Have you ever found yourself in no man’s land or behind the curve? Of course, we all have. Has your company that you lead or work for ever found itself in no man’s land or behind the curve? At some point in time the answer is yes.
The current economic condition is and will become a line in the sand going forward. Corporations, large, small, private (for profit or not-for-profit) will be different post COVID-19. We can expect not all corporations will come back at the same time, at the same speed and unfortunately, some will not come back. Any attempt to define this specifically in any way is purely speculation.
Is there a recipe for preventing you or a corporation from falling into or staying in no man’s land or behind the curve or both? Peter Thiel had a simple recipe – “Innovate or Die,”
What is innovation? Please pause a moment and consider this…………..
Some of Drucker’s explanations are:
- Innovation – “changing the yield of resources or changing the value and satisfaction obtained from resources by the consumer.”
- “They (entrepreneurs) try to create new and different values and new and different satisfactions to convert a ‘material’ into a ‘resource,’ or to combine existing resources in a new and more productive configuration.”
- “Systematic innovation therefore consists in the purposeful and organized search for changes and in the systematic analysis of the opportunities such changes might offer for economic or social innovation.”
The corporation that looks for opportunity, identifies then, develops an innovation idea and achieves it, most likely will no longer find themselves in no man’s land or behind the curve.
While the recipe, innovate or die, seems simple, it is not. Pre or post COVID-19 opportunities exist in your market or industry. The question is – were you looking and are you looking for them now? (For more on this read my blog on Secrets). Once you find them, then what? How successful is your company with innovation implementation or driving change through the organization?
Through the decades, most innovation programs fail. A recent survey showed corporations involved with start-ups and pilots, less than 25% of pilots are commercialized. The costs associated with these results were not published. An example of investment in technology, robotics and AI, JP Morgan Chase invested $9.5 Billion in 2016. The investment did not materially impact the company’s score in the Drucker Institute Company Rankings in years 2019, 2018, 2017 for innovation or financial strength. While the bank is successful in stock price and market cap for that period, how much better would it be with significant innovation results to drive, more prominent market dominance, greater profits, growth strategies and market cap? The search for opportunities never stops regardless of past success or failure.
Overall, the entire Drucker Institute innovation survey results show the limited success for the majority of companies (see graph below). What was measured, I considered are key elements to innovation and producing products or services needed by a consumer – individual or companies. The specific measurements of the Drucker Institute were:
- Hiring focus on current cutting edge fields
- IoT
- AI
- AR
- VR
- R&D
- Drone technology
- Blockchain
- 3D and more
- New patent applications
- Abandoned patents
- Companies no longer investing in obsolete products or services
- Trademark applications
- Innovation and technological accomplishments for products or process
- Metrics
- Consumer perceptions of companies’ performance in innovation
Over 95% of the 640 companies’ innovation scores fall below 70. Clearly with these results, there is plenty of room for improvement.
Peter Thiel lived by his recipe. His initial innovative idea did not deliver the results required to change dramatically the existing process. His assessment for innovative solution needed to be 10 times better than the existing process. Thiel and his team achieved that and more with PayPal. Thiel looked for opportunity, identified it, developed it and commercialized it. You may know some of the members on his 1999 team – Elon Musk, Reid Hoffman, Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, Jawed Karim, Jeremy Stoppelman, Russel Simmons, David Sacks.
Innovation takes something special – Drucker says an entrepreneur. An entrepreneur for Drucker, “… always searches for change, responds to it, and exploits it as an opportunity.” Innovation takes on several other characteristics – small, nimble, offsite pilots, not an operations person with dual responsibility (in smaller companies may not be avoidable), develop away from the existing business. Innovation takes process, hard work, defined goals, accountability, metrics, leadership, a system if you will.
Status quo, no man’s land, behind the curve, if this describes your company (for profit, not-for-profit) now or in the past, big or small – it is time for a new recipe – innovate or die.
I worked on teams in the past that “combine existing resources in a new and more productive configuration.” These teams were extremely successful because we identified internal opportunities to improve results. Innovation that I am recommending to you – expand the horizon. There are global opportunities that are just waiting to be discovered, developed, pilot, scale and commercialized.
What are you waiting for? The time is now.
By the way, if you want assistance on this journey, check out my website. The team is ready to assist in order for you to achieve your objective.