Innovation – Big and Small

When in 6^th grade, on the walk home with friends, we would stop at a local store and buy a soda (for 5¢) - I'd often think how nice it would be to have an ice cold bottle of water instead of the sweet soda.

With the popularity of bottled water today, was mine an innovative idea? No – it was just a thought, because there was no action to bring it to reality.

When Alexander Bell (and others) perfected the telephone – that was innovative because the idea was developed and something new was introduced. When the rotary dial gave way to push buttons it was a feature change – just a now 'tool' to do the same job of dialing the phone – but when the wireless phone was developed, it dramatically changed how (and where) we used the telephone.

Likewise, making a mobile phone smaller or introducing the flip phone were simply changes in features, but the smartphone was a creative development that added something new – pocket-size access to email, text messages, and internet. - Innovative.

Sticky notes, non-stick frying pans, digital recordings and personal players, and Google search are all innovative. Each was a creative idea that was developed, introduced as something new, and permitted us to do something differently. Innovation 2.0 (further updates and changes) is often just adding features, not renewing or altering the original.

The formula for innovation is: Idea + Development + Introduction = Something New and Useful. Although successful market penetration is not specifically part of the formula (e.g., the Ford Edsel was quite innovative but was a dud in the market); innovation does offer the possibility for rewards ($$) to the innovator.

Today there is an additional – radical – kind of innovation which also has three elements:

• Take something now existing and eliminate all but the core functionality
• Chop the price dramatically
• Expand the market reach by 100X, or 1000X or more.

This is Disruptive Innovation.

Currently, we see this happening in cellular communications – new entrants into the crowded market are offering unlimited calls, text messaging, and data/internet, you buy your own phone, and no contract for $20-$30 per month. These carriers are selling via the internet, at Wal-Mart and similar places – not at free standing storefronts in malls and urban centers. The trade-off for giving up some 'cool' features and putting up with some limitation of coverage areas is deemed worth the user saving up to $1,000 per year in mobile phone bills.

Disruptive innovation has the potential to completely alter established markets and create new leaders at high volumes, lower prices, and profitable margins. The former leaders are forced to 'change or perish' – once begun, disruptive innovation eliminates “business as usual”. Later, as innovation 2.0 feature creep sets in for the new leaders, another opportunity may develop to do it all over again by another disruptive innovator.

Although I have used product illustrations, the concept applies whether product-based or service-based, for profit, non-profit, or government entities that can remove features to get to important core elements, reduce cost/barriers to access, and expand the user base.

As we are struggling with flagging sales, disappearing budgets, pressure from customers, users, and the public, and lack of desired results with past tactical changes, perhaps a disruptive innovation approach is a valid path to take. Get less frills, pay less for the result, and more will benefit through increased access.

Welcome to the New Normal!

What innovative approach could offer a solution for that vexing problem?

Moving Parts

I was having lunch with a friend who is the Assistant Deputy Director to the Deputy Assistant Director, after she came back from vacation.

In a week off, she realized that many of the offices around hers are vacant, and that while once safely in the midst of the horde, she had been exposed by years of attrition. Last woman standing.

She is paid well for skills that are somewhere in the middle of the business development process, probably earning more than 90% of the people in her vacation state. However the results that are now required go far beyond the capabilities of any skills either of us know.

You know why you didn’t win that re-compete? It wasn’t because your team wouldn’t cooperate with you. It’s because the customer didn’t want you back.

If business gets any worse, they may let her go, too. What, you thought you were family?

So we started discussing Plan B. She has spent 30 years honing big company skills. Needs a cast of thousands.

“I’m concerned that by concentrating on getting results, I haven’t developed any management skills.” Don’t worry, management skills are over-rated.

I started naming the three key factors of disruptive innovation – lower price, fewer features, larger audience, and she got excited.

“That’s my college roommate! She has her own business, works with two other one-person businesses in Chicago and Atlanta, no one else like her, and she makes over a million dollars a year!” Now my Assistant Deputy Director has a believable model. Doesn’t know what hers will be, but knows it can be done.

If you’re going to strip out the moving parts, it’s good to think about the three requirements for work to have value, get it right the first time, customer has to care, and the thing must change physically. Then think about what’s the minimum process and organization that will provide what someone wants.

June 12 is the next Capital Technology Management Hub featuring Sales Lab'sRainmaker 14 – The Myth of Full Capacity - 300 seconds of pure profit. The featured speaker will be Cory Lebson of Lebsontech LLC, presenting User Experience: What it Means & Why a Technology Manager Should Care!

Customer Service For All

Organizations get feedback from a number of sources – email, social media, word of mouth, even from other employees.

There is a strong tendency to jump into action when a complaint is registered – all in the name of customer service.

The urgency and energy spent to respond is almost obsessive in many of us – we gotta fix it; we must change it; we have to overcome it.

It is not a bad thing to pay attention to negative feedback and work to satisfy the disappointed customer or patron.

In the frenzy of the moment, does the remedy become so large it over shadows all the satisfied and loyal customers and patrons. This raises the question – are you serving your strongest supporters? The satisfied customer.

Top notch customer service addresses problems promptly, but also conveys appreciation to the happy users as well.

To illustrate the point – I was in line at a fast food restaurant behind a couple suffering (loudly) an error in their order. The manager rushed out to sooth the situation, offered some free stuff, and ushered the two to a table. Meanwhile I was waiting to order – which went smoothly. Unfortunately, neither the server or the manager offered a comment about the delay or thanks for patience while they addressed a problem with the prior order.

This is a minor event, of course, but it often occurs on a grander scale with similar results – a little oil on the squeaky wheel and ignoring the downstream effect on others.

Customer service is serving the customer and it's a 360 degree activity.

How would you create exemplary care for the customer or patron? 

