Good Essay On The Business Of Innovation

The major lessons, learnt from the “Business of innovation” deal with the prerequisites and drivers of innovation. The key thing that was mentioned by the vast majority of experienced innovators, invited to the studio, is that it is necessary to see the space for innovation and not to be afraid to invent new things. If a manger of a large corporation sees that something functions not properly and needs to be improved, he/she shall not think that it is just the way things need to work and develop ideas, learning from issues and failures.
Actually, as it was also underlined by the speakers of the “Business of innovation”, failures represent an important source of learning. However, they do so only if one does not perceive a failure as a tragedy for business, even if it is costly in financial terms. An important question that was discussed during several parts of the “Business of innovation” was whether only start-ups can innovate or big corporations can also do so. In this regard, it was emphasized that corporations need to establish conditions, favourable for innovation. They include the development of a company’s identity and elaborating on the ways to overcome procedural and communication-related barriers to innovation, frequently present in large companies. Furthermore, companies shall promote special trainings for future innovators.
Another insight is that the companies shall elaborate on the ways to get to know more about their customers, especially their preferences and perceptions about specific products. This is especially topical for innovators, concentrating on the development of new product lines. In this respect, it is not worth forgetting that innovation does not necessarily mean inventing a new product. Most frequently innovative products represent creative combinations of existing ones (e.g., the mix of a multi-player online game and reality show).
Finally, despite the fact that the innovation is usually considered to be risky, prominent innovators advise to take care about the money first before starting to introduce new ideas into practice. To conclude, the major lessons to be learnt about successful innovation include seeing the space for innovation; being not afraid to innovate; learning from failures; creating innovation-friendly atmosphere; getting to know customers; combining existing ideas and valuing financial resources.
The major challenges for innovation, experienced by corporations can be addressed as follows. First of all, companies often lack a vision of the directions for future growth. In other words, they do not know whether to expand to foreign markets , try to develop new products or combine both. Secondly, many companies do not have innovation-friendly atmosphere. This challenge is caused by a range of factors. Large companies with hierarchical organizational structures often develop complicated lengthy procedures that prevent management and employees from effective bottom-top innovation. Furthermore, it is hard for large companies to reinvent their identities, so that they fit modern competitive landscape and inspire employees to introduce the game-changing ideas. A third important dimension of innovation-related challenges deals with people’s inertia. Even if they have some ideas how to improve the operation of the company, they will not introduce them, thinking that things still go like they should go. Importantly, large companies are often distracted from innovation by a significant amount of daily operations-related factors. That is why it is often recommended to create specific departments that will primarily deal with innovation in large companies. Finally, corporations may lack an outsider perspective to develop the framework for changes and promote them.To sum, strategic discrepancies, the lack of innovation-friendly environment, distractions and the absence of an outside perspective lead to the fact that organizations are prevented from inventing game-changing ideas.
I agree with the vast majority of the positions, expressed by the panel. Innovation is a crucial exercise for modern companies, functioning in the capricious consumer society. Meeting the ever growing needs and wants of consumers successfully is nowadays only possible, if a company continuously searches for the ways to improve its performance and introduces new products. In this regard, it is highly important for companies to be aware about the industry trends and consumers’ needs and wants.
Interestingly, many of the panelists mentioned technologies as a key driver of successful innovation. Making best use of new technologies and bringing them closer to the average consumers shall be viewed as one of the major tasks, posed in front of the companies. Even if a company is already successful and attracts attention of billions of consumers around the globe, it is not the time to relax. Considering the example of Facebook, broadly used worldwide, it is necessary to emphasize that it currently explores the opportunities to finance research and development in the field of augmented reality in order to introduce new communication-related opportunities to customers. If the leadership of the corporation relaxed and forgot about the need to continuously improve the consumer experience, another company would promote the idea of augmented reality, weakening current positions of Facebook.
Another crucial thing to mention (that was only briefly addressed by panelists) is that innovation is all about people and their ideas. Therefore, it is essential for corporations not to forget that and put an emphasis not only on rules and procedures, but ideas. Even special procedures and rules can be elaborated to promote innovation (e.g., flat organizational structures, common brainstorming sessions, meetings with the company’s CEO for employees and mangers).
The most important concepts I associate with the “Business of innovation” include innovation, growth, leadership and risk management. I would say that I tried to innovate since I was at school, not knowing that what I do is called innovation. When preparing papers and leading group projects, I always tried to do something the way that was never used before. Actually, I did not even always invent a totally new idea or concept, but created it with the help of combining several ideas or concepts I already knew. It was also useful to emphasize comparisons and parallels, especially when learning history and trying to explain specific novel events.
The concept of innovation is tightly related with the one of growth. Innovation facilitates growth. That is why I always try to do something new to let myself grow in professional and personal terms.
Leadership practices are also important to facilitate innovative thinking of team members. If a leader is a good listener and can successfully motivate a team (e.g., through building up trustful relations within it and promoting openness, he/she will necessarily find the procedures and practices that can help a group develop ideas. For instance, when I was leading school research projects, I tended to use different short table games to break the ice and immediately transferred to brainstorming .Being excited about the game, team members extrapolated their excitement to brainstorming, and we got really good suggestions that could be hard to develop without any preparation.
Finally, it is always crucial to be aware of any risks, stemming from innovation. Understanding this, I always consider safety and possible risks, w hen doing something new (e.g., new sports).