Want to Innovate?
Go ahead!
Today innovation is not the exclusive realm of the traditional incumbents, the formal organizations, the infield. Individual innovators in the decentralized outfield setting can drive innovation from idea to finished product, based on their own decisions. The means needed are increasingly available. A key factor is the new possibility to produce concrete objects though small batch manufacturing and 3D printing – the maker movement and software-hardware integration are important trends. Another key factor is the availability of alternative ways to get financial support, such as crowd-funding and donate options. The paths and formats are many and diverse. New phenomena are being developed through explorative and iterative processes, with autonomy to change course and means under way. This is pannovation –pre-approval not needed innovation, a serious challenge to the traditional linear, gated, and controlled model of innovation. Huge numbers, immense diversity, and nearness to users make pannovation a game-changing force. Increasingly, the forefront of innovation will run in the outfield setting.
This book discusses what the traditional incumbents can do. A new view of innovation is needed, not limited to incremental, in lane improvements but also open to genuinely different new track thinking. The huge test-bed of the outfield can be used to advantage. The gatefree space is a central theme, a concept describing how infield parties can emulate the outfield in allowing unhindered, unbiased, and open-ended exploration, letting ideas evolve, improve, mature, and combine, before hitting hard points of evaluation and stop/go decisions.
The author, Jan Rollof, MD, PhD, Associate professor, has written several books on creativity and innovation.
