Another factor that I have seen while working with different companies is that the culture of the companies is critical to the success of any Open Innovation efforts, even if companies decide to create a separate team focused solely on Open Innovation. Culture of an organization often dictate how problems are defined and approached as well as the language being used to define problems, solutions, and such concepts as Open Innovation.

As you stated, I have seen Open Innovation defined and discussed in inconsistent terms in various organizations, and in classrooms. I believe that there are opportunities for this excellent idea to mature even further and to become a more effective engine for innovation.

Thanks for your insights into this topic. It’s great to know that scholars are investing their efforts to advance this idea both in philosophy and execution.

I’ve recently finished reading your book and was deeply thrilled to learn new ways to look at the problems of the healthcare.

In the chapter on pharmaceutical industry, you mentioned “Differences in Scale as a Driver of Dis-Integration” in the pharmaceutical industry and linked it to the concept of open innovation. I can easily understand that the pharmaceutical industry is disintegrating to represent what you term ‘modular architecture’ in the process of introducing a new drug to the market. But I was a little bit unsure if the concept of open innovation applies to the pharmaceutical industry, or if open innovation is related to the modular architecture of the system. I wonder if your call for more precise use of the term open innovation also applies to this instance.

Thank you again for sharing your insights. Your works on disruptive innovation and the recent book have really been the source of inspiration and helpe

Thanks for another thought provoking article. From being inside of large corporations such as Cisco, GE, and McKesson I see a few issues that need to be addressed with open innovation.

First, it seems to me that companies are sending a message to internal employees that the most valuable ideas come from outside of the company versus inside. While there are some cases of that being correct, I believe that ideas that aren’t vetted with your JTBD framework are just hypotheses. As data has shown and you have proven 93% of ideas in their original form aren’t worth implementing. Too often companies jump on ideas versus ensuring those ideas came through the foundations needed for good innovation such as contextual inquiry, hypothesis testing, rapid prototyping, etc…..

This leads me to a second concern. May an example serve to illustrate. GE did a great job of teaching the skills to be a leading Six Sigma person. Green, Black and Master Black Belt designations were awarded to those who had evidence to prove they were skilled. I do not see many companies, Intuit and the work started by Scott Cook and Roy Rosin is an exception, teaching the skills necessary and giving the career advancement to employees who have not only been taught how to innovate but have proven their ability to drive innovation. Without thinking about innovation systematically, as was Six Sigma, whether it be open or internal innovation, I do not see innovation having the impact it can.

Last, (for now) I see open innovation if not defined well, just being another form of M&A activity. For many years Cisco was rewarded for acquisitions that improved its portfolio and revenue. However, we now see that Wall Street no longer rewards Cisco or GE for their acquisitions. Articles have been written about Wall Street’s desire to see companies organically innovate. If open innovation is not systematic and simply turns into a “fund” of money where GE and others can buy ideas, I do not believe that shareholders will get rewarded for investing in companies who “say” they do open innovation.

As always, thanks for posting.

Todd Dunn

My company will pay $10,000 for the best solution to how to get the caramel inside the Caramilk bar.

Not:

My company will pay $10,000 for ideas on how to sell more Caramilk bars.

Unfortunately telling this to those that come to this blog is probably like preaching to the choir – and academia, which exhibits more rigor in this regard, has its own relevance problems to overcome.

I look forward to learning the how to overcome this concern while maintaining as much of the richness of open discussion as possible, Until then, we should probably consider ourselves warned not to assume that everyone (or anyone) sees the same gradations and shades as we do before trying to engage in a meaningful conversation about concepts we believe to be important to our mutual success in the future.