Innovation Types

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There is a lot of energy around innovation as we struggle between old economic structures and systems and new ones. Are we really talking about the same kinds of innovation or not? In working with a coaching client who catalyzes innovation, I developed the following chart and typing (borrowing from a dozen models I found in various domains and with the help of several practicing innovators including my collaborator Herman Wagter).

Let’s explore, across these types, where innovators focus their attention, what is required, the timelines usually involved in implementation and adoption, and some examples within business model, marketing, product/service, and process.

Disruptive Innovation

Here, we are looking at game-changing innovation. These innovations offer an unexpected new value proposition. This type of innovations requires: deep creativity, long term market building, and has trouble creating market (because people don’t even know they want it yet).

To be disruptive is deep creativity – coming up with something that no one else is doing or knows they need. They aren’t inward facing: “how do we do what we do better?” They aren’t outward facing: “how do we do something better than what others do?” They involve lots of random play in a nonlinear process. Attention focuses on where there is complacency or “accepted wisdom” that no one else is questioning in the market. Highly emergent, networking is everything. To be disruptive, you must see a striking new perspective on a existing problem. To win the market by being disruptive you need to execute on a bold plan. To be successful, you have to invite people to make a trade off in what they think is valuable. You create a different value proposition where that market validates the trade off as an improvement.

Combinatory Innovation

Welcome the the world of mashup innovation. These innovations take something that is working in some other domain and transport it into a new domain or they take existing offers and bundle them in better ways. This type of innovation requires: broad awareness outside market zone and short-term market building.

To be combinatory, innovators look outside their domain of known expertise for ideas that work. Partly emergent, you have to be able to see what is not there yet. This is a world of allegory. Find systems like your system and use what works there. Alternately, take several things that work and combine them in new and more effective ways. The value proposition is enhanced: more, wider attributes.

Efficiency Innovation

These innovations focus on refinement. They offer iterative improvement on existing technologies by reducing waste. These types of innovation require: engineering creativity and competitive market building.

To be efficiency innovators, look for ways to refine what is. This is about control and limitation. What about what is there now is not critical? What about what exists really matters and what can be left behind? Remove what is not highest value adding. What would a simpler way to do it be? The value proposition stays the same, it is offered with better speed/cost/options.

What form of innovation are you doing? What type do you want to be doing? How are you going about achieving that?

What examples would you add?

Flash Collaboration Discussion

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Announcement

The HUB Berkeley, Friday April 9th at noon
Berkeley, CA

Brown Bag lunch with Jean Russell, curator of Thrivability: A Collaborative Sketch. Jean will present and discuss flash collaboration. She used this process to involve 70 collaborators from across the world in producing an ebook in less than 90 days. The ebook was repeatedly a top “twittered” and “facebooked” item on Slideshare. It is approaching 5000 views in less than 3 weeks. It is cash positive on a generosity model. She will point to successful ways of using social media to both develop and launch a project, as well as project management for flash collaborations. Take away ideas on how to collaborate with your network for tangible and visible results.

Catalytic Philanthropy

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I am so deeply offended, I felt compelled to write, and now share with you. The following is my reply to Catalytic Philanthropy, an article in the Standford Innovation Review by Mark Kramer. It is subtitled: “Despite spending vast amounts of money and helping to create the world’s largest nonprofit sector, philanthropists have fallen far short of solving America’s most pressing problems. What the nation needs is “catalytic philanthropy”—a new approach that is already being practiced by some of the most innovative donors”

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I must agree with Ryan [in the comments]. The arrogance and condescension in this article is disgraceful. Articles such as What is a Donor To Do? www.tpi.org/downloads/pdfs/research-whats_donor_to_do.pdf [pdf] have a much more respectful approach to addressing the evolution of donors from checkbook philanthropy to transformational giving. Furthermore, playing a blame game with the subtitle, as if it is ills that business and government have failed to address should be solved by philanthropy (when they weren’t solved by business or government). The last thing we need to do is blame the generous souls who go beyond their peers with their compassion by offering their resources. If anything we should point the finger at the business sector for externalizing costs at the expense of their workers, their consumers, and the communities they touch with usual flagrant disregard for the systems in which they operate. Granted personhood and yet acting all too often with little compassion, respect, or even citizenship, the business sector as a whole could take a few lessons from Mr. Kramer, if we adjust a bit of the language. But finger pointing is not going to move us into the world we want.

