The impact of the Millennial Generation on working environments and retail experiences

The Millennial Generation (those born post 1980) has come of age and is influencing the way in which retailers sell and market their products and services. Also, the work place has been influenced by working environment designed to facilitate this highly networked generation. A recent article (interview with Nick Shore, MTV Insights) illustrates the inspiration behind MTV Insights, a study exploring how the Millennial Generation will reshape the future of commerce and working environment (The Millennial Mega MashUp, April 2012).

Beware of One-Size Solutions

A "Procrustean Solution" in statistics is where you draw the trend line you want and then pick only the data that fits the line. This may have even influenced the famous quote "Lies, damned lies, and statistics", which is attributed to, amongst others, William Gladstone, Mark Twain and Alfred Marshall. The back story of Procrustes comes from Greek mythology. On his way to claim his birth-right in Athens, the young Theseus stopped at the house of Procrustes for bed and board. Procrustes was not the sort of Greek hotelier you'd wish to meet. He invited his guests to stay in his special bed, which he claimed was so extraordinary that it's length would exactly match the person who slept on it. What he failed to mention was that if you were too tall for the bed, he'd cut your feet off, and if you were too short, he'd stretch you. Nobody ever appeared to fit the bed at first, because secretly Procrustes had two beds of different sizes. Happily Theseus saw through the deception, slew the villain, and went forth to deal with the Minotaur.

There's no win-win with a Procrustean Solution, it's a form of deception where one set of interests are forwarded at the expense of others. A statistician would obviously be aware of what they were doing if they were cherry-picking the data to fit the curve, but the person looking at the analysis would assume that it was "kosher".

When you are looking at solutions to problems, and especially when someone is suggesting a solution to you, it's easy to be persuaded by the sales patter particularly when there's some compelling evidence to back it up. In Innovation Management, it is important to realise that one size does not fit all. Processes have increased in complexity, and there are now an increasing number of practices which are largely unproven and where the contribution to the bottom line is unclear. A trial and error approach to innovation processes can be expensive and success rarely comes quickly. Since companies need to change fast in a world of accelerating change, they should learn from others' successes and failures as well as their own.

Remember Procrustes, and don't assume that there is an extraordinary solution that will perfectly adapt to organisations of all shapes and sizes. If someone tells you they have a bed that fits everyone, talk to someone who has slept in the bed first!

How to Conduct Successful Technology Scouting

How to Conduct Successful Technology Scouting

Key findings from Best Practice Research Study

Even though the concept of Open Innovation (OI) has been around for some time, insights tend to focus on the ‘what’ and ‘why’, but not the ‘how’. This post gives a sneak preview of the actionable findings from the recent best practice study I have conducted into Open Innovation, and reveals what best practice is for Technology Scouting.

Culture for Breakthrough Innovation

Why are some companies expecting success in breakthrough innovation (this being automatically disrupting market behaviours) without considering the change needed in their employees?

Structuring Front End Innovation

Attitudes to Failure and the Working Environment for Front End Innovation

We often see the FEI process being referred to as ‘fuzzy’ due to the combination of convergent and divergent thinking required when delivering excellence. However, the values of FEI come from companies taking a grasp of their FEI process with a structured approach. This blog post focuses on two of the key aspects to address when structuring the FEI process; attitudes to failure and the working environment.

The Growing Trend of Business Model Innovation

Creating value through Business Model Innovation

In today’s highly competitive and fast-moving technology advanced market space, much of the innovations and cost savings that could be achieved have already been achieved. As our economy continues to put companies under resource scarcity, managers are hesitant to make any big changes where the potential value is accompanied by a degree of risk. A recent piece of research by Raphael Amit and Christoph Zott (Sloan Review, March 2012) uncovered how companies are focusing more on complementing their product or process innovations through business model innovation.

How business models can accelerate innovation.

Lessons in parenting and teenage development

Fred van Ommen, SVP Innovation Excellence at Philips, was speaking at a conference in Barcelona last month  (the 2nd Annual Open Innovation in the Life Science Sector to be exact). His chosen topic was how business models can accelerate innovation.  The Life Science Sector is an area that Fred is passionate about . He ran the MRI (magnetic resonance imaging ) business at Phillips for six years, and during that time he doubled the business,  and he did that  by  changing the design of the outside of the machine. Fred realised that the key to success was the anxiety that an MRI produced in people, not the technology inside the MRI.  People are afraid when an MRI  machine makes a  noise and they are also scared by the lack of mobility. Fred’s success was because he considered the human side of the product.  At Barcelona, Fred and his colleague, Corina Kuiper, took this one stage further when they compared business model innovation to parenting and teenage development. Their starting point was that as a parent you have to be consistent, and with innovation you have to have consistent strategy over time.  

The following comparisons flowed naturally after that: