Using Expert-Based Research to Enable Innovation

In the current difficult economic environment and intense competition, almost every CEO in America realizes the importance of increasing the capacity of your organization to innovate. In fact, a recent PricewaterhouseCoopers study found that CEOs of product development qualified second in importance only to innovation as a source of competitive advantage. Former GE executive Jack Welch and the author offers this perspective, "... If the rate of change within the institution is less than the rate of change outside, the end is in sight. The only issue is the end time. "The challenge to innovate is great, but most companies struggle through a disjointed process, too often in their traditional way of looking at your business. Research shows it takes nearly 300 ideas to achieve a product of individual success. "The companies thought are moving quickly to make the right decisions to improve innovation and product development," said Ken Amann, Director of Research at consulting and research firm CIMdata. These companies have strategically focused on innovation as an organizational core competency and reinforce this philosophy (1) focusing on innovation in the organization (2) that allows innovation through a continuous injection of new divergent views (3 ) that converge in the high value of ideas through a process of objective assessment. How do they do? Innovative leaders know they can increase the business impact of innovation by injecting an external perspective for idea generation and evaluation. By leveraging the expertise of the experts and the changing needs of users lead to cut the list of ideas to the priority with the promise of a few more commercials. For over 20 years has helped leading companies Guideline allow for innovation and ideas converge in law from providing assistance in organizing and moderating expert forums. The magic occurs within these interactions as the ideas and views of an expert or experts who are merged with the knowledge of individuals in the client computer. Their combination of vision fuels innovation, generating new ideas or improving the viability of the concepts involved. Here are some examples that demonstrate how leading innovators have used external vision and experience to generate, evaluate and prioritize ideas. Product Concept Ideation Need to strengthen a process of ideation stale? The technical experts and leading technology users can be selected in a forum to discuss unmet needs, the limitations of existing solutions, product concepts and unique product needs. Bringing a fresh mind from outside the organization together in a moderated session, invariably there are new concepts for solid products. Guidance recently organized and moderated a forum of experts for a major medical products company. The session produced 10 new concepts for specific products and in turn fed new ideas within the group of observers from the client, generating a total of 40 product concepts. Product Concept Testing - Do you have many ideas, but need an unbiased opinion to help prioritize the list? A forum of industry experts provides a direct, open platform for the objective, independent view on the concepts of product development. His perspective can help clarify and prioritize the ideas with most potential. You can accompany this entry through the depth telephone interviews with additional expertise and / or major users. The results will help you discover the barriers to adoption, the ability to meet unmet needs, advantages and disadvantages of specific product characteristics, and acceptance of the buyer. Another medical Targeting customers with products that are used this method to filter and prioritize the 10 new product concepts. The experts helped them select the three most commercially promising concepts which subsequently received approval and funding for development. Product Concept of Risk Analysis have the idea and concept to the test, how to assess external risks associated with the development of the product concept? Resorting to an industry expert to interact with you and your project team to discuss specific aspects of the product concept. Moderate interactions can be open or anonymous, are carried out either on site or via teleconference. Open interactions allow both the expert and the client know each other. Anonymous interactions allow the client to remain anonymous, while specific information derived from the expert (s) for product development. On-site interactions bring the expert (s) to a location for face-to-face, usually for at least half a full day's interaction. This allows a more complete interaction among participants. Meetings by teleconference are used for shorter interactions. In a recent interaction, a leading technology-based consumer packaged goods company hosted a teleconference with industry expert, moderated by Guidleline. While remaining anonymous, the client computer analysis of the risks involved in the process of legislative approval for the product concept. Expert knowledge of industry issues and regulatory process, provided the equipment with alternative perspectives that helped them make better go / no-go decision based on a more realistic estimate of the costs of development and approval of its concept product. Best practices in service delivery What are the key services to be provided along with its new product to be competitive in the market? A forum of industry experts can be used to assist in the examination of critical success factors, including product qualification, market demand, customer acceptance, and quality system requirements. Guidance recently moderated a forum on the website of renowned industry experts to determine the management of supply chain best practices for high-volume, high quality, cost-conscious global semiconductor market. The outcome of this panel of experts identified and ranked the importance of industry specific issues, E. g. , Quality programs such as ISO, TQM, Six Sigma, SPC, FMEA, and correction and control. This enabled customers to focus on the most critical dimensions of service for their industry. As you can see, with external technical and industry experts can provide valuable information to inspire innovation that leads to winning products and services.