“… Because its purpose is to create a customer, the business has two — and only two — functions … Marketing and Innovation. Marketing and innovation produce results, all the rest are costs …” — Peter Drucker

The ability to develop and launch new products and services is critical for the long-term future of any business, yet 90% of new developments result in commercial failure. This article discusses some of the issues with innovation and highlights proven processes that ensure every launch is a winner. Topics covered are:

• Why you shouldn’t listen to the Voice of the Customer
• The search for Six-Sigma Innovation
• How to identify Innovation Hot-spots
• On-Demand Concept Generation

The Importance of Innovation

The creativity and inventiveness of people is a vital ingredient for any business. However, it is only through innovation, the implementation and exploitation of their ideas that a business is able to compete and prosper.

Already, the competitive landscape has significantly changed with globalisation. Now appearing are many new competitors from low-wage, dynamic economies. For instance, China has given birth to some 50 automakers, such as Geely, Chery, Great Wall Motors and Brilliance. Who knows which of these fledgeling car companies will become the global giants of the future? Staying competitive will require a step-change in innovation performance.

As Peter Drucker points out, the two key activities within any business are Marketing and Innovation. Marketing allows the identification and understanding of suitable hungry markets. Innovation allows the fulfilment of the market’s need in some unique way that customers value greatly. Without marketing, there is no customer pull. Without innovation, the proposition is copied or disrupted by competitors. In the longer-term companies that don’t innovate die.

The post The Innovation Lens | How To Identify The Next Big Thing appeared first on Raglan Tribe - The Business Growth Engineer.

Recently, I was leafing through an old course on six-sigma problem solving which was a staggering 250 PowerPoint slides. The course was structured around the six Sigma terms Define, Measure, Analyse, Improve and Control.

Nothing wrong with that, but it occurred to me that you do not know whether or not you have learnt the course material until you have gone through the full D.M.A.I.C. cycle. Now here was a problem, the way the course was structured, when the teacher taught the define section, he took you through 32 different techniques for defining a problem.

Next with measure, there were 40 different techniques and so it went on through the whole cycle. The 250 slides, took you through hundreds of different techniques in a linear sequence before you closed the loop and solved your first problem. Remember learning feedback does not happen until you solve a problem.

So my question is why can’t trainers teach you the minimum to close the loop and then focus on feedback when you solve your first problem? It would be nice, to learn the most common technique for defining a problem, the most common technique for analysing a problem, the most common technique for improving a problem and then the one most common technique for controlling the solution to the problem. Ta da, you have your first solution, you have some feedback and if the solution is not very good the trainer can introduce you to another more advanced technique within the problem-solving cycle that will enhance the solution.

Fractal Learning Definition

And so, I have coined the term fractal learning that describes a learning process where you learn the minimum to close the course-correction loop so that you can assess the quality of the solution to identify gaps in your learning. This sounds like a much better way to learn than a trainer stuffing your head full with hundreds of techniques before you see any real-world results.

It turns out, that this approach is ideal for business training where you naturally have a business process with a feedback loop in terms of financial results. Imagine, a training approach, where you take a business process, learn an improvement technique and see the profits soar before you learn anything else. It’s a very lean approach and I thought it was original before I came across this TED talk by Josh Kaufmann.

The first 20 hours — how to learn anything | Josh Kaufman | TEDxCSU

The video is brilliant and the referenced “Axis of Awesome” video is at the bottom of this page. So just to recap, the key steps in Fractal Learning are:

1. Deconstruct the skill that you are trying to learn
2. Learn enough to get into a self-correction loop
3. Remove barriers to practice
4. Introduce more advanced techniques each time you cycle through, based on the feedback

You will quickly move from unconscious incompetence to competence as you practice and get the results. The business course-correction process could look like the business loop in the diagram.

A. Attract Leads – First, do the minimum to attract some leads. This could be advertising or going to a trade-show. Whichever makes most sense, but just learn one technique and move on.

B. Sell Offer – If someone shows interest, then practice one sales technique for making the sale. If that worked, you could try an up-sell to Enhance the Offer next time through.

C. Fulfill Offer – Developing a product is complex, if you don’t have any products, then offer a service instead or ship someone else’s product. Either way, get something in the box.

D. Collect Payment – Now collect the payment with the easiest payment taking technique. Perhaps use PayPal through an Internet Connection.

You see, it doesn’t have to be difficult. You just keep going round and round the loop making money and learning new techniques during each circuit. Many techniques won’t work, that’s fine. Effectively, you are building a business as you learn. However, you must have a test and measurement system in place to collect the feedback and to prove what works and what doesn’t.

If you like the video and want to learn how to improve your business, then this site is for you. Fractal Learning focuses on these business processes and learning the minimum before quickly turning your learning into action and getting the business results.

Axis of Awesome Act

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There are three major areas of risk in the product development process when it comes to developing new hi-tech products:

• Technology risk
• Management risk
• Market risk

We tend to dwell on the first two, because that is what you’re aware of on a day to day basis.

Will the technology work? Do you have good development and communication processes? Do you have the right people? is the project on track? and so on…

But by far the biggest area of risk is the third one — market risk. Think about it, you only really know if you’ve got a flop on your hand when you launch the new product into the market. By that stage, you’ve already spent all of the development budget.

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