Innovation involves different paths of process to create, including observing, understanding issues, crafting solutions, and implementing. Also, innovation is a process of making novelty values that customers want. In this article, I overview the most popular approach to processing innovation, which is the design thinking of the IDEO and discuss insights for every process involved.
Overview of the innovation process
Innovation processes are activities innovators perform to discover opportunities, make ideas, craft solutions and experiments, and roll out innovation to the marketplace. Any innovation process begins with someone observing around to torch issues that need quick fixing, then understanding these challenges before identifying the most critical problem. There are many tools to dig into details, including the Five-Whys technique. These opportunities are typically valuable or promising projects that lie in the firm (e.g., improve operational excellence) or market or customer (making new or improved products) or technology (e.g., developing a breakthrough technology). For example, a factory manager may create a new process to reduce the production cost or improve operational excellence; similarly, innovators may spot unmet needs in the market to improve existing products, make new products, or increase customer experience. After spotting these opportunities and identifying problems, innovators will spend time creating ideas and solutions before they test them as the problem-solution fit. The best tool for creating divergent ideas is brainstorming, where the team meet to think, solve an issue, and conclude some good ideas. Once a solution is invented to fix a problem, innovators craft a solution and prototype for easing communication with potential customers and collecting feedback. A prototype is a primitive version of a visual draft of a solution, enabling innovators to use it for quick learning and validating assumptions of the solution. Prototyping leads innovators to accept or reject or refine hypotheses about the product or service solution before it is rolled out in the market. In summary, the innovation process answers two types of lean tests, (1) the value test evidencing novelty value of the innovative product or service and including the problem-solution fit and product-market fit, and (2) the growth test evidencing the possible scalability of the innovative solution.
Innovation processes by IDEO
One of the powerful approaches to managing innovation is the design thinking of IDEO. The design-thinking approach begins by observing people and getting insights about the challenges they face, then collecting information on these challenges and concluding the problem that needs a quick fix. After then, you will develop a solution and prototype for learning and testing, followed by the implementation to reach a product-market fit. Here’s an overview approach to innovation, as described by IDEO (Kelley and Kelly, 2013)1:
Inspiration (Observe)
It is about going out into the world and proactively seeking experiences that will spark creative thinking. We find that connecting with the needs, desires, and motivations of people helps to inspire and provoke fresh ideas. Observing people’s behaviour in their natural context can help us better understand the factors at play and trigger new insights to fuel our innovation efforts.
Synthesis (Understand)
After your time in the field, the next step is to begin the complex challenge of “sense-making.” You need to recognise patterns, identify themes, and find meaning in all that you’ve seen, gathered, and observed. We move from concrete observations and individual stories to more abstract truths or patterns that span across groups of people. We often organise our observations on an “empathy map” or create a matrix to categorise types of solutions. We reframe the problem and choose where to focus our energy.
Ideation and experimentation (Solve)
Next, we set off on an exploration of new possibilities for discovering challenges. We generate countless ideas and consider many divergent (different) options. The most promising ones are advanced in iterative rounds of rapid prototypes—early, rough representations of ideas that are concrete enough for people to react to. The key is to be quick and dirty—exploring a range of ideas without becoming too invested in only one. These experiential learning loops help to develop existing concepts and spur new ones. Based on feedback from end users and other stakeholders, we adapt, iterate, and pivot our way to human-centred, compelling, and workable solutions.
Implementation (Rollout)
Before a new idea is rolled out, we refine the design and prepare a road map for the marketplace. The implementation phase can have many rounds. More and more companies in every industry are launching new products, services, or businesses to learn. They live in beta and quickly iterate through new in-market loops that further refine their offering.
- This post is sourced from my new book- Your Guide To Reach Innovation.
- For more information about the book: https://growenterprise.co.uk/your-guide-to-reach-innovation/
- To register in our newsletter: http://eepurl.com/ggcC29
Final note: the book- Your Guide To Reach Innovation, is an actionable guide to innovation from beginning to end. Enjoy reading the book, and I look forward to your reviews.
Author: Munther Al Dawood
maldawood@growenterprise.co.uk
Reference:
- Kelley, T. and Kelly D., 2013. Creative confidence, Crown Business, New York
Grow Enterprise 