to go?

We have so much time on our hands, really?

I certainly can’t afford the time. And then for what, some long introductions and a few ‘choice’ bullet points. Thank god for streaming these live events so you can tune out much but being there, can you run and hide? Did I mention the radio talk shows, and book publicity videos?

Then you have the reading material. OMG! That is me included here! We do need a break from all this, we are all progressively tuning out, not actually in.

Can we afford to miss out- our Kiasu fears– many it seems are saying yes and exactly doing that, others seem caught in this fear of missing out.

Real lasting value or just simply filling in our time?

No seriously, we are so far running ahead of ourselves in delivering ‘something’ as service providers but is it of real, lasting value? We have opened up the spigot to allow a deluge of “anyone” who can simply take hold of an idea or a thought, quickly put it together through a host of technologies and social platforms, so as to deliver their contribution to the mountain of advice equally piling on, I mean mountains of advice.

Can we call stop, surely we are all gradually switching off or do we just totally tune out? I believe clients, meaningful decision-makers in clients are tuning out, as they surely do not have the time for all this.

I just feel we are all getting a little frantic in offering free advice

How can we get back to the basics within innovation, those that can put to simplification back in innovation? Well actually getting back to the basics on anything come to think of it?

I was reading a short article from Ron Asakenas over on Forbes (subject innovation) commenting about “It’s time to simplify innovation”. He prompted this post of mine. His opener I liked:

“Innovation is one of the most popular topics in the world these days, with new books and articles on the subject appearing almost daily. (For example, there are over 70,000 book listings about innovation in Amazon). The problem is that nobody quite knows what the word actually means.

Instead, we’ve gotten tangled up in all of the variations, nuances, tools, techniques, models, frameworks, and paradigms of innovation. So what was once a simple concept — the idea of systematically finding, encouraging, and implementing new ideas — has become horribly complex. Unfortunately, by complexifying innovation, we’ve probably started to kill it.

To reverse this trend, we need to simplify how we approach innovation – by better defining what it is (and isn’t), what it takes to carry it out, and what is needed to enable truly new thinking to thrive”

Personally, I really am not so sure we can reverse this trend but we do need new thinking.

The technology is becoming so pervasive, it just seems to get easier to ‘knock out’ a presentation, offer a webinar, or write an article. We are in a ‘swamp’ of material ‘up to our necks’.

We are making innovation complex, needlessly complicated and increasingly unattractive. We are failing in really “moving that innovation needle” because we are getting more and more people simply “tuning out” and the more we try, the more they reject this and then seemingly tune out even more. We are simply the dog chasing its own tail and enjoying it because we know no better.

The real art of engagement is being lost.
I’m noticing more and more, poorer engagement by everyone, we are in the deteriorating engagement cycle. Where are the meaningful dialogues instead of the ‘like’ symbol?

It is harder to grab someone’s attention, and hold it sufficiently long enough to move through an issue to the next one. We are all becoming so distracted and I’m struggling with an answer to how we collectively can pull back and recalibrate around innovation knowledge and its meaningful exchange?

I’m all for seeking simplification but for innovation to really return and begin to move ahead again it needs this engagement but it needs equally for me, every time, context.

For me Context is King

Maybe it is the one real arbiter of success; it really provides the need to simplify. In an innovation process, context becomes the most important arbiter of success, it is the point we gather around to understand so we can see and understand our role and contribution.

Sorting through for simplification and worthwhile engagement for all concerned

Here is my first attempt to recalibrate all this current flow of (harmful) innovation ‘intensity’. Just an opening suggested context framing, for sorting through this deluge of workshops, and webinars and getting them more personal in simplification, solving needs and offering value.

It needs more work but goes like this for all the multitude of organizations (and individuals) offering innovation advice that needs to reconsider what they are offering and need to ask a set of pre-qualifier questions:

One– If the idea, approach or value proposition isn’t aligned with the needs of the firm or the corporate strategy, (also context) then it will most probably be ignored and tuned out by those we are in need to actually engage with. Do we bother?

Two– How can these ‘open’ webinar sessions be aligned PRIOR, otherwise we end up with a service provider’s generic offering? It is up to the provider to understand the client’s needs, to perhaps work a lot harder on these, otherwise is not time relevant and valuable; it simply stays generic and less valuable. It simply is ‘casting around’ without knowing if there is any catch in this. A scatter-gun approach and not client targeted. Is this really worth all the effort?

