Innovation – A field guide
I should be clear - I have absolutely no qualifications to tell anyone how to be innovative. I may not even be able to spot it when it hits me. Worse still I believe the notion of it is played out and tired in the business world.
That said – I respect it and value it. Innovation is recognized after the fact. rarely is it called out in the birthing process. Which is messy and painful – as most beautiful and enduring things are.
So here are 10 things which I believe mark innovation at its process roots:
- Initiative – take it, seize it, consequences be damned. Initiative is never given, it is always taken. be the one.
- Play – go out, fall down, scrape your knees, get up and do it again, and again, and again.
- Take Action – Study first, but do something.
- Study – read, investigate, research, look around. what is it and how does it work. learn.
- Use Common sense – besides being a virtue, it is the best way to arrive at the biggest “Ah HAH!” moments.
- Believe in Magic – What is mysterious today is science fact tomorrow. what is tired today was novel and wondrous yesterday.
- Be Focused – on areas that you can impact, ignore everything else until it moves into your field of focus.
- Touch – feel things, touch them. take them apart – dissect.
- Think about it – always have it on your mind
- Write it down – It is all mental energy that goes into the ether unless you record it
Good luck – Innovation is oversold, hyped, overcomplicated, and in the words of the talented Bob Harrell “squishy”.
America Inc.
One of my favorite publications lately is Bloomberg Businessweek. It is a worthwhile and fast read.
A few weeks ago a brilliant article, by an equally brilliant Journalist / Analyst Mary Meeker, came out. In it she takes the position that if we looked at America as a business, a public company, we would have a different perspective on our great nation. I agree. It is a well conceived and well written piece. Read the whole thing here>
Today I will not attempt to dissect or review it thoroughly. I will take exception to 2 points.
- Correlating the raise in US Government spending on entitlements (like Medicare) to the decline in personal savings
- The implication that spending on entitlements itself is bad because it put the US on the road to financial ruin.
Earlier estimates had the inflection point at 2065
On point #1 – Correlation is not causation. I run daily. Each morning before dawn I trot around the pastoral offices of the Yellow Caterpillar campus – I have noticed that each day as I return back to the office as the sun is rising and I am warmer. I have researched this and indeed found the temperature is higher than when I set out. Without fail 100% of the time the temperature is higher on return than on departure. I have therefore postulated that, nay correlated, the rise in temperature to the culmination of my run. You can all thank me for the warming of your days. correlation is not causation.
On point #2. This is trickier. Mary’s thinking here is that the trend of the rate spending on entitlements will outstrip revenue by 2025 (2065 at the latest) – scary, man the lifeboats, predictions that I believe the math on.
But the underlying implication for most of the article is that entitlement spending is inherently bad. I am not partisan (nor is the article, even though it appears in a Bloomberg magazine…). However, I have a firm conviction that Health-care - or at least cost effective access to good Health-care is not a privilege. So therefore I can’t throw out the baby with the bathwater.
Maybe we should look more closely at a system that has USA Inc. spending 3x times as much on Health-care per capita than UK Inc. or Japan Inc.. Why does Health-care cost so much? Perhaps the entitlement in this case isn’t the root of the evil, its what the Health-care system (providers and insurers) are charging USA Inc.. Lets get vendor costs lower.
Stay Well (your wallet depends on it)
Amazon App Store for Android: – 1 Bad, + 3 Good
I am a charter member of Amazon’s Prime service. I love them.
Last night when got the email heralding their new Android App store the first thing I thought was: “Cool another new Angry Birds game”, but quickly shifted to pondering how Amazon is just the right provider of this service to get us Android Marketplace users to the dial-tone like service Apple provides with iTunes. I love my ‘Droid, but the existing Marketplace, well… sucks.
Amazon is out to change that – I believe they will.
First the bad:
-1. Test drives: We used to have a full 24 hours. Amazon has shortened this to 1/2 hour. 30 minutes. This is not a good compromise. To get connected to my corporate email I use Touchdown. It is a great application, but the setup alone will take the better part of an hour, and then there is the usage – will you actually like using it? can you get it set up the way you want? granted not all apps cost $24 and have such complicated setups, but it makes the point that 30 minutes is just not enough time. Apple doesn’t even allow tryouts so I guess there is that.
The Good:
+1. Searching: Amazon has this nailed. They have beaten the pants off B&N for books searches and this isn’t even a contest for the mess that passes for search on the Android Market.
+2. Ease of Buying: Amazon has me every time with those 2 buttons for “One-Click” purchases. All I do is click the button for 1 or 2 day shipping - I like choices like that. Try to buy an app on your phone using the dysfunctional-duo of Google checkout and Android Market.
+3. Buying Suggestions: Amazon knows me. I want to hire the team that wrote the “you might also like” algorithm. I can’t wait to see this in play as it takes your other Amazon buys into account when it suggests an application for my phone…. “Since you have purchase Star Wars books 1 – 297 you might also like the Darth Vadar voice disguiser 3000″
So does the 1 drawback negate the 3 wins? I don’t think so, but it will change my downloading habits. Having 1 day to play around with a application makes for some easy installing. having 30 minutes means I have to commit to a playing with the app right then. Sometimes I download first and ask questions later.