I suggest a good read and then digestion of Claire Gaudiani’s book, Greater Good: How Philanthropy the American Economy and Can Save Capitalism (http://books.google.com/books?id=s2Bu-k4GvscC&dq=greater+good&printsec=frontcover&source=bll&ots=6m8IrKm6ku&sig=Hj8wm0_cU9M84pBM-pOWgeKQcgw&hl=en&ei=4dGVSrPcKNCTlAfY36mbDA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=11#v=onepage&q=&f=false)

I am an advocate of social entrepreneurship and a fan of blended models of business and social benefit. I believe it is more that these address gaps in our tool belt. I agree that we need to collaborate more, and innovate ever more effective ways of addressing the issues we face – individually and collectively. I have doubts that nonprofits are eager for donors to take leadership role in guiding their programs as a learning ground for trying new tactics. Wise philanthropists know how to honor the wisdom and resources of a nonprofit while leveraging the impact of their own dollars.

Finally, I have to question the issue of audience this article addresses, for if it hopes to lure in donors and potential donors into an evolved model of philanthropy, it might be best not to insult the form of philanthropy they have been practicing. If however, it seeks an audience of non-philanthropic individuals driven by the business-approach can solve the world mentality…well then, write on. (although business collaboration networks in competitive markets….mmm…yeah, where are those?)

To be clear, I appreciate the success stories here…and I don’t dispute them. Nor do I dispute the need for evolving philanthropy. In fact, I am an avid supporter of evolving philanthropy. What I take issue with here is the style, tone, and framing.

Collaboration and Complementarity

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Collaborate with others to build your visibility, their visibility, gain access to resources, share access, increase value. Complimentarity. And I mean something pretty simple with this–who compliments what you are doing? Who has a similar market to your which will allow you both to increase your visibility to your target? What products and services compliment what you are offering? How can you leverage that compliment to build your revenues?

It matters significantly less what your competition is doing (unless you want to stay in red oceans) and does significantly matter who you have explicit and implicit cooperation with.

See Blue Oceans.

Social Media Memory

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I “follow” abut 700 people on twitter, with about 1000 following me. At scale like this, the question I often am asked is, “How do you remember all those people?”

* about a hundred don’t tweet often, I would guess
* I already know about 250+, so I have hooks in my memory for them
* there is no social obligation on twitter for tracking all of it (unlike email)
* people @ or DM if they really want me to hear
* I use PeopleBrowsr to sort/group folks and the tags there help me remember
* as a network weaver, people fascinate me – how many sports stats and players does a sports fan track?
* whenever I don’t remember someone (and want to) PeopleBrowsr has lots of ways to dig for info

Part of this seems to be about building social media memory skills. In my years of Omidyar.net community, I seemed to develop strength in that memory muscle. While I was in college I could hardly remember which author wrote which books or held what beliefs, when it came to online community and my connections, I remember tons of details. It can be a fun game with folks – they ask me a question, and I remember who posted wedding photos to Omidyar or who lives in Boston. I think the ability to remember has a lot to do with how important something is to you. To me, my network made of hundreds of brilliant, interesting, inspiring, compassionate people is very important.

And I solidify this by meeting up with folks as I travel so I can really ground myself in their being. Then we when check-in online, I can imagine their posture, gestures, and warmth. I think the optimum number of connections for full rich relationship is much lower than the number I track via social media.
This works in something of a power law form. There are the edge folks – people I have encountered, but the connection has not deepened. Some of these folks are very good at putting enough into the initial connection that the looseness is sticky enough to hold.

How do you “hook” people into your memory?
– I prefer using sensory data, as I am a kinesthetic person – I experience others in my body. ooo, that sounds weird. Let’s just say that 3-d is better for me than voice or visuals.
– Like many others, my memory is often container-based/domain-specific – so meeting them in twitter doesn’t mean I will recognize them in email or at a conference.

