Tue, 29 October 2019
What can derail the innovation journey? Recently, I finished a 3.5-day Innovation Bootcamp. In the end, I was asked an interesting question with a different look and perspective of innovation, now and in the future. The participant asked what challenges are facing innovation. After answering the question for the group, I put more thought into what I’ve seen in the past, is happening today and can persist in the future. In today’s show, I will examine in more detail what I see as the 4 challenges facing innovation that innovators need to pay close attention to and address. Ethics in InnovationOver the years, there have been many companies making promises and claims that were not true or half-truths. A number of them have been very high profile market players like Theranos. Poster child type companies that toe ethical lines and cross them creating innovation skepticism and pessimism in customers, investors, and markets. Whether you cross the ethical lines or have perceived to, the damage is done with confidence destroyed. This puts a negative perception on innovators/entrepreneurs as greedy people focused on making some quick money. Why are ethical lines crossed though? Many times it is driven by ridicule and fear of failure. as well as not gaining the full potential of what may be defined as success. We need to do something to change the nomenclature of fear of failure through our education system, society in general and organizations across industries. Why was it such a big deal when Theranos crossed the line? They had created a compelling story and marketed it with no slowing while assembling a Board of Directors of who’s who of the world. But the challenge with the Board was none of the members had real sophistication around the risks, challenges and how to execute for breakthrough innovations. They had no Innovation Sophistication where they had:
Innovation sophistication doesn’t mean you took a company IPO or were sold for high multiple and big dollars. It is the years of experience toiling in the innovation trenches where you build a sophistication, insights, and wisdom to navigate an innovation journey and have sustained success. Unrealistic Expectations for InnovationWhen you set unrealistic expectations people lose confidence and innovation outcomes diminish. In innovation many times we overstate and overpromise a capability creating an expectation bar that is hard to follow through on. We all have done it. If you underestimate you may not get the traction with the funders you need to gain appropriate funding. It is a fine balancing act of over and under-promising and setting ill-fated perceptions early on. For breakthrough innovations, it takes patience—law of patience. You have to have the intestinal fortitude to progress forward with expectation balance incorporating patience in an ecosystem that has very little patience. Many today use the ‘Rule of 18’ to manage the innovation journey. However, this diminishes breakthrough opportunities and creates short-sightedness inflating potential capabilities, timelines, and sales. It does have some value in setting expectations, securing incremental funding (especially for companies that normally would have not received funding), incremental progress, enhancements, and capabilities--but not the highest return breakouts—Killer Innovations. The best path is to set expectations early, with a balanced view of what is achievable while providing the highest potential for a breakthrough. Be careful not to cross the lines of expectations and lose credibility. Availability of Funding for InnovationRaising money has always been one of the hardest things to do and today it’s more competitive and demanding then it has ever been. If you’re not in the hot trend space of the day you start off with a huge disadvantage to overcome and need to be very precise in your targeting of the right fit investors. The characteristics of entrepreneurs range, but most are in the fast lane category stretching the limits to gain traction and quickly building and flipping their innovation. With the dynamics of the market, investors and innovators the ‘Rule of 18’ quickly become the default. A dangerous zone for innovators and markets as you limit the opportunity to gain breakthrough and killer innovations. Many innovators and investors fall into the ‘first to market’ mentality which time has proven to be rare, and not necessarily the most profitable path. Iconic names today like Google, Facebook and Apple weren’t first to market in their categories, they just made them better. As I always say the difference between a good idea and a great one isn’t about the idea, but almost always about the timing. Characteristics Investors Look For to InvestYou have the full package and can demonstrate that you:
Most importantly you need to be very clear on your execution. As I always say, Ideas without execution is a hobby and I am not in the hobby business. Funding is not an easy path, just as you work to create that next innovation, you need to also approach your funding with creativity. Step out and apply creativity to your funding structures. Think through all the possibilities to make it work such as:
Spend some time learning your needs, financial structures that work for your innovation and company, who are the right investors and what are the market permissions that give the best chance to get funded. Government’s Role in InnovationI’ve been inspired since I was a child from the incredible innovations driven by the Government and long term focused private labs that reinforced my desire for inventing. From the Space Program to DARPA and the Internet. We need inventions and innovations that are a result of more long term projects. There must be a big stretch goal, coupled with patience and appropriate funding. Investing for discovery and global competition and not only financial gain. This emphasis has gone by the wayside and needs to be revitalized. Long-range innovation has declined drastically in the Government as well as in Corporate’s comparatively to the past. The government has outsourced more of that R&D and innovations to short term focused and profit-oriented organizations. This can have a more negative than the positive impact. Today, China R&D spending is off the scale. To get a competitive advantage, breakthroughs Government and Corporates need to build back that R&D and long term innovation backbone. Overcome the 4 Challenges to InnovationThese 4 challenges change and impact progress, discouraging innovation and slowing it down or preventing it from ever happening. The short term ‘flip it’ approach won’t lead to true discovery. It will only drive the fear of failure with setting unrealistic expectations, lack of appropriate funding, bad investments, questionable behavior, and unethical actions. We need to work to change the game so we can create breakthrough innovations and discover things we never imagined possible. Let’s connect; I am on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. If we do connect, drop me a note and let me know. The email address is feedback@philmckinney.com or you can go to PhilMcKinney.com and drop me a note there. If you are looking for innovation support go to TheInnovators.Network or want to be challenged to develop the next big idea, check out our Disruptive Ideation Workshops. Don’t forget to join our Innovators Community to enjoy more conversations around innovation.