Be Well
Pharma’s one big reason to get an iPAD 2
Who should adopt the iPAD 2 right now. as in today. They should have all been in the Apple store over the weekend getting set up.
Should Pharma upgrade to the iPAD 2?
- Medical Science Liaisons – MSLs
- Clinical Trial Liaisons
- Field Based outcomes research managers
Whatever your favorite Pharma, BioPharma, Biotech, or Medical device company calls these purveyors of medical wisdom and clinical insight.
Those fine folks who interact with your KOLs daily.
The reason?: Face Time.
-Rewind-
The iPAD 1 was a boon to marketing and sales alike. In fact the desire to use one was common ground for teams that historically don’t share much…. Apple is funny like that, they can polarize and unify in broad strokes like no other tech company can.
iPAD 1 opened the door. It sparked imagination like very few devices before it. In fact I have said that it is one time where buying it just for the sake of owning it is a good thing. The iPAD 1 needed no “killer app” it WAS the killer app.
But we struggled with how to justify the investment.
-Today-
This time around it’s different – the iPAD 2 offers a killer app Out Of The Box. It has the iPHONE 4 like ability to do “Face Time” video conferencing.
Sure Pharma has tried this video thing before. This time is different; a smallish piece of hardware makes it very different. The Medical establishment is ready and willing to adopt these things en masse.
iPAD 2 will change the way doctors practice medicine, but it has the potential to change the way Pharma talks to doctors as well
The iPAD is a heavy piece of paper – a form factor that invites interaction. I can see the Medical Student standing in the hallway watching a brief presentation, I can envision a doctor grabbing one in the doorway of his office for a quick 5 minute chat with an MSL on a question right before seeing that patient.
I can picture PERFECTLY in my mind a Sales Rep handing their iPAD 2 to a doctor who just asked a medical question for a signature and video chat with an ‘On Demand’ MSL….
iPADs put this type of interaction within reach for very little investment. From an IT and Finance perspective this is a no brainer. However we (pharma) have typically been slow to adopt the kind of process change needed to make this dream a reality.
Lets change that.
Japan Disaster – averted?
The tragedy in Japan will continue to unfold. It breaks my heart to think about what gets lost in a natural disaster like that and how even today as I sit pretty comfy on the coach writing a blog there are people stranded on roofs of destroyed homes waiting for rescue from Tsunami waters.
Pre 2004 things would have been very different. There were things that prevented a more global catastrophe this time.
After the Tsunami of 2004 a joint effort to put in an early warning system meant that Hawaii, and the Western sea board of the US had ample warning of the impending waters speeding toward them.
The wave was traveling at 500 miles an hour, but that still gave people hours to prepare themselves. Boats set to sea, people moved up vertically or inshore. Who knows how much property and life were spared this time around. Technology worked.
In Japan however the bigger disaster that was averted was a nuclear meltdown. 7 Japanese Nuclear power plants were nearly shut and by chain-of-events nearly *melted down*..jpg)
Diesel generators that are supposed to kick in when the power goes out were flooded and inoperable, control room operators worked overtime – in radiation levels that were 1,000 above normal, towns in 6 mile radii were evacuated.
Surely it was bad, but a radioactive cloud blowing across the Russian frozen desert or pacific ocean never materialized. yet… Whew.
Post-PC era?
The recent comments by Steve Jobs and other commentators in the blogsphere sparked a little introspection for me about how the iPAD (and here I will expand on other slate devices) are being adopted, used, and misunderstood.
The jist of Steve’s position is this: It’s not about ‘speeds and feeds’ and replacing that big desktop and notebook that you have, it’s about technologies marriage to humanity – art that is what should drive the tablet (slate) device highest and best use.
Apple Soapbox Checklist:
- Right Brain thinking – CHECK
- Knock PCs – CHECK
- Insult the unwashed masses – CHECK
I wish I could disagree with him, I can’t.
An iPAD isn’t really meant to be, nor should it be, a replacement for a desktop. Actually given the fact that you need a PC MAC with iTunes installed to work the thing I doubt it could be.
I *think* we all pretty much get it. We get that an iPAD is at it’s best when we want to browse the web from the coach, check email real quick, play a mindless game or three.
But to use Steve’s argument against him here. The iPAD is a device that invites creative use. That means developers will search for things to build on it, users will strive to do more with it, companies will be forced into adoption by critical mass. real world business uses abound:
Roambi on the iPAD
These things have done exactly what every PC / MAC netbook, desktop, laptop, tablet, etc.. has failed to do – Excite people. People with P&L responsibilities, people with businesses to run and budgets to run them with.
There is real business use for these devices and in the CRM space this is especially true: Quick fast updates of customer information, location based checks of addresses data, inviting and appealing electronic detailing with short fast MEMORABLE factoids.
Lets get busy.
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