What are ways of being “sticky” in other people’s memory?
– At nearly 6 feet with starkly contrasting hair/skin, I am visually pretty easily memorable (not much I can do or did do about that). Now, don’t go get a tattoo or piercing just to be memorable, but do dress in your own fashion and highlight your uniqueness (rather than worrying about whether your uniqueness is attractive or not).
– ask an unusual question – rather than asking “what do you do?” which is soooo typically American, ask “What are you passionate about?” or “Tell me a short story about your greatest adventure.”
– be yourself. If you consume all your brain cycles trying to remember what people know about you or who you were trying to be last time you met them, you won’t remember them and they won’t feel connected to you.
– be curious. The more you bring someone else alive, the more they will remember you.
– be clear about who you are, and get enough info from others that you are clear about at least one dimension of who they are.

What other ways can we be memorable (and positively so)?
How do you keep your social media memory?
What tools do you use to assist you?

Subversive Giving

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Of course activists have long given their time and money to causes, but this sort of activism I have not seen before. This kind–the kind where people contribute to a cause, planned parenthood, in the name of a political personality so that this personality would be blanketed in the usual “a contribution has been made in your name” letters. What an interesting way to take advantage of the system!

First, you must understand how much I truly and deeply appreciate subversion. Then you might benefit from knowing that planned parenthood is very good at overwhelming donors with materials and requests, which is why I stopped giving to them (paper is such a waste of resources). Third, I really prize innovation and creative thinking.

So I am totally celebrating this unusual form of philanthropy. Reminds me a bit of shareholder activism. Bravo. Now, my friends, how can we continue to evolve practices like this to fuel our purpose?

Bravo.

Here is the letter, borrowed from What’s Sarah Thinking blog.

Instead of (in addition to?) us all sending around emails about how horrible she is, let’s all make a donation to Planned Parenthood. In Sarah Palin’s name. And here’s the good part: when you make a donation to PP in her name, they’ll send her a card telling her that the donation has been made in her honor. Here’s the link to the Planned Parenthood website:

https://secure.ga0.org/02/pp10000_inhonor

You’ll need to fill in the address to let PP know where to send the “in Sarah Palin’s honor” card. I suggest you use Sarah Palin’s home address, which is:

Sarah Palin
PO Box 21
Wasilla, AK

PS make sure you use that link above or choose the pulldown of Donate–Honorary or Memorial Donations, not the regular “Donate Online”

Convergence Colliding in Chicago

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Chicago New Media Summit concluded tonight. I didn’t attend. At first I was excited by the great idea of rallying around Chicago’s talented new media folks and pushing us toward the leading edge. Worthwhile endeavor. But as the waves of email blasts announcing presenters rolled on and the fees got discounted (but not within range of many nonprofit and grassroots activists), I started to get more and more uncomfortable. I just wasn’t feeling an authentic connection.

Tonight the event concluded. And in my inbox is another email blast celebrating…and announcing some next steps. Here is what I posted in a comment on my profile page:

1. A microsoft event? I predict Chicago will not be the center of innovation, geekiness, and cool media, should this be focused on Microsoft. See bubblgeneration blog last couple years for ideas on what sort of companies and their models which could support this sort of “convergence” here.
2. Moving to a microsoft platform? Please don’t move me over. Why oh why would you move a community?
3. Talent, ideas, and code? Collide? What happened to people. New media is in huge part social media. People. I do not aspire to think of myself as a “talent” to be commodified. I am a social creature yearning for connection and thriving by sharing ideas, sparked by the synchronicities common to a flourishing community.
4. And what does all this have to do with the Chicago bid for the olympics? Do I need to behind that to be here? Seems like a pretty big agenda to not be supper-de-dupper clear about it.
5. I do appreciate the notice about fees and our grassroots friends in our latest email blast. Thanks for coming around to our value (after the fact).

Entering Social Spaces Online

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Seems like each week there are new social media spaces to join and participate in. And lots of people help others learn and adopt online social practices. Each space has its own nuance on social practices. There are general rules of thumb, sure. But each site – even a cluster within a site – is specific in the way it encourages flows of connection and information, and thus which practices are encouraged. So how do you know what to do where?

I see lots of do and don’t lists, and they are great. Very helpful if you want a rulebook to follow. But if you want to learn the skill of adapting as you enter spaces, the work you do needs to go deeper into your practice. What questions should you ask yourself when joining and contributing to online social spaces?