Three– Once an idea, theme, the specific need is identified and ‘fleshed out’ and these have to be more client or issue/problem specific for clients to consider then they need clear deliverables not just boring ‘takeaways from mindlessly listening’ – what problem will it solve that is relevant to my issues, how can it be applied, its benefits and impact understanding. Can we deliver on this?

Four– Without this ‘need related’ information on the idea or concept delivered through a workshop, or webinar then it becomes too disconnected to adequately consider, evaluate and convert into useful consideration, then it is not worth it unless you want the simply curious how can afford the time but don’t make decisions. Is that worth all the costs involved?

Five– Surely as service providers if we fail to get through these ‘points of client relevancy’ then there is no new product or service connection or consulting engagement that most of this current activity is trying to generate. Then we should find another, perhaps those that are certainly much harder, to engage, as this easy route is not yielding a ‘reasonable’ return on all the ‘invested’ time. Well is it?

Stepping back to move forward.

There is nothing rocket science here in these five points to be considered but we do need to turn all this innovation advice, this deluge of stuff into something clearer, with a more specific value and context.

We do need to define this upfront far more. It means working on innovation a little harder before we rush to offer these webinars, conferences, half-day meetings.

It might mean less “bums on seat” for the webinar, so be it. If we can get ‘real engagement’ because we are closer to understanding specific needs and not opting for generic solutions, the quality of the material automatically lifts as the group tuning into it has a very specific interest that can have higher chances of leading onto ‘something’.

This automatically raises the engagement game, from the discussion and reduces the ‘also runs’ who don’t have the meaningful insight and knowledge that clients are actually needing to make this engagement really valuable to them.

It also stops the random roaming, the needless cruising around, the mindless listening to the droning on, that is taking place today. We begin to simplify as the context is clearer for us, the value exchange higher and the potential to advance from ‘free anything’ moves into showing that you (we), the provider of the service, have real value to bring into the conversation.

Today, finding good innovation insights that can be applied to a relevant situation that might be coming from general webinars, is a little like ‘panning for gold, it is back-breaking work in your investment in time and eventual application. Knowing the ‘needs specific’ means we can all ‘pan smarter’.

Where is the exchange point of money and value?

I always remember a lovely throwaway comment I heard years back when it came to client and consulting / advisory engagement

“If you wish to have value for money, would you give money for value”

Offering anything free I believe you are not offering any real value equation or much in my mind. Does Apple give anything away for free? No, it builds value through its offering or its partnerships and we need to go back and do this for the knowledge we are offering to prospective clients.

Where we are today with this “free” approach provides very little apart from sucking up an awful lot of everyone’s time and screwing up client-provider engagements into this “race to the bottom”.

We are sacrificing much in quality and carefully considered advice. I believe real decision-makers are tuned out from this channel to market approach mostly.

Now I’ve had my little rant I better go back and check out the value of my own webinars. Do they stack up to offering real value, in addressing specific needs? I’d like to believe so but this also does give me my own pause for thought and by the way, they are actually not free.

The post Tuning out, a need for simplification and better value first appeared on Building Your Innovation & Ecosystem Intelligence.

Today I think we are yet again at yet another crossroads in this innovation understanding and perspective. That is to extract the leading edges required from their innovation activities within organizations. This will require fresh innovation consulting business models to exploit the growing complexity of managing emerging innovation practice to support and extend their understanding.

I’m attempting to get my head around it, let me share some of my thinking here.

There has been a continual shift of where innovation knowledge resides. The external provider, who was the main source of latest insight, hands on practice and leading ideas in the past, I think have been significantly falling behind in recent years, on their contribution and value to organizations.

The advice they are providing is shifting from deep research and repeating practice into investing into offering more the insights of what might constitutes leading edge models to then suggest offerings that generate client value, as a must to understand and have. They have moved from clear ‘leading’ practice proponents to often ‘lagging’ but are exploiting their connections for knowledge insights to offset this.