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Tue, 22 October 2019
Creating and continually innovating the entertainment experience to keep your customers on the edge of their seat is a monumental undertaking? Can the entertainment experience go to new levels? What cool innovations and technologies is the sports industry doing to make your time watching an event/ game more enjoyable. Today’s guest is always on the forefront of what it takes to keep customers engaged in the experience. Steve Hellmuth has been innovating the customer experience for over 30 years from the Olympics to Major League Baseball and today the National Basketball Association with some of the most experiential ideas, innovations and technologies. This week on Killer Innovations, Steve Hellmuth joins us to discuss what he and his team are doing to make your experience with the NBA beyond expectations. Permission to InnovateThe NBA has a great reputation for willingness with ample runway to experiment and fail in order to get that next innovative experience. NBA Leadership, players, players association, fans and owners are the most progressive at experimentation and interactive experiences. Steve and his team continually are working special fan experience projects to give you the thrill of the game. It’s important to have permissions with every relation and level in innovation efforts and the platform to test your ideas and validate. At this year’s NBA Summer League Steve had his mobile unit parked in the middle of all the broadcasters to rollout some of their experiments from their innovation sandbox. This is the perfect time to interact with players, fans and management with room to experiment with innovations/ideas, fail, adjust and try again. Some of the fun experiences you will see this season have been tested at the Summer League and percolating in their innovation sandbox. A number of these ideas they have worked on for many years and just now are being deployed—sometimes innovation takes a long time to curate and requires patience. Where is the Fan Experience GoingInnovating in this league is all about entertainment and the story. Steve teamed with Phil in the past spending a good deal of time in 3D initiatives and experimenting on the convergence looking for the focus that would give the best experience with successes and failures. So what will be the experience of the living room of the future be. Today Virtually Reality and Augmented Reality have been problematic, but it will play a part in the NBA experience as it moves towards better eye tracking and the next generation. Steve also wants to move faster towards no walls and pick your experience in your media room to feel like you are in the venue. Part of that will be to expand on the synchronous experiences with all information flow and devices to track what really catches your attention and is exciting at that moment. He envisions more immersive experiences and premium services that give the fans an opportunity to pick and choose experiences with or without advertising. Steve and team will continue to work closely with stadiums to get the most innovative blueprint and technology deployment to ensure the 6th man affect is in play in all games. What’s in the Innovation Sandbox for Rollout this SeasonSteve’s vision is to get everyone involved in the NBA experience and to do that their innovation sandbox has to continually be testing the limits, being the first to leverage technology advances (such as WIFI-6, 5G, others) and coming up with innovative ways to put you closer to the floor and part of the game. Some of the focus this year and near future that you will experience includes:
Where’s the Next Level of Innovation & Impact for the NBAThere are a number of areas that Steve and the team continue to experiment with for the ultimate fan experience, but one area that his in the interests of the players, fans and leadership is ensuring the players are at the top of their game and available to go at a 100%. Biometric video capture and motion capture of the players every move is a priority. This will allow for preventive actions and better load management. With a number of dynamic player duo’s this should be a real fun season full of rich fan experience both live at the event or from your favorite sportscave. About Our GuestSteve Hellmuth is the Executive Vice President, Media Operations & Technology for NBA Entertainment. Under Hellmuth’s direction there have been numerous first’s in innovation to include, SportsVU Player Tracking, the optical player tracking system in every venue, making the NBA the first major US professional sports league to quantify and analyze the player movement in live game action throughout an entire season. Steve spent time in his management career with MLB and NBC and has produced the Emmy-nominated telecasts for the 1986 World Series and coordinated the production of Olympic profiles for the 1980 Moscow games. He also produced Larry Bird Night for the Boston Celtics and the All-Century Team Celebration on field at the 1999 MLB All-Star game. Best place to see some of Steve and his team’s innovation experiments, prototyping and rollouts from the sandbox can be best observed and experiences on NBA League Pass and NBA TV. Let’s connect; I am on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. If we do connect, drop me a note and let me know. The email address is feedback@philmckinney.com or you can go to PhilMcKinney.com and drop me a note there. If you are looking for innovation support go to TheInnovators.Network or want to be challenged to develop the next big idea, check out our Disruptive Ideation Workshops. Don’t forget to join our Innovators Community to enjoy more conversations around innovation.
