Developing societies are facing challenges with basic needs of food and water, housing and energy. Increase in population is intensifying the challenges. The problems of sustainable development, distribution of energy and energy security are interlinked with each other and therefore a new idea or innovation is required to address the societal challenges. The social environment is rapidly changing with the want of sustainable economic development and stable democracies. Scientists and engineers play vital role in social innovation and helps in addressing the social needs and challenges of the people. Social innovation is the adoption, integration development and creation of new practices and concepts that creates a better world. The innovation gives most importance to people and planet. Social innovation involves steps that focus on people health, community development, education and working conditions. People residing in a society are the main components of society that leads to social development. Social innovation Continue reading
Innovation Management
Case Study: iPod, Apple’s Best Innovation
Apple had in effect recognized an opening inside the digital music market. They had acknowledged that there was a drop in sales of digital music players due to the goods presently on the market being inadequate. Apple will have believed that the then current crop of music players were insufficient thus prompting them into designing the phenomenon that is the iPod. Due to the success of the Sony Walkman, Apple decided they wanted to enter the music player market. Therefore the company expanded from the core product of computers and software manufacture into many areas including personal music/media players (iPod). The creator of Apples iTunes was Steve Jobs, an in-house software creator. Apple released the first iPod into the market place on 23rd of October 2001. It proved hugely successful due to the software created by Steve Jobs which allows users to download music directly from the internet to the Continue reading
The Relationship Between Creativity and Innovation
Creativity and Innovation are two different terms and they technically have different meanings. Creativity means originality, imagination and inventiveness that are brought out through resourcefulness. Innovation, on the other hand refers to modernization and improvement over an existing idea. In this way, it is true that creativity and innovation are two different terms and cannot be used interchangeably. Yet, they have been used interchangeably in several areas or walks of life, including business and management as well as technology. In this way the main distinction between creativity and innovation, being the originality has been ignored and as the line between creativity and innovation is thin, it becomes even more difficult to distinguish between these terminologies. Innovation is an important aspect of growth and development of individuals, organizations, cultures and societies. Innovation and creativity refer to bringing in new ideas to life. Innovation can be achieved strategically through a process of Continue reading
Importance of Innovation and Change within an Organization
In today’s constantly changing world, innovation and change play an extremely important role within any organization. New technologies like faster software and hardware and improved manufacturing systems are increasing production and changing the way we do business across the globe. Newly advancing markets are becoming more and more capitalistic, opening the door for corporations to come and do business. There are multiple elements when dealing with innovation and change within an organization. The first element is how an organization can change successfully which consists of the steps that are needed and the process that makes change happen. The next element is technological change, which is how organizations adapt and implement new technology. From new technology, organizations come up with our next element, new products and services. As these organizations become larger and larger there is the need for strategy and structure change as well as cultural changes. These two elements Continue reading
Innovation Theories: Bottom of the Pyramid and Dominant Design
The use of innovation for sustaining businesses have been in time since the advent of businesses themselves. The ability to exploit technological developments in order to solve real problems bring about value to the people using the businesses’ products or services. The value created by a business is the result of proper innovation taking place in a multi-faceted fashion in the spheres of technology and business administration. Hence, innovation theories are a concept to extensively address and analyze real world problems to get the most valuable benefit whilst the solving the problem. Creativity lies the in heart of innovation and it is a critical ingredient that catalyzes the process of value generation via the services and products of the business. Different innovation theories have been coined and discussed globally by businesses to strategically place their products or services in a way that helps their clients or customers the most. This Continue reading
Effects of Innovative Culture on Organizations
Growth creates a need for structure and discipline, organisation changes which can strain the culture of creativity that is so vital to future success. To sustain competitive advantage, companies need to institutionalize the innovation process; they need to create an internal environment where creative thinking is central to their values, assumptions and actions. Management changes and management generally is about implementation. When the managers of an enterprise feel pressured, the fear-driven response is generally to implement better and which generally results doing more of the same only quicker or cheaper. While this is great for doing more of the same, it is still the same and meanwhile everything else is changing — customer’s needs, technology, society, macroeconomics and geopolitics are all changing. Innovation is the engine of growth. It is also a mindset — meaning it is influenced by beliefs, values, and behavior. Company culture therefore has a huge influence Continue reading