I see the front end of energy as the critical feeding-in point for the energy transition. So what does this mean exactly?
The front end of energy for me is the point of discovery and validation. It is the place I feel I can make the best contribution within the energy transition. The discovery is where the stimulus and catalyst point to take an idea to commercialization. Continue reading “I aim to put more innovation into the front end of Energy”
I lived for about fifteen years in Asia and the before, and in the in-between period, I travelled around the region a fair amount.
Today less so, but ask me where I want to go, and it is back to my city for twelve plus of those years, Singapore.
Some events today set me thinking that resulted in re-issuing this post, shortening it down a bit. Often we do not stop and think of the real differences culturally in how we want to0 engage and build relationships between the East and the West
Participating in business and engaging socially with Asia, watching how Asia has evolved has been a real experience that stays with you as something hugely valuable. It partly shapes your thinking and how you look at things going on in the world. Continue reading “East meets West in understanding Innovation Cultural Orientation”
We need to think about a choice-cascade integrative model for innovation. Often we fail to understand our role in contributing to innovation; we need a cascading effect. Here I want to explain my thinking behind this and provide the visual cascading steps I feel help us succeed in innovation.
For me, the “cascading effect” for innovation is “a sequence of events in which each produces the circumstances necessary for the initiation of the next”.
It presents an idea, a concept, a prototype, a piece of knowledge that provides the catalyst to be exploited in a broader community as the next step and so on. It cascades. It is where we fit understanding and fresh knowledge within the innovation web.
Getting innovation through any process of understanding is hard. Knowing what is required to generate innovation throughout an entire organization is even more so.
We need to deploy the cascading effect on innovation to support this supporting “effect.” Continue reading “The Cascading Innovation Effect.”
Sustainability is central to innovation’s future progress
Today’s challenge for me is not only to be building the innovation capacity but also to be establishing clear ways on how we should set about sustaining it. Increasingly, organizations must have the capability and capacity to sustain innovation to provide the stimulus for lasting growth and resolve the complex challenges we face today and in the future.
To get there, though, it does seem this must be through continued learning. Hence, your capabilities become stronger, evolving and more unique, thus making them more difficult for competitors to understand and imitate.
Let me outline an innovation framework that builds capability through a sustained approach.
When you set out to build capability to be sustaining, you need to consider there are two types of capabilities, distinctive, which are the characteristics of the organization which others cannot replicate and reproductive, which can be bought in by the competition but always need to need to be appropriate to any objectives you are trying to achieve. Continue reading “Sustainability is central to innovation’s future progress”
Suddenly we are stopped from traveling; we are advised to work from home to keep us safe from this coronavirus and catching it. We have the choice of “self-imposed” or “company-imposed” time at home.
Time takes on a different meaning; we are cutting out those (unproductive) meetings, the train, car, and flight times, and we have the luxury to do what?
Well, it is offering us that luxury of actually having time to think and reflect. Now that is dangerous as it takes us off our ‘chosen’ treadmill of pursuit.
I was pondering some thoughts around the quest for growth, the demands for change, and the need to become nimble, agile, and more dynamic in what we do. We crowd out our days and never stop to reflect.
So I started to think a little more. Now that can be dangerous, and I am not too sure it gave me answers, just more questions. My starting point was the endless journey of innovation. Continue reading “Everything is changing faster- can we respond differently in our Innovation work?”
In the last few months, I have got increasingly nervous about where we are NOT going on climate change
I have never before published one article on each of my three posting sites. This post I just had to. It is shaping me in how I look at innovation, collaboration, the power of networks, ecosystems and most of all, in our world of energy transition needed to reverse climate warming. So apologies if you see it on three separate sites but I don’t apologize for my real, underlying concern on where we are seemingly heading as a world.
The bush fires of Australia have been shocking, devastating, and crippling. They catalyze the concerns we all should have.
Each of us might or likely will face a shocking, devastating or crippling “event” in our lives in the next ten to twenty years. I feel it is inevitable, irrespective if we stopped all the debates and did the level of investment, we need to reverse the climate warming.
The next ten years of our investments in cutting emissions and refocusing our energy needs must go towards clean energy (renewables). Our ability to make a change will determine if these events recently will become the new norm, as our planet spins even more out of our ability to control climate-warming through greenhouse gases.
So I have to move through this shocking, devastating, and crippling effect but have I have begun to accept the reality that our world is in a “state of climate alarm,” not just a “climate emergency.” Continue reading “Politics, Economics and Climate need to come together.”
The problem of scaling can confuse those innovating, can this be changed?
I have often been returning to scaling, struggling with finding the best answers. Many organizations struggle with scaling. This can be scaling their organization, their capabilities or more often, taking an idea into a fully scaled delivery.
Maybe I have been looking at it all wrong?
The complexities of scaling can’t be lightly dismissed. You need very often, size to scale. This could be in a new plant, in where production should be situated, so it can be allowed to scale at a later date, in resources able to achieve scale or more importantly you scale according to the type of goods or demand so they can be readily available, closer to the market they are needed.
When you work in a global organization, scale takes on even greater set of dimensions, one that needs coordinating and managing.
So I was thinking through some points on scaling a little differently. They are partly ‘open questions’ or some thinking out loud. You can say they are “half-baked”, perhaps in more than one way! Continue reading “The problem of scaling can confuse those innovating.”
Formalizing a new innovation learning-as-a-service is complicated, far more than I originally thought, it is often a puzzle.
Still, a certain course has been set and it is now working through much of its structure, learning much myself on the way to fit this within the innovation puzzle we all have.
When I was thinking through this concept I fell back onto one of my most valuable techniques to work through, clustering a set of questions and capturing all the different thinking through the use of Mind Mapping techniques. Such a valuable tool.
A selection of maps included what a curator can do in innovation; of painting a picture of a strong advocacy practice, of working through a guiding approach, the need to reflect on the whole facilitation process, etc., and each brainstorm takes a time to work through, build and formalize.
The end result becomes a much richer landscape of what I can offer and what equally might be needed. Continue reading “Fitting understanding into the innovation puzzle”
Since early September I have been significantly focused on researching, relating and renewing my understanding of Business Ecosystems, Platforms and then what led into the power and need of improving customer end experience. This came about from having some evolving conversations with my ‘old’ sparring partner Jeffrey Phillips, over at Ovo Innovation. He nicely moved the ecosystem discussion towards capitalizing on a final outcome: achieving seamless customer experiences and our thinking began to really take off.
Jeffrey Phillips and I have collaborated around different innovation thinking for some years and in a late August discussion over Skype, we realized that what was emerging from our usual exchanges and insights was that the area of Innovation within Ecosystems was gathering pace and what did that mean for innovation in future business and practice implications.
We both have some shared as well as some different views on how this would shape up for the future. As usual in these discussions, we agreed to think about a potential collaboration on this by exchanging some opening thoughts in written exchanges. Those quickly took hold and we realized our need and the greater need was to explore and exploit the key themes of ecosystems, platforms and customer experience far more.
Intersections allow access; they open us up to new possibilities. Continue reading “The voyages of discovery we all need”
We all value those times when we can slip away from our desk, from the computer or phone and just simply step outside.
Some do this because of a necessity of topping up their nicotine levels or finding a few moments for having a chat, others just simply want to step away, relax a little and freshen up.
Another reason to get out of the office is when it comes to thinking differently within the business, going out to seek out different, often radically new ideas. This offers the chance of seeing something completely differently, by being simply aware and open to new possibilities, detaching yourself from your own (comfortable) environment .
Continue reading “Getting out of the Building, Going Cross-Industry for Seeking Out Radical Ideas”
