Good morning and I trust this edition of Leadership Notes finds you well. I’ve been reading blogs recently and have found a couple of most interesting terms around innovation. They are; ‘contestification’, and ‘WWWabs.’ ‘Contestification’ refers to the idea that innovation can be inside and outside an organization, and one way to drive innovation is to set up a contest. Consider for example, Toyota asking aspiring innovators how the company’s technology can be used for good in unexpected ways, see toyota.com/ideasforgood, or Facebook, just today announcing the 2011 Facebook Hackers Cup. So, the question then is, if you are seeking innovative ideas, why not set up a contest, and invite people from all over the world to contribute their ideas to make your business more successful? Secondly and more internally focused, is the idea of WWWabs. Used in the business of “apps”, WWWabs take an app out into the market while still alpha or beta versions, to be used in “the playground” and ask for feedback and suggestions. (Consider a WWWab and a contest, for example.) In your organization, what might it look like to take alpha and beta versions out of the lab, and put them into the playgound of the market place? Micheal Schrage, writing in an HBR blog, writes, “instead of R & D, what matters is E & S – Experiment and Scale.”
What ever happens, stand by for a huge blast of innovation as global contests and experimentation offer new ways of touching our customers.
This will be the last Leadership Notes of 2010, as I’ll be taking a Christmas break with family and friends. Thank you for your engagement with the process, your patience with spelling mistakes, and your much appreciated feedback and encouragement for Leadership Notes. Happy Holidays to each and every one of you.