{"id":316,"date":"2012-09-13T10:52:06","date_gmt":"2012-09-13T14:52:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sdaconseil.com\/blog\/?p=316"},"modified":"2013-03-07T11:33:06","modified_gmt":"2013-03-07T16:33:06","slug":"innovation-topic-1-the-suggestion-box-a-bag-of-gold-nuggets-or-crackerjacks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sdaconseil.com\/?p=316","title":{"rendered":"INNOVATION STEP 1: THE SUGGESTION BOX: A BAG OF GOLD NUGGETS OR CRACKERJACKS?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Montreal, 13 September 2012<\/p>\n

The suggestion box is the first response organisations put in place to stimulate innovation within their walls.\u00a0 It is simple, easy to organize, democratic, cheap and unthreatening to middle managers.\u00a0 It requires little commitment and literally no change in processes or practices.\u00a0 In other words, it is safe, and as a matter of fact, who knows what gold nugget we might find inside the box!\u00a0 There is a widespread belief that creativity, plucking ideas from employees, leads directly to innovation.\u00a0 Only sometimes, at best.<\/p>\n

More often than not the suggestion box looks a lot more like a box of crackerjacks, with lots of small puffy ideas.\u00a0 The suggestion box traditionally yields a high volume of ideas of small or modest impact.\u00a0\u00a0 These mini and small C ideas (C for Creativity) fly in all kinds of directions, as employees look around their immediate work space to tap on what gets on their nerves or what stands as an immediate problem.\u00a0 These ideas are rarely connected to the customers.<\/p>\n

And why would the employees really care?\u00a0 Most office employees have minimal clues about their company strategy, the competitive landscape or the market priorities.\u00a0 Not surprisingly they would not even know what to look for and where!\u00a0 Furthermore, it is not sure for most of them that carrying a good idea forward, is just the right thing to do.\u00a0 Like a running back on the football field, the employee is likely to face headwind, resistance tackles, and political vetoes.\u00a0 Fear of an adverse reaction from the boss is an understatement in many organisations.\u00a0 It all seems a lot better and safer to concentrate on where the next budget cuts will fall upon!<\/p>\n

Yet once in a while there is indeed a toy gift in the crackerjack box.\u00a0 Good enough, there are always a few low hanging fruits ready for the picking. \u00a0It shows that at least some employees are<\/em> listening to cues. Sometimes the suggestion box can be scaled up into a corporate challenge or innovation program.\u00a0 Brainstorming sessions are added.\u00a0 New media tools are implemented.\u00a0 Much good comes out of the effort, such as internal improvements, cost savings, employee participation and the impression of finally being consulted.\u00a0 But when the focus centers mainly on the suggestion box, most companies feel disappointed.\u00a0 Because senior management actually hopes to encounter the gold nuggets and magic bullets in<\/em> the suggestion box.\u00a0 Yet the really big C ideas that lead to projects with big impact don\u2019t fall off trees. \u00a0They are not either in the crackerjack boxes.\u00a0 No, they usually come from<\/em> hard, constant and conscious work to search<\/em> for the best ideas. \u00a0In other words, sweat is required.<\/p>\n

The really good ideas come from passionate observers with deep knowledge of the industry, markets or cutting edge technology.\u00a0 Like successful fly fishermen, they pick up on signals, clues and new trends that others don\u2019t see.\u00a0 They get the first hunch about what is changing out there.\u00a0 They catch the first whiff of a new opportunity.\u00a0 Smart entrepreneurs lead this category.\u00a0 They are on the lookout for their next vision.<\/p>\n

Others, and they are few, are particularly astute at keeping conversations with their customers.\u00a0 Most companies see themselves as client focused, but by-and-large, they mostly mean they are in regular contact with their customers:\u00a0 Exchanging information on order processing, transaction status,, billing, daily chit-chat, etc. \u00a0Real conversation requires time and observation in the field, time for interviews and special conversations where emerging needs are tapped in, habits detected, hidden discontent revealed, ill-defined desires spotted, etc.\u00a0 It is essentially from those conversations that critical patterns are detected.\u00a0 These are the gold nuggets, signals of market potential.\u00a0\u00a0 They don’t usually sit at the bottom of the suggestion box.<\/p>\n

There are not many gold diggers to be found in companies.\u00a0 Gold diggers need free time and an inherent passion\u00a0for hunting the nuggets. They excel in open forums, in chats around coffee tables and in wanderings across odd networks.\u00a0 Once they get a good idea in their hands, they know the idea has to bounce off other viewpoints and criticism.\u00a0 They know their idea will grow through collisions with other ideas.\u00a0 They will find missing bits around conversations in meeting rooms.\u00a0 They will find encouragement and advice when the idea is tested with potential customers.\u00a0 They may at times benefit from a dip into crowd sourcing, when a tricky problem lingers. Possibly years of incubation may be required to turn a good idea into an attractive proposal or even a commercial object.<\/p>\n

Crackerjack boxes are fun.\u00a0 But the real innovation work is done with customers.\u00a0 There is no shortcut.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Andr\u00e9 Du Sault, MBA (LBS), MPA (Harvard)<\/p>\n

DS&H teaches innovation as a new competence for leaders.<\/p>\n

Forthcoming:\u00a0 Innovation topic (2)\u00a0 The transformation of good ideas<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Montreal, 13 September 2012 The suggestion box is the first response organisations put in place to stimulate innovation within their walls.\u00a0 It is simple, easy to organize, democratic, cheap and unthreatening to middle managers.\u00a0 It requires little commitment and literally no change in processes or practices.\u00a0 In other words, it is safe, and as a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5,6],"tags":[76,78,43,79,77],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sdaconseil.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sdaconseil.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sdaconseil.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sdaconseil.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sdaconseil.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=316"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/sdaconseil.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":331,"href":"https:\/\/sdaconseil.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316\/revisions\/331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sdaconseil.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=316"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sdaconseil.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=316"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sdaconseil.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=316"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}