How Innovative is Your Company?

*  AWARE – of themselves and resources required,
**  EMERGING – Innovating in response to market need,
***  ESTABLISHED – Innovating in anticipation of market need,
****  MATURE – Innovating and creating a need with new offerings,
*****  ROBUST – Innovating under uncertainty,

“Four Synergistic activities to build a culture of innovation”

The +4π Program lays out a set of novel and traditional management tools and practices in a step wise manner for the companies to progressively build the culture of innovation. The four major activities are

Strategic Road map – 

Defines what products and services would a company develop with timeline to capture the market share. Set of tools progressively add rigor to the road-map through Bench marking, Portfolio balancing, Project prioritization, Competitive intelligence, Smart forecasting, and Scenario based planning. This is like the GPS for your car that guides you through the fastest route to your destination.

Expertise Building – 

Defines what Talent, Knowledge, Assets and IP, are required when to support the strategic road map. Set of tools guide subject matter expertise & leadership development, High performance team building, Knowledge augmentation, Leveraging networks, Succession planning; all using novel visual maps. This is like the power under the hood of your car that will enable you to reach your destination.

Innovative Development – 

Defines the process to systematically develop new products, reducing risk and cost. The Basis is DRIVE – Define-Research-Ideate-V(systems)-Engage. This guides the team through an innovation value chain which begins with white space or a market demand, and ends with an emotionally engaged customer.

Efficiency Improvement – 

Aligns products, processes, employees, customers, and business metrics, to continuously improve the efficiency and productivity of the enterprise. This set of tools guide the employee morale and customer engagement from management objectives, providing synergy benefits making the whole greater than sum of individual pieces. This is like 4-wheel alignment and balancing to run the car smoothly without serious wear and fuel inefficiency.

The money saved from improving efficiency more than pays for the investment in building a strategic road map and expertise, making the entire program having a positive effect on cash flow.

True Value – Synergy 

A significant value contributed by this framework comes from the relative sequence/dependence and integration, where tools are using same set of parameters and indicators. This is generally missing in so many organizations in spite of their structure and process focus.

Scope –

As of April 2016, the framework matrix has over 50 models and tools. Most organizations have some of these tools already in practice, and those need not change. However many of these are rather novel and even new to seasoned management.

You are Invited –

Come.. use it, challenge it, refine it, or simply critic it, so others can improve.