Managing Innovation: Now What?

Trends in managing innovation

There is a plethora of articles written on the importance of innovation management in the product development process. However, many managers are still asking for concrete resources and tools to get them and their teams passed the initial concept of innovation management and moving towards managing innovation. In their article “The New Rules of Managing Innovation” (BusinessWeek), G. Michael Maddock and Raphael Louis Vitón, discuss several trends shaping innovation and offer practical answers to the often asked questions of ‘what’s next; or now what’.

A closer look at these trends helps us identify three actions that can make managing innovation a highly productive process:

1. “Falling silos.” Maddock and Vitón highlight how cross-functional teams can actually improve the process of managing innovation so that regardless of the company size or industry, the benefits of teamwork can be quickly optimized. Experts with diverse knowledge and skills, work in tight collaboration to promote the sharing of new ideas and insights and bring more innovations to products, services or business processes to market faster than the competition. The traditional silos that stifled innovation fall as barriers to communication between functions disappear.

2. Managing innovation from the “outside-in”. Organizations that seek the advice of experts in their industry greatly benefit from the new and fresh perspectives of external individuals and groups. Managing innovation becomes a more efficient process when you can learn from the successes and failures of others.

3. Leveraging social media. Maddock and Vitón emphasize: “If you are not taking advantage of social media, you are missing an opportunity to create and launch better ideas faster.” A growing trend in the product development world is the use of social media as an effective tool in managing innovation. The faster that Brands accept that the consumer controls the conversation about products and services the faster they can take action to discover what they are really looking for and respond to their needs.

Managing innovation with OneDesk

OneDesk has the requisite tools to seize the opportunities these trends provide. Make managing innovation a critical process where resources inside and outside your organization work together with great tools and ‘leap frog’ over your competition.

Collaborate: Use OneDesk’s enterprise social collaboration tools to break down the silos of communication and promote open innovation. Cutting edge social applications, like chat, discussions, email and blogs keep innovation teams both inside and outside the organization connected and working together at all times.

Listen. Engage and Take Action: Social Media is driving product development. Right now customers are online talking about your products and services and someone from your organization better be listening, because your competitors are taking action. OneDesk helps you leverage new insights by allowing you to ‘tune in’ to the social web and engage with your customers. When you listen and engage with customers, you will be able to create and deliver more innovative products and services that take center-stage in the marketplace.

Know what is available and get the tools to make managing innovation an effective process for your organization.

The question is: What’s next for your team?