Innovation knowledge is residing far more in-house of the client

The innovation knowledge needed for completing innovation has transferred more and more within the actual organizations needing to achieve the innovating. Through their constant ‘sets of experience’, working daily within innovation they are building up some essential capabilities and capacities. The external provider has to be able to spot and fill the gaps to offer any value, they are not leading but responding.

With the growing reliance on collaborative tools and the use of technology has meant much more of the complexity of projects has to be managed from within, far too much of the necessary insights and linkages needed cannot come from external resources.

Consultants are being relegated to issues that remain complex but essentially generic, important to organizations but not the vital part of innovation need.  The use of external providers has progressively reduced in high-end value activities into more gap filling ones, as they lack the depth of inside knowledge to pull together the thinking and outcomes needed for delivering the innovation outcomes.

Their value as project specialists has even diminished due to the network need becoming so vital within dispersed organizations and this requires a deepening internal understanding and where the knowledge resides to be extracted.

It seems the role of the consultant has become more marginalised or specialised.

The business model for innovation consulting needs changing. Innovation within consultancies has been seen to be a cheap exercise to support, often not seen as the powerful force for driving the growth and fortunes of the organization as it should have been.

Much of innovations troubles today have been this poor recognition of the need of innovation to ‘reside’ in the boardroom.  It was disconnected from the strategic domain as it was a little ‘abstract’ and intangible, light on established practice.

Today that has changed, innovation needs a much higher focus, it needs to be fully aligned to what an organization wants to do, if it wants to thrive and grow. Innovation is very strategic.

There was also the ‘established practice’ over many years of consulting multiple times across similar issues that were just repeating themselves across many clients that had value that clients were willing to pay for. Often the consultant invested in the costs only once to find the (common) solutions and then set about extracted an increasing yield of return from repeating this multiple times. Today clients see through these practices and are certainly seeking uniqueness to their specific problems. Best practice still extracts from that rather tired model of establishing common practice.

Today innovation needed has to be increasingly unique, for the end results to stand out. This has its implications for anyone providing a service.   The value of best practice might give assurances to the doubters but it is the growing focus on emerging or novel practice that is more valuable to know about.

Also the growing use of open innovation has also enabled more organizations to learn from others and exclude the middle man, by working directly with others tackling similar problems and learning from each other.

Large Consultants are becoming marginalised as they lack the depth of expertise, collaborative inputs that contribute, the notable exception being still in technology application and the expertise and knowledge to link this across global organizations.

The large consulting practices certainly still possess the ‘on-hand’ extra ‘feet-on-the ground’ to augment the repeating work being undertaken within organizations or validating its position. These shift means thinner margins, more chasing to cover growing fixed costs being built up in the broad scoped consulting practice.

Shifting focus on what innovation consultants need to offer.

Consultants working in innovation today, are less ‘innovation factories’ producing the solutions and are often left with more ‘constant’ re-bottling the wine’ to maintain their place. The taste is for consistency not challenging the palate. Consultants can become more advocates for change but this needs a consistency of focus to extract value out of, as the external source of championing change, by providing the knowledge insight.

There is also this rapidly adjusting position into specific ‘knowledge providers’ and validators. Just look at the explosion of thought leadership coming from consulting firms, their ability to hone in and benchmark trends by having access to C-level executives provides a more ‘open’ understanding that internal analysis can ‘pick apart’ and absorb or reject.

Actually in a recent piece of research by www.sourceforconsulting.com they are suggesting the Law of Inverse Audiences for though leadership pieces: the narrower your focus (research or thought piece) the smaller the number of readers but the more interested and engaged those readers are likely to be.

The real insight in this was not so much thinking you know your audience here but the trend that is occurring- to forward this insight onto colleagues as validation or collateral to doubters. Yet the consultant who researched or wrote the piece will most probably never know where it has been used as it’s gone internal. Inside absorption of this external knowledge and what was actually achieved by the consulting firm that undertook this. The old model states “the client will think of us when needed” Will they?

No, the business model for innovation consulting is actually under attack, the position of making money is becoming a whole lot harder unless you shift perspectives and redesign what you can offer so it ‘fits’ far more with the internal needs of clients today.

Are these some of the shifts we are detecting?

An initial work-in-progress list of the shifts in consulting taking place relating to innovation – so what is missing here? This is certainly not exhaustive and not set out to be that, it is attempting to ‘ indicate’ the consistent shifting that has and is taking place in adapting the innovation consulting business model, in search of growth and utilization.

