Innovative Business Ideas – HBR’s “8 Essential Questions for Every Corporate Innovator”

We all know that innovation is essential no matter the industry – but there are right ways and wrong ways to go about achieving profitable change. One of the biggest problems encountered by so many CEOs comes from not having a distinct innovation strategy – so how can you go about developing and imagining those innovative business ideas that bring with them major gains?

We often like to share interesting and relevant pieces we find, and this week we thought we’d share this really noteworthy article from the Harvard Business Review. In it, the author presents 8 essential questions regarding corporate innovation – and how to tackle the innovation process. For any business, innovation can bring with it a number of hurdles – so how can you develop an innovation plan to help you conquer those hurdles?

According to the article, these are some of the crucial steps in the innovation process, and the questions you might want to be asking when you get to each step:

• Identifying New Growth Opportunities – By asking what problems need to be solved, you can easily spot an opening for innovation.
• Identifying the Threat of Disruption – Are those services you provide actually being used? Or, are you ahead of the curve as far as competitors’ offerings?
• Designing Compelling Offerings – What is your “hedgehog?” Is there something someone else is doing that you can do better?
• Commercializing Your Idea – How do you sell that idea/service/product? What do the customers think about it?

Each of these requires extensive consideration. Without a plan, that innovation is largely just an idea floating in its own little bubble. It needs context – and these questions can help you create a space for the idea to flourish.

Innovators Alliance can give you the tools and expertise to set a plan in place to make use of those innovative business ideas. Contact us today to find out about how a network of your peers can be the answer: 1-905-332-0340.