Direct download: Innovating_the_New_NBA_Experience.mp3
Category:Past Shows -- posted at: 12:00am PDT |
Tue, 15 October 2019
Is controversy good when it comes to innovating? Today’s guest is passionate about creating breakthroughs and states ‘If it isn’t controversial, it’s not a good idea’. Scott McNealy knows a few things about changing the game by challenging the status quo, disrupting platforms, products and services. Focusing on continually challenging an idea, model, platform, technology and service leads to disruptive breakthroughs and advances society. This week on Killer Innovations, Scott McNealy joins us to discuss a number of topics in the quest for future advances. Lessons from the TrenchesSeeking to make an impact by looking at things from a different lens has always been Scott’s game if it’s technology, golf, education, marketing, politics or social issues. His open source view permeates his approaches and has led to positive impacts. Scott has had opportunities to learn from his pioneering and early mover days with Sun Microsystems to recent ventures in marketing and education platforms. There are many takeaways in the battles he and his teams engaged with over three decades of incredible growth and technology advances that made significant contributions to the boom of the PC and Internet. So what does it take to continue to innovate and grow. Scott has some key thoughts from disrupting markets, managing and leading in fast growth times to developing breakthrough products and services.
Augmenting Education Now and the FutureWe need education advancement more than ever before. Today’s tools and platform don’t provide the best we can do as a society for our students, teachers and parents. Scott started Curriki to focus on augmenting the education experience and creating a new digital era in our education. A catalyst for Scott’s desire to challenge and create value in education was the rising cost of educational material and his open source mentality. The desire is to have no student, no teacher and no parent left behind. To fulfill that we need to continue Innovating around the facilitation of key learnings and interdisciplinary skills like critical thinking, communication, teamwork and civility along with STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math). Curriki’s free and open source exchange platform with a new age of curriculum, is all about a virtual and classroom experience that:
Scott believes this is a group effort by society regardless of your views and he is looking for people who are passionate and interested in supporting the augmentation of our education system. Everyone can help create our future of education. Making an Impact with Issues of TodayTackling issues in society are important, however, the forum and approach you use can be effective or destructive. Finding commonality to break the divide and divisions in business and politics helps progress us forward and strengthen the future. Scott has a lot to say on challenging ideas and having healthy conversations around them. For companies being A-political and getting involved in policies that impact your business, investors and shareholders should be the focus, but not alienating substantial fractions of your customer base. Is Government’s job to promote or regulate business? Government is not the answer to innovation, or all the challenges and problems we have in society. Financial freedoms and liberties give people and business the abilities to make a difference. Scott is in the early ideation stages of a digital issue-based platform to provide a forum for healthy discussions around the challenges we face. This digital town hall approach would give everyone with different views the opportunity to make an impact and cross the aisle to find commonality and bridge the divide and solve problems. He doesn’t believe today’s social media platforms provide the best channels to get things done in a civil and breaking the divide fashion to progress forward. Future Advances and Taking ResponsibilityThe future is full of many possibilities when it comes to disruptive technology. Autonomous everything will be one of the most impactful to our society. Where do you play in it and filter through the possibilities as an entrepreneur and innovator? Any area within a technology space can be the best or worst, but it is really about the execution. Some areas people have pinpointed as the unfruitful path have turned out to be the most successful. So do your research and analysis, then dive in, adjust and be nimble on your journey—don’t wait, fire away. Scott has challenged many leading companies from Microsoft, IBM and Apple taking on their ideas, products and business model—challenge the idea, not the people. Controversy leads to the next innovation breakthrough. Most importantly we need to have more responsibility and accountability with our generation on how we manage our own lives and not rely on others or Government to take care of our actions and needs.