What does the future hold for ‘traditional’ innovation consulting?

Whatever the shifts taking place and I think there are many, the established, more traditional consulting model is not working for innovation. They are being marginalized, left often to catch up with the work going on within their clients. The consultant is not leading; they are following in the practice of innovation. Greater specialization is required and seemingly valued by clients. Knowing what this is becomes the hard part.

There also needs to be further work on what differentiates’ one consultant with another. The client is far more discerning, reacts very negatively to any ‘one size’ fits all approach as innovation activity is unique to each client. The establishment of more Chief Innovation Offices or Vice Presidents for innovation are demanding more from their service providers than ever before. These providers need to be clearly seen as differentiators otherwise that will not get house room.

Shifting sands, covering up old weaknesses

The world of consulting does need to change but many of the client issues still continue to remain the same or in some cases might have even got worse. It becomes  the consultants challenge on more how you can reduce the ‘pressures’ on internal teams or provides real ‘impact’ that supports ‘delivery’ differently than before and can’t be achieved internally alone.

Clients still struggle with a consistent ‘lack of time’ and as we know time is either a friend if you have it or the worst enemy to innovation if you don’t. Just simply chasing for client answers is getting worse rather than better.  Clients are constantly stretched in their utilization of the limited resources they have available to them. They are constantly being distracted away from managing the bigger picture, into side events or having ‘dual’ roles.

There remains this chronic attitude of “I’m not taking any risk or we don’t have a real appetite for experimentation” pervading board rooms. The reality is clients still want tried and tested solutions, yet for me, crazy as this is, they are reluctant to be the experiment lab yet they cry out for the need to be different. How do you ‘square that off’ with what innovation needs to have – a constantly exploring and experimental climate – to find new solutions?

Client budgets seem to be tighter each year, the cost of each innovation undertaken is rising and taking more time and cost as well as the toll for dealing with growing complexity and conflict is demanding. Organizations and the individuals responsible are under growing pressure for innovation to generate real sustaining growth.

Consultants have to manage complexity within today’s dynamics.

Consultants have to work through these dynamics to find their position to offer value and how to figure out what their position is so as to provide the relevant services. This will increasingly call for a far more flexible, agile and focused model than ever before. The pressure on margins, the inability to have more ‘bench strength’ simply waiting around for that client call, the procurement procedures that batter down fees, scope and future options, limit detailed discussions until contracts are awarded makes this harder to work through, yet consultants must.

There are also seemingly more competitors around, in the form of boutique providers of really specialised focus or industry specific expertise, a clutch of independent providers of detailed innovation knowledge and plenty of workshop and training providers, all nibbling away at those finite client budgets that keep eroding the margins and scope for building a reputation for innovation consulting.

Can today’s consulting practice for innovation stand out?

How can they provide real needed and welcomed services to the client? It is getting harder I feel out there for many and the search for different and unique innovation consulting business models is definitely on.

Some are managing this by working on their value position to offer 1) new solutions, 2) adapting solutions that are more evolutionary in their growing understanding, 3) thought leadership that provides new insights and advice to underpin selected competencies and 4) being masters of creative problem solving.

Getting your specialization right

For me I designate these emerging inovation practices as made up of 1) Systems thinkers,2) Structure implementers, 3) Subject Matter experts and those that are 4)Advocacy Catalysts within innovation, or there is a hybrid of all of these, aligned more than likely to a given innovation specialisation.

Whatever the services offered, these still need to be valued by the client (as their clear jobs-to-be-done) and to be positioned and recognized as the service provider who can deliver a higher degree of uniqueness for supporting the specific solutions on these.

I think this is calling for very different innovation consulting business models, more agile, flexible and adapting to unique conditions found within each client.

So if you are an innovation consultant are you mapping your one out or working through the multiple options on your business model canvas yet? I would, as it is not just to survive but to search and find the winning ways to thrive and be recognized as the expert needed.

As for clients, to extract real value from your providers are you clear enough on what you need? Perhaps I can help? I prefer to work in the advocacy space and try to offer subject matter thinking.

The post Are we getting real value out of innovation consultants? first appeared on Building Your Innovation & Ecosystem Intelligence.