Be strategic. Social media is a huge flow of information and people often very loosely knit together. What do you want to foster? Disregard fads of tools and spaces. What you do with your extremely precious time needs to be purposeful. Do you want: friends, information, a thriving network to use as a resource, marketing your [fill in the blank]? How will you know when you have that? How will you maintain it over time? Social spaces online just like physical social spaces require your attention to stay alive and flourishing.

Listen. Like I shared above, each space has its own social norms. Yes, there are general rules, but if you lurk before blasting posts, you can get a sense of how often to post, ways to appreciate others, ways to find interesting people and ideas, ways to avoid trouble, what puts people off… How do people behave in this space using this tool? What best practices can you collect? Sense into what is working for you in other people’s social practice. What gets you engaged there? How can you offer or connect, mirroring what worked for you?

Applaud. In speech we often give praise or acknowledgment with our faces. We nod or even just keep eye-contact. There are zillions of body clues. And they don’t show online. At all. Not even with emoticons. How can you show you are listening? How can you show that you are giving your attention to someone or something? How can you show you are a contributor? How can you help others shine? Where can you quickly, easily, and usefully connect people, ideas, and resources? If the general principle of social relations is truly get what you give, then what are you giving?

What questions wander through your mind when you are visiting new online social spaces?
What really irritates you as a social practice?
How do you quickly and easily sense a spammer, a connector, a maven, an influencer?

Your answers help you figure how how you want to be online. And they create an opportunity for you to be genuine in your practice.

Here are some resources for you that I saw on twitter today:
Top 10 Reasons Brands should Listen to Social Media
The Creation of Twitter Best Practices: Round 1

Relationship building

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I was writing in response to a question posed by Mark Carter on facebook this morning. He asked what does one do to build relationship after the hello.

And I wrote about authenticity and being as the crucial elements to making relationships. But this line came pouring out, and it didn’t fit the rest of my response. So I will share it with you here. Mentor those who ask questions, and fearlessly ask questions of those you want to learn from.

Questions are the root of conversation. Without them we all too often talk past each other. I was thinking, when I wrote this line about how important it is to build up, down, and across the network.

When someone asks you a question, they give you honor. Accept the question with grace, and, as possible, be helpful. Mentor those that ask questions, for the curious are great explorers. Those you help become your legacy.

Fearlessly ask questions of those you believe you can learn from. Sometimes this is a child, who can say with the greatest simplicity some of the most profound unfettered things. Sometimes this is a person of high rank and station that you have obtained access to. Be fearless in your questions. This may be the one great opportunity you have to find the answer you need right now. You do not serve yourself or the world by being fearful. This, of course, rests on the premise of good faith. Assume the best in others, and they may rise to the challenge. Give others honor by asking of them what you need, especially when it comes to knowledge or connection. Give others a gift–the opportunity to be a contribution, to serve, to be valued.

Ask questions. Offer answers. Rather than speaking into the ever-recorded infinite space of the internet, hoping someone will hear: listen, ask, respond.

Don’t finish that!

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I have the sense that there are lots of people doing really great work…but they want to get it to a finished point before sharing it. Really? Sure about that?

In the age of participatory, nay, collaborative culture, as soon as something is finished it can’t be collaborative. If you want other people pitching in to make an idea work, software better, or actions more impactful…don’t dictate what should happen and push out what has been finished. Open with curiosity. Share vision and motivation…share ideas as rough sketches for group discussion. Collaboration doesn’t work as well if comes off as “I made this, now will you implement it?” *

Collaboration works better as “I had an idea, what would you do…? or would you help me figure out…?” And it can really work well with a bit of acknowledgment like, “You are such a whiz kid at x, and I was working on this idea related to that….could you help me think it through?” or “You are so well connected in z neighborhood/network, I would like to vision there. How do you think that could work?” So I encourage those of us in collaboration to stop finishing things. Let documents come alive–living documents invite collaboration… Let ideas and actions live.

*This worked better in pyramidal structures where authority or perceived authority can push things to happen. In collaborative culture, work is accomplished by attraction–the pull of an idea, person, thing, or vision. And the key to get in the door of collaboration is invitation. Don’t invite people to a party that is finished.