Innovations are not introduced there

Author: Tom Godwin - Executive Vice President, Head of Innovation at Zenith Media .

I lead a rather cosmopolitan futuristic lifestyle on the top floor of a glass skyscraper in New York, although I’m not yet delivered a pizza by an unmanned drone, I do not order a taxi through Alex at Uber, and I don’t open the door of a hotel room with my smartwatch. I also do not order a hotel room through a bot (I tried it and brought me to white heat) and do not receive news via a bot, because this is a terrible way to stay informed.
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In a world where technological capabilities are evolving at breakneck speed, it is strange that British Airway has developed a smart plaid that discriminates emotions, but cannot streamline e-mail alerts. It is strange that IKEA has made the space of virtual reality to assess their kitchens, but it does not cope with the elementary directions of Internet commerce. My car rental company has invested millions in videophones in offices, but the application loses 50% of the applications that are processed through it.

We put the question wrong. You need to ask, not how you introduce innovations, or what project is developing new things, and why you need it and at what level. Pizza ordered with a smiley, bot, or smartwatch, emoticons depicting eggplant-flavored condoms are superficial innovations. Yes, this is something new, tangible, slightly related to the corresponding segment of the business. Usually this is the development of a small innovation group, with the main purpose of issuing a loud press release, a smart photo shoot, so that there is something to discuss at the next teleconference on the financial activities of the company.

And, in general, not such companies should be engaged in innovations. These are retail companies that produce popular products, but about which there is little to say. Maybe a brand, worth billions of dollars and stable sales is a bit boring. Therefore, there are special editions, applications and Internet commerce projects with a dubious indicator of product profitability. Mattress manufacturers become publishers. Why it happens? Because judging by Conde Nast, The New York Times or Hearst, is publishing a simple job? Or very profitable? Each new product of the company introduces chaos in the organization of business, or even leads to global changes.

And at the same time, many companies desperately need innovation. The best shows for the whole period of television existence are now being released on TV, but the sphere is still in decline, since they do not understand the needs of the modern consumer. Airlines use tremendous technology to secure the flight and keep to the schedule, but they systematically fail to cope with the simplest communication tasks.

It's time to stop perceiving technology as a fashionable tattoo - something superficial, applied to a hidden, not very often used part of the body.

Given the experience of car rental companies whose employees are lost due to an influx of orders, hotels whose employees do not know when your room will be ready and ask for credit card information three times, retailers need to adapt to the world where online purchases have made people impatient: you need to get what they want in a blink of an eye, and better still faster.

Companies need deep innovation. Not symbolic gadgets, but a fundamental restructuring of business from its very foundations. Think of business as a multi-layered bulb. On the top layer is communication, how the company positions itself. Next is marketing: services, product promotion, pricing and manufactured goods. At the root, on which the whole business-corporate values, business culture, used processes and systems are based.

Surface changes affect only the top layer. There, the easiest way is to take less organizational effort and change is most noticeable. Launching an innovation lab, incubation fund, or venture capital unit requires only a few people in a trendy office, even if they do nothing after the media buzz subsides.

Innovation at the marketing level is more interesting. An example is Honest and Dollar Shave Club, both of which have made significant changes to their products, or to a sales, supply, or payment scheme. But although their innovations are valuable and dynamic, it is not clear how much they are breakthrough.

Examples of real innovation can be found in companies that were created for the modern world. They changed the style of behavior, acquired new technologies, introduced a new procedure for office work, and, above all, changed the expectations of consumers at the root. Obvious examples include Uber and Airbnb, but also Facebook, for example, which has become a major owner of media outlets that do not publish anything.

You can also compare the income and expenses of Buzzfeed with some old-fashioned company like Conde Nast. Compare Netflix with Blockbuster, Spotify with music stores, or Kodak with Instagram. The fastest growing companies in the modern world, such as Tesla, for example, which costs $ 30 billion, or Dropbox, Nest, or WhatsApp, surpassed all imaginable expectations, precisely because innovation was at the root of their business.

For God's sake, do not invent more machines using the iBeacon protocol, and do not print junk on a 3D printer.

Technologies will create vast and profound changes. The coolest mobile technology has not yet been invented. Mobile payments, digital wallets and the Internet of Things will create the most successful testing ground for your business.

Technologies such as 5D, super-fast WI-FI, smart cities and other forms of ICT will create a new world architecture in which your business will operate. People will change too. Already, people are not ready to wait for anything, delivery should be on the same day, returns should be free, and the user interface should be almost invisible and super-reliable.

Maybe you need an innovative laboratory. Maybe you need to cooperate with some startup. Maybe your organization needs a push and new directions - just for the sake of God, no automata using the iBeacon protocol and trinkets from a 3D printer.

It's time to stop perceiving technology as a fashionable tattoo - something superficial, applied to a hidden, not very often used part of the body.

It is rather the oxygen needed for the heartbeat of your business.

Source: Innovation is in all the wrong places