I was planning to go to this convention held in Brussel over December 5^th & 6^th, 2011, but eventually was forced to stay back in the office to complete some work for different projects I’m working on.

Thankfully the main conference was online so I was able to follow it, even if a little selectively.

I’m sure you agree on conferences or in this case, a convention, are often ‘variable feasts.’ You never find everything appealing or valuable to you, but even at a distance, I did find plenty of interesting areas in those I was able to watch.

I hope they make many of the sessions freely available post-convention as they have much to draw ‘inspiration and understanding’ from for all of us.

I’m not planning this as a detailed report of the convention but to reflect  and comment about why I think it provided a good contribution to the innovation debate(s), especially here in Europe.

We do need to ‘tune in’ more on what these events can offer, if managed well, in-depth and breadth of innovation’s scope. I’m singling out some of the more striking moments for me.
The intent of the Convention
The Innovation Convention is to become an essential part of the Innovation Union flagship initiative. It will take place on a regular basis to take stock of the progress made towards the objectives of the Innovation Union and to discuss ways forward with a broader perspective in the global innovative economy.

This particular one was opened by the President of the European Commission, Mr. José Manuel Barroso and had about 1,200 or more selected participants.

I got the impression Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, European Commissioner for Research, Innovation, and Science came and went. From my own past experiences you get invited to speak and participant yet, as it seems in this case, the convenor of the convention and responsible for innovation at the top of the EU were not around to listen to want you want to say.

Clearly there are many within the DG research and innovation that can brief her and of course I hope they have that chance, there was a lot of great comments to reflect upon.

Also what I gathered also from the twitter chatter she did spend some good time touring the many exhibitors participating as well. I am sure it is never easy as a convenor to be in all places at one time. Actually I would have felt the same with a number of different and interesting sessions with a choice of plenary, parallel and fringe sessions all competing for the participant’s time as well as visiting the exhibitions and ‘do’ the required networking.

Why was it valuable?
When you are able to attract such an array of top flight speakers and contributors to the innovation debate you are going to gain much and also desperately wish you could have had more.

The opening session was explosive, in a positive way

The opening session excellently facilitated by Ann Mettler of the Lisbon Council was threatening to be explosive, in a positive way. The panel after warming up got into their stride moving from global innovation, working with young people and examining many of the obstacles within the EU for innovation to overcome.

I have to say Ben Verwaagen, the CEO of Alcatel-Lucent was terrific in throwing in the constructive bombs, Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz mopping up the fragments and Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Chair & MD of Biocon Ltd offering some really useful and insightful observations from her Indian perspective of looking into the EU.

The two other participants Jean-Paul Agon, CEO of L’Oreal and Silva Venturini Fendi of Fendi Associates, keeping pulling us back to thoughtful aspects of where innovation works and why, from their perpective.

This was simply a terrific session that could have gone on all day from my point of view with such an expert panel. You could not have asked for a better opening session on drawing out issues, problems and barriers but plenty of constructive solutions. One very telling takeaway was how the EU has got very insular, inward and introspective. In its time of crisis if the EU draws (even more) in, it will lose out eventually.

Kiran Mazumdar- Shaw spoke about affordable innovation models, which we have ‘boxed’ here in the West as ‘frugal’ or possibly ‘reverse’ innovation. I like the real difference she offered- affordable. This reflects not just Indians current need as they are in many developing countries but increasingly will be the innovation approach here in the West. We do need to break this constant churning consumption habit and affordable and lasting need to be more built into the “West’s” changing set of watch words to adopt.

The Delivering Better Healthcare debate

The panel of Dr Margaret Chan, Director-General of the WHO, the CEO of GlaxoSmithKline, Andrew Witty and Marc Koska of Lifesaver gave us the sheer dimensions and complexity of healthcare and where innovation is playing its part.

It provided shocking reality on the ground from Marc Koska and how his organization is innovating to overcome given issues.

Also the really thoughtful ways GlaxoSmithKline are responding to their social pressures and commitments by opening up facilities, patents and working through a difficult path of innovation change going on with the Pharmaceutical industry.

The whole change within Pharma is evolving in front of our eyes.  Ms.Chan added dimension upon dimension on the complexity of world heath. You came away with what a multitude of problems there to be resolved and where innovation has such opportunity.

