redefining innovation
TRANSCRIPT
Robert Fransgaard.Creative Director, EMEA.
Salesforce CXD.twitter.com/fransgaard
www.linkedin.com/in/fransgaard
Salesforce, a founding driving force of Cloud Computing.www.salesforce.com/company
Salesforce Customer Experience Design 2015 Reel: https://vimeo.com/121897634
Forbes 2014 list of “The World’s Most Innovative Companies”
1. Salesforce.com2. Alexion Pharmaceuticals3. ARM Holdings4. Unilever Indonesia5. Regeneron Pharmaceuticals6. Amazon.com7. BioMarin Pharmaceutical8. CP All9. VMware10. Aspen Pharmacare Holdings11. Vertex Pharmaceuticals12. Red Hat13. Hermès International14. Hindustan Unilever15. Monster Beverage16. The Priceline Group17. Rakuten18. Marriott International19. Fastenal20. Chipotle Mexican Grill21. Stericycle22. Cerner23. Coloplast24. Henan Shuanghui Investment 25. Tingyi Holding
www.forbes.com/innovative-companies/
The Innovation Premium is a measure of how much investors have bid up the stock price of a company above the value of its existing business based on expectations of future innovative results (new products, services and markets).
“”
How Forbes Defines Innovation.
My View on what Innovation is:Making it Real!
Chinese delegation to USA discovered Science Fiction being a
key driver to Innovation.
One type of Science Fiction is the Utopian, far out in the future with
shiny spaceships colonizing planets.
Another type of Science fiction is Cyberpunk: A future just around the corner where technology and the web is a humming in the background of
everybody’s lives.
However, that Cyberpunk future is the world of today.
Reality has surpassed the fiction:A hacker army located in the basement of a restaurant.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/32926248/bureau-121-north-koreas-elite-hackers-and-a-
tasteful-hotel-in-china
The crowning jewel is the in-house North Korean restaurant that can bring you delicious Korean food right to your room.
The Internet is Everywhere.It is all possible.
It is all here.
For people outside the Digital Industry all of this is still
Science Fiction and not relevant to their daily lives.
In a workshop to define the future of an internal system, we asked
participants:
“If you had a magic wand, what but be your one wish that would make your job easier? You can wish for
anything.”
One participant said “I want to be able upload photos as easy as on
Facebook”.
Don’t underestimate the real value of small, tactical initiatives like that. In some situations this is
exactly what, and all that, is needed.
What is transformational to the Digital Industry can be very
different to what is transformational to the a business.
Don’t confuse Transformational
with Cutting Edge.
While the Web may be maturing, it is not slowing down. Rather it is
speeding up and even we, as professionals living and breathing Digital, are struggling to keep up.
The distance between digital professionals and everybody else is getting bigger, not smaller because
of the increasing speed of the evolution of the Internet.
Here are three things to address in order to bring Customers on the journey to Digital Innovation:
1. A too big a focus on Strategy,
Blue Sky Thinking and The Big Picture.
2. Not appreciating the Craftsmanship required to actually get it done
and deliver something.
3. Using classic Idea
Generation Methodologies, which are based on the physical world with
physical limitations.
3. Classic Idea Generation
Methodologies.
A classic workshop exercise is to imagine a real obstacle
doesn’t exist.
3. Classic Idea Generation
Methodologies.
e.g. “what would a kettle look like if
it didn’t need power?”
3. Classic Idea Generation
Methodologies.
However, removing obstacles in a digital context where there’s
already almost endless possibilities, makes a too wide
playing field even wider.
But what if we flip the method around and add obstacles instead?
3. Classic Idea Generation
Methodologies.
e.g. “Design an app, but only 10% of
pixels can be coloured”.
3. Classic Idea Generation
Methodologies.
Another classic workshop method is “Cherry Splitting” where
participants divide a problem or object into the individual
functional parts.
3. Classic Idea Generation
Methodologies.
e.g when redesigning a bicycle, you
would divide it into wheels, seat, steer, chain etc.
3. Classic Idea Generation
Methodologies.
But a digital product can divide it into very very small, but still functional chunks to the point
where the exercise becomes useless.
3. Classic Idea Generation
Methodologies.
Maybe for digital a better way is to rearrange the individual parts
into new structures.
3. Classic Idea Generation
Methodologies.
e.g. take all components of a contact form and rearrange them
into a new order.Button first maybe?
3. Classic Idea Generation
Methodologies.
2. Craftsmanship.
At Digital Shoreditch 2015 I explored what Digital Professionals can learn from Creatives working with physical tools and Materials.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=agZYtFOTpdc
2. Craftsmanship.
For the presentation I decided to go to the source and interview an
artist friend of mine: Phuc Van Dang.
www.Phucisme.dk.
2. Craftsmanship.
Phuc produces art on anything from paintings and drawings to porcelain and photography to fullsize wall
art and performa art.
2. Craftsmanship.
One of the things I didn’t cover in the Digital Shoreditch presentation was Phuc’s focus on delivery and
understanding his tools and materials.
2. Craftsmanship.
Because of the nature of some of his pieces, it is crucial he fully understands how to bring his ideas
to life.
2. Craftsmanship.
There is no “undo” for Phuc.
2. Craftsmanship.
The non-committal nature of Digital Production means the craftsmanship doesn’t get the
respect it deserves.
2. Craftsmanship.
It can be updated later.Fix it in phase 2.
etc.
2. Craftsmanship.
But we are forgetting once it is live, it is committed and judged by the users. Some may not appreciate
it. Some may never come back.
2. Craftsmanship.
While we can fix the product, it is much hard to fix the lost
relationship with a customer.
And finally back to point 1 on the heavy focus on Big Picture thinking.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
A customer has a simple request, a simple thing that will mean a lot
for their company.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
It may not be cutting edge and the knowledgeable Digital Professionals
want to show a display of their vast knowledge of the Web.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
Present all the many many solutions to the customer ranging far beyond
the original problem.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
Lift the thinking beyond the immediate problem and look at the
Bigger Picture and present Strategies to approach the problem
and all its new-found cousins.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
Not only does this sometimes mean the customer think they are being
oversold…
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
…it also leaves the customer overwhelmed and questioning whether what they wanted was right in the
first place.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
The barrage of options and how far it takes the conversation away from
the immediate problem leads to indecisiveness.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
And nothing gets done.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
Customers are not stupid. But they naturally focus on the problem they have at hand. That’s where we need
to start the journey.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
“You Must Walk Before You Run.”
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
Another analogy with reference to physical limitations because it assumes all are affected by the
same gravity, friction, wind etc.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
There is no physical limits to how fast we can move on the web. Going from walking to running may take
exactly the same time as going from walking to flying lightspeed.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
We have to find the right speed of the customer to make sure they are
with us.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
But as soon as we do, then the real tangible transformational stuff
happens. Not only in our thinking, but also what is being delivered.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
It is made Real.
1. Strategy and “The Big Picture”.
Final thought:The only wrong decision
is not to make one.
Don’t make the vast possibilities of the Web become an obstacle to
making decisions and prevent ideas from becoming real.
Thanks!