Join us:

June 12 is the next Capital Technology Management Hub featuring Sales Lab'sRainmaker 14 – The Myth of Full Capacity - 300 seconds of pure profit. The featured speaker will be Cory Lebson of Lebsontech LLC, presenting User Experience: What it Means & Why a Technology Manager Should Care!

Stages of Innovation

Innovation is not “out there,” it’s a process. Looking at it historically, technologically, geographically, and developmentally can make innovation familiar and straightforward.

Innovation in the United States in the 1700’s, was often British mechanics emigrating to make their fortune, building other people’s inventions they had learned in Britain. The work was often pirated tools for production, built by immigrant craftsmen.

Recent waves of innovation include agricultural innovation, mechanical innovation, electric innovation, distribution innovation, retail innovation, electronic innovation, software innovation, and digital innovation.

Clayton Christensen has defined disruptive innovation, where fewer features and lower price create a much larger user base. Disruptive innovation is currently seen in enough industries to be observable, measurable, and predictable. As a disruptive innovation matures, it adds features and costs, becoming vulnerable to subsequent disruptive innovators.

Fred Wilson wrote Darwinian Evolution of Startup Hubs charting innovation cycles through time and space to predict when and where innovation will show up.

Jay Deragon shows unsuspected entry points and several unique strategies for innovation with New Business Models In The Middle.

Cory Doctorow demonstrates organizational models for current innovation in Makers.

Wondering where to start your innovation? Some observations:

• My innovations are the result of focusing on something I know. Innovation is making.

• Innovation is starting up where the last person stopped, and

• James Patterson made more money from moveable type than Gutenberg did. (Innovation is not just about new technology. Historically, greater gains come from better application of an existing technology.)

Looking at it that way, there is an unlimited amount of meaningful innovation just waiting to be hacked.

What’s next for you? 

June 12 is the next Capital Technology Management Hub featuring Sales Lab'sRainmaker 14 – The Myth of Full Capacity - 300 seconds of pure profit. The featured speaker will be Cory Lebson of Lebsontech LLC, presenting User Experience: What it Means & Why a Technology Manager Should Care!

 

So What – It Doesn't Really Matter, Does It?

When I was head of HR at a large hospital in Baltimore, supervisors and managers would come to me when routine discipline did not correct a situation with their direct reports.

I recall one situation with a rather autocratic supervisor of the supply department. Their responsibilities included unloading several trailer trucks of supplies first thing each morning, securing the supplies, and delivering the non-pharmaceutical supplies to the clinical areas and then the rest of the hospital.

One of the crew was eternally late – every morning he'd show up about 30-45 minutes after the shift started and the supervisor would write him up, applying progressive discipline, including suspension.

The supervisor had asked for a per-termination review with me in preparation for firing this employee. I ask the supervisor to send him to talk to me before his shift was over that day; I was curious why he wouldn't come to work on time.

When we met, I asked him what the problem was with being on the loading dock ready to work by 6:00AM, like all his teammates? Here's how he saw it:

• I get there when I can, but if I'm late, I always make up the time at the end of the shift – my supervisor get's his 8-hours every day
• When I get to work I jump right in and don't waste a minute unloading the trucks and moving the supplies to the floors and departments
• I'm a hard worker – reliable except for coming in late
• I do not think I should be fired for being late – it's no big deal, I do the work.

I asked him to review his typical day with me and list each person he came into contact with in the course of his duties. He told me that it took about an hour to unload all the early trucks when everyone was there, longer if someone was missing.

He listed his teammates, then the clinical staff, then the department staff, and a few others – 75 in all. He volunteered that virtually all of the 75 relied on him for their supplies and would page him for emergency requests, instead of calling general supply.

I asked him about how 'I do the work' applies when he's late to the loading dock to unload the trucks? As he was telling me that he'd jump right in, he realized that not being there shortchanged his teammates, since they had to do his share until he showed up.

He told me there was over an hour delay getting to clinical area delivery when he caused the unloading to drag longer. Asking him to describe what happened when he arrived on the floor, he said the staff would jump him and get the supplies they really needed and rush off to the patient's room. They seemed stressed.

Anything different with the other departments? Often they were anxious to receive the supplies so they could complete or deliver their work.

My last question was how much work was there at the end of the day, when he was making up time? 'Usually not too much – I just chill until I can punch out with 8-hours'.

I summarized what he had told me:

• The other 5 guys on the loading dock relay on him to do his share and have to work harder to cover when he's not there
• The other 70 people he sees each day rely on him to bring them supplies as early as possible so they can properly care for the patients or complete their work
• These same people rely on him for emergency supplies and special service
• He is letting down most of this entire group when he does not come to work on time -
• The other guys have to work harder
• The clinical area is more stressed when they do not have the proper supplies at hand
• The work of the staff in other departments is delayed when he is late on the delivery rounds
• His 'make-up' time doesn't make up for the problems he causes when he's late.

It is a big deal after all and what he does makes a difference to 75 other people in the hospital. He said he had never seen it from that view and agreed that he affected a lot of people by coming in late.

He made me a promise that he would be in and ready to go by 6:00AM from tomorrow on! I gave him an alarm clock to help him keep that promise. And he did for the remainder of time he was in that position, before he was promoted to a more responsible one elsewhere in the hospital.

We get so focused on our tasks, that we can lose track of how our work affects others. If it really does not matter, look out – job elimination may be just around the corner.

How would you impress the value of an employee's contributions on others within and outside the organization or department?

Join us:

June 12 is the next Capital Technology Management Hub featuring Sales Lab'sRainmaker 14 – The Myth of Full Capacity - 300 seconds of pure profit. The featured speaker will be Cory Lebson of Lebsontech LLC, presenting User Experience: What it Means & Why a Technology Manager Should Care!