I could go on and on about the values you could have taken away from these different sessions and the so many other outside of the main hall sessions.

Those two sessions alone that I’ve mentioned fill you head with so much possibility and identification to engage and find distinctive ways to contribute.

Often the draw in conventions is the big name key note speakers.
Having  Eric Schmidt, Google Chairman delivering his personal thoughts around “In Search of a Better Problem”, Don Tapscott on “Innovation in the Age of Networked Intelligence.”

Michael O’Leary, CEO of Ryan Air opened the second day’s session with no more than anyone who has heard him before would expect; a lively, entertaining but valid set of criticisms and lots of poking fun at the EU on “Doing Innovation his (or Ryan airs) Way”.

Michael O’Leary also led a Master class where young innovators presented their case to the audience and Mr O’ Leary contributing his views as a coach. Pupils for the Master Classes were provided by The European Young Innovators Forum and The European BIC Network and I sometimes wondered if the Irish wit, interpretation and thoughts offered by Michael O’Leary fitted.

What did come across as ‘in barrel loads’ was the need for passion, commitment, sheer determination and personal belief and that is just some of the attributes that Michael O’Leary has in abundance.

Some personal disappointments

As I mentioned conventions are a mixed bag. I really would have liked to have listened more to Sam Pitroda, the Innovation advisor to the Prime minister of India. Also for me, Will Hutton, executive vice-chair of the Work Foundation, just seemed subdued and not as insightful as he can be. Both were involved in the social innovation session.

The climate change debate just seemed to ‘bob along’ and for many others I just had no time or opportunity to tune in unfortunately.

The real personal disappointment was the Open innovation and public policy in Europe session offered by Professor Henry Chesbrough.
The session was billed as “ large, vertically integrated R&D laboratory systems of the 20th century are giving way to more vertically disintegrated networks of innovation that connect numerous companies into ecosystems.

Since innovation policy ultimately rests on the activities and initiatives of the private sector, it is vital that policy follows this evolution. New research and analysis on open innovation, for the Science Business Innovation Board AISBL, results in a series of recommendations for public policies that could, if implemented, improve the climate for open innovation to take place in the European Union – and thereby improve the competitiveness of the European economy overall.

Taken together, these recommendations comprise an informal ‘charter’ for EU open innovation policy”.

So I was certainly expecting some depth in this area of rich potential of open innovation within Europe. Why was it such a disappointment for me?
Sadly it got caught up in a potted history of open innovation.

We  went back in time and at least fifty percent of the talk was ‘locked in the past’. I understand context and Professor Chesbrough is rich in this ground laying but I was hopeful we would be looking out in the future through his charter and he failed to get into living up to the billing.

Instead he ‘hinted’ at this and promised more would come from a fringe session. Then you learn his report released by the ScienceBusiness will come out after this session, and cost 35 UK pounds to buy. So a document about open innovation and public policy in Europe, sponsored by a number of well known companies comes at a cost. That for me demonstrates closed innovation not open innovation. What a pity.

The value of such a convention is what you gain out of it.

I clearly was happy to ‘participate’ in this convention, even at a distance. The flow of ‘tweets’ also added value for me in gauging different reactions. It is getting interesting that one of the bellwethers at conferences is the level of tweet chatter, you do get some really interesting reflections and comments and these are getting closer to ‘live’ feedback.

I heard for the ‘geeks’ in the convention had limited space to type, while sitting in the conference hall, whereas I had the ‘luxury’ of being in my office, managing my day on two computers, listening to the convention, tweeting where necessary and getting on with the work that held me back from going.

The organizers should be congratulated. It seemed to me to be a highly organized set of events attracting 1,200 people, plenty of high-quality speakers and an awful lot of messages that bubbled up on innovation to reflect upon.

I just hope there is a significant evaluation taking place on what was offered if it is going to be an annual event to take stock of innovations progress within the EU.

For those that missed it, here is a link onto the site http://bit.ly/owtjiJ and let’s trust the EU makes available different video recordings so many more can share in this event and gain much from its contribution.

Just check-in to see if this happens as I’ve just been told it will take a week or so to do this. Also ‘pencil’ this event in for next year.  I certainly did.

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