By Ron Shulkin

Maybe this rings a bell for you: You want to launch an innovation program at your company but you can’t get any support.

I talk all day to people who are interested in innovation. They know in their hearts that embracing innovation is the only way their organizations will flourish. They know the only way their company can compete in the difficult economic climate we face is to adopt an innovative approach. These people I talk to fall in love with the idea of collaborative ideation; assembling all of their smart people while they share ideas and other information of interest. They yearn to allow their cohort to find others within the company who are like minded; with common areas of interest.

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By Peter Verschuere

I’ve always been determined not to lose my creative side, because it's my belief that innovation cannot persist without creativity. If you loose your creativity, you stop to be innovative.

Yesterday I've been watching Josh Linkner's keynote on creativity, and I'd like to share it with you because it induces positive vibes and contains some strong and valuable messages:

• Never cave to your detractors.
• Sometimes you have to let go in order to seize greatness.
• Aim for the future.
• Pursue the unconventional path.
• Put passion first! (the money will follow).

Josh Linkner is the New York Times Bestselling author of "Disciplined Dreaming: A Proven System to Drive Breakthrough Creativity".
Josh is the CEO and Managing Partner of Detroit Venture Partners. Together with business partners Earvin "Magic" Johnson and NBA team owner Dan Gilbert, Josh is actively rebuilding urban areas through technology and entrepreneurship. Josh is also Adjunct Professor of Applied Creativity at the University of Michigan.

But most importantly, Josh is on a mission to make the world more creative.

Peter Verschuere is Social Media Director at CogniStreamer®, an Open Innovation Management System. Learn more about CogniStreamer®, follow our tweets or join us on Facebook. 

By Ron Shulkin

Here are some thoughts on contributor’s perceptions when involved in crowd sourcing and collaborations…

It is an accepted fact at this point: tapping into the “wisdom of the crowd” or “crowd sourcing” is a great way to get to a reliable set of truths. By asking lots of people what they think about any given challenge, the group, acting as a holistic unit, will generally push the best idea forward.

A promoted idea will most often

• yield the best financial return,
• offer the best way to answer the challenge at hand and,
• ultimately point to the best path forward for the organization discussing the topic.

However, human nature can sometimes add a mix of positive and dangerous components into the process! By being aware of both effects, the company’s innovation managers can keep the process on track.

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By Ron Shulkin

If you’re about to spend your 2011 on a decision to buy an idea management system, here’s some last minute due diligence questions to ask your software vendor (and yourself) before putting yourself out there with a risk. Enterprise software decisions are always a risk. The good news is that a successful decision can bolster a career.

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By Ron Shulkin

You may not know it yet, but you want an idea management social network in your organization. If you don’t have one, you may only get an electronic suggestion box, which is really no better than a static list of ideas. And that’s not going to do anyone any good.

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Some collected thoughts on why innovation matters, now more than ever.

• Innovation generates high-value, better jobs.
• Innovation fuels wealth creation and profitability.
• Innovation creates new industries and markets. It spurs productivity and economic growth.
  I don’t know of a company or a country that has prospered and grown over the long term that has not also been an innovation leader.  The company that builds a culture of innovation is on the path to growth. The company that fails to innovate will eventually disappear.
• Innovation raises the quality of life.
  We face enormous challenges today - as individual companies and institutions, but also as nations, as societies, and as a planet. I believe most if not all of these challenges can be highly responsive to innovation. We’re not innovating boldly enough in as many areas I think we could and should be doing.
• Innovation goes beyond invention.

Judy Estrin is an American business executive. She is currently the CEO of JLabs, through which she pursues a broad range of advisory activities including sitting on corporate and advisory boards and speaking engagements.
In this video clip, she states that we've become too shortsighted and more risk averse when it comes to developing new technology, and that this cultural shift away from innovative breeding grounds is to our own long-term disadvantage. 

Peter Verschuere is Team Coordinator at CogniStreamer®, an Open Innovation Management System. Learn more about CogniStreamer®, follow our tweets or join us on Facebook. 

Collaborative Idea Management Systems are mini experiments looking into human behaviors that result in out of the box thinking. They’re not just electronic suggestion boxes.

When you get a bunch of smart people posting ideas and then invite others to comment, you invite chaos and disruption. If you’re lucky, the serendipitous discovery of great (breakthrough, revenue producing, cost saving) ideas pop up. 

Collaborative Ideation is a little like the show Survivor: When you log into the dialog about ideas you get to see who prospers, who gets double crossed, and who gets voted off the island.

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By Ron shulkin

Connect and Develop is the new black (R&D alone costs more, is slower and is sooo last year).

There is a blessing to the new world of collaborative innovation. Instead of spending heaps of money on research to get new products or the solution to problems and obstacles, industry has the ability to use Web 2.0 technologies to connect with those who have the answers. Just by asking every smart person in the company, the ability to connect to an answer is enabled. Or by asking the rest of the world (e.g. “open innovation”) months or years of research time can be short circuited and new products can be fast-tracked into development.

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By Ron shulkin

This blog entry is about why it is important to collaborate across your company’s disciplines and divisions while having the support and encouragement of your management. The topic is innovation, why it is important for everyone to come up with new ideas to keep any given company’s product offerings fresh, new and cutting edge. And how great ideas are the result of a collaboration of diverse people.

It doesn’t do anyone any good to “preach to the choir”. In my little group, I’m sure we all agree our ideas and our way of doing things are just great. After all, we all have similar backgrounds, work on the same topics and produce similar results. But to be successful, you need your ideas to get “viral” and leave your immediate sphere.

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By Ron Shulkin

Thinking about getting an idea management system? Here’s your feature/function check list.
Of course you should still poll your user community and get their feedback to see what they need. But after you’re done, I bet you a nickel you’ll end up with a list like this one.
Print it out and check off the items during your demonstrations.

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