About Our GuestScott McNealy is the former co-founder and CEO of Sun Microsystem which pioneered it’s way in computing technologies from hardware, operating systems to software, including the JAVA language. He was with Sun from its start in 1982, IPO in 1987 to sale to Oracle in 2010. Scott also is on many Boards and advises Fortune 500 to entrepreneurial startups. He co-founded social media intelligence company Wayin, which was recently acquired and founded Curriki the non-profit free education service. Scott is looking for help with Curriki and you can connect with him on Twitter. Let’s connect; I am on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. If we do connect, drop me a note and let me know. The email address is feedback@philmckinney.com or you can go to Philmckinney.com and drop me a note there. If you are looking to develop a Loonshot, check out our Disruptive Ideation Workshops. Don’t forget to join our Innovators Community to enjoy more conversations around innovation. |
Tue, 8 October 2019
Have you created a Loonshot? Have people dismissed or laughed at your Loonshot? Safi Bahcall takes us through how to manage Loonshots—a big goal, an audacious idea which has a lot of enthusiasm and support, but may be viewed as crazy. What if you nurtured these crazy ideas that are dismissed and written off. Loonshots have always been created and declared, but not always nurtured, which is critical for real success. This week on Killer Innovations, Safi Bahcall joins us to discuss how to handle Loonshots. Phase TransitionsThere are behaviors and patterns for Loonshots. Previous building blocks can support the creation of a Loonshot or destination. However, the most important focus has to be on how you get to that destination, which is the continual nurturing of those crazy ideas. As the goal is established, the nurturing process spurns off other creations, insights and breakthroughs making the ultimate destination not only achievable, but also richer in value. A big challenge is that many times good teams kill great ideas. Why though? From experience and research there are certain properties of groups and characteristics that lead to failure or phenomenal success. Leaders Role with LoonshotsWhat can you do that ensures phase transitions are balanced as a leader of innovators and those driving execution. Leaders need to understand their role, the rules and any exceptions to rules. Safi breaks this down into nurturing three elements in the toolbox, the Ice Cube, Garden Hoe and Heart.
What are the Rules for Individual Innovator’sThere are three rules that are critical for innovators to always keep in their toolkit as they create Loonshots and nurture them.
Balancing the Activities to Create ValueManaging Loonshots there are two dimensions that leaders need to balance, the size and type.
About Our GuestSafi Bahcall is the author of How to Nurture the Crazy Ideas That Win Wars, Cure Diseases, and Transform Industries. He is an author, second generation physicist, and CEO. In 2001, he co-founded a biotechnology company developing new drugs for cancer. Safi led its IPO and served as its CEO for 13 years before being acquired. Safi has numerous awards and accolades to include National Science Foundation Fellow, Ernst & Young New England Biotechnology/Pharmaceutical Entrepreneur of the Year. He also worked with President Obama's council of science advisors (PCAST) on the future of US science and technology research. Pick up Safi’s book today! Let’s connect; I am on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. If we do connect, drop me a note and let me know. The email address is feedback@philmckinney.com or you can go to Philmckinney.com and drop me a note there. If you are looking to develop a Loonshot, check out our Disruptive Ideation Workshops. Don’t forget to join our Innovators Community to enjoy more conversations around innovation.
Direct download: Loonshots_Creating__Nurturing_Crazy_Ideas.mp3
Category:Past Shows -- posted at: 12:00am PDT |
Tue, 1 October 2019
Does architecture have an effect on how we think, feel, and act? Donald Rattner has researched and explored environmental psychology and come to the conclusion that it does. This fact plays into our daily lives, affecting how we act and feel at the office and in our personal lives. This week on Killer Innovations, Donald Rattner joins us to discuss innovation and creativity in design of architectures that impact our daily lives. Natures Effect on CreativityWhat is the role of nature in regard to creativity? The human body craves to be near nature; unfortunately, we spend ninety percent of our time indoors. Rattner says to you do not have to do a lot to bring nature to your workplace. One study showed that simply placing a plant on your work desk can boost your creative output from fifteen to twenty percent. Fortunately, you do not need hours of exposure; you need a certain amount of inputs to achieve the necessary restorative affect nature has on the human body and mind. Creativity at HomePeople get ideas more often while at home; it is the place where you do the most unconscious ideation. So, what can people do in their homes to improve their creativity? First, you need to designate a creative place; pick where you want to associate creativity with. Second, pick a place where you want to spend time in. Try to get a sense of openness in your creative space. Studies have shown that the more open the space, the more open your mind is to creativity. Another point Rattner makes in his book is the effect that ceiling space has on creating an open space. Pictures, color, beauty, lighting, sound, music, and scent all affect creativity. About Our GuestDonald Rattner is the author of My Creative Space: How to Design Your Home to Stimulate Ideas and Spark Innovation. He is an architect and practitioner. He has also taught at the University of Chicago and worked at Parson’s School of Design. Pick up Rattner’s book today! Let’s connect; I am on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. If we do connect, drop me a note and let me know. The email address is feedback@philmckinney.com or you can go to Philmckinney.com and drop me a note there. Don’t forget to join our Innovators Community to enjoy more conversations around innovation.
Direct download: Design_of_a_Place_and_its_Effect_on_Creativity.mp3
Category:Past Shows -- posted at: 12:00am PDT |