saahil goel - formal and sustained management of incremental technology innovation

8/14/2019 Saahil Goel - Formal and Sustained Management of Incremental Technology Innovation

1/16

December 1, 2008

Formal and Sustained Management of IncrementalTechnology Innovation : An Improvement to

Corporate Technology Infrastructure

By Saahil Goel , Student, Katz Graduate School of BusinessBrian Butler , Head MIS Department, Katz Graduate School of Business


2/16

December 1, 2008

Contents

Executive Summary 2

The Issue, context and

motivation 3 The Position and Perspective 7

Recommendations 12

References 15

Executive Summary

ith the changing economiclandscape, both large and smallcorporations are relying on

innovation in business processes and intechnology to enable cost savings fromprocess improvement i.

Innovation is defined as The managedeffort of an organization to develop newproducts or services or new uses forexisting products or services.Technology innovation is defined as A

change in appearance or performance of products or services or the physicalprocesses through which a product orservice passes. Finally, incrementalinnovation is defined as A new product,service, or technology that modifies anexisting one ii. From these definitions andbasic derivation, incremental technologyinnovation can be defined as a managed change in the process technology that anorganization uses to deliver its products or

services that modifies or builds upon theexistent process or technology .

Incremental innovation is relativelyshort-term in terms of benefit generationand is applied in smaller and measurablechunks. This considerably lowers thelevel of risk that a firm faces byindulgence in the process of suchinnovation. Incremental innovationattempts to improve an existing product

or service by innovating around whatsavailable iii. Further, when incrementaltechnology innovation is applied acrossan enterprise, it can bring about significant improvements in a companysinternal processes and businesstechnology infrastructure.

W


3/16

Page 3 of 16

The fundamental issue withincremental innovation ismismanagement of suchinnovative practices. Factors suchas timing, resource allocation, ideageneration, selection andprioritization, competitivelandscape and measurement criteria make incrementalinnovation extremely difficult tomanage using any pre-determinedformal process. Incrementalinnovation also has to deal withfostering a culture of innovationamongst the company employees to encourage managers anddecision-makers to implement innovative and lateral thinking inall their problem-solving attempts.Further, innovative ideamanagement should occur at acompany-wide level whichrequires careful reception,prioritization and implementationof innovative ideas from grass-

roots levels all the way to the topmanagement.

The Issue, context andmotivation

ue to the ever evolving technologylandscape, it is difficult to makeinnovative technology decisions

that would best solve business problems.Today, several technologies are availablefor each and every leg and each and everyfingernail of those legs of any businesscorporation. To be able to identify thebest portfolio of technology innovation touse for each business problem presents a

unique and mammoth challenge fororganizations. Further, since knowledgeis diffused amongst variousimplementation-level employees, it is alsodifficult to manage innovative technologyideas that are generated at the grass-root level. Ideas may come from all levels of forward-thinking technologyimplementers. The real challenge is inidentifying the ideas which wouldgenerate most value for decision-making,

prioritizing them, experimenting withthem and then actually implementingthem in a corporate setting.

The issue of management of incrementaltechnology innovation is fundamentallydifficult due to several reasons.

First, there is a cultural aspect involvedwith ingraining innovation into themindset of a companys employees. For

incremental innovation to be successful,the companys top management shouldfoster a corporate culture of innovationand ensure that the message reachesevery level of an organization. However,in most companies top management isused to running existing business and isnot very focused on building future

D


4/16

Page 4 of 16

competencies iv. This is usually left to the strategic business centerswithin an organization. Further,because of the level of detailinvolved in incrementalinnovation, management is not clearly aware of the value it mayadd to the company. Due to thelack of cultural awareness about innovation, management may alsobecome a hindrance by not providing enough human andeconomic resources to aidinnovation. For this reason, thereare talks about having a Chief Innovation Officer in companies v.However, the innovative-culture-drive should be only gearedtowards creation of a culturewhere individuals who want to beinnovative are encouraged to doso. A culture where innovation isforced will lead to failure asemployees who want to go about routine work (and should) will not

do so as they would like a piece of the innovation-idea-reward pie.

Second, in addition to getting top-management support fortechnology innovation there arechallenges inherent to thereception and prioritization of innovation ideas . To begin with, acompany has to encourageemployees who are intimate with

the processes and technology tomake suggestions about innovation. Rather thanconducting an organization-widestudy of areas whereimprovements could be made,encouraging people who are onthe ground is an easier way for

companies to receive ideas about innovation. Once such a culture andplatform is established to manage receipt of innovative ideas from employees at thegrassroots, the real challenge is toprioritize these ideas. Due to theuncertain nature of innovative ideas, it isdifficult to put a dollar figure to theimprovement a certain idea might cause.In fact, some ideas may actually bedestructive in nature and may lead to aloss for organizations. Due to the risk anduncertainty involved in prioritization of innovative ideas, it is difficult forcompanies to come up with any kind of aprioritization matrix.Further, because each innovative idea isunique and is dependent on thecompanys line of business, the current technology portfolio, company size,geographic location, future aspirationsetc., it is difficult to create or utilize anypremade benchmarking / prioritizationcriteria for putting a value to aninnovative idea. Due to these reasons,

only innovative ideas that have a veryclear business impact or are very low risk get adopted first and more often than not other ideas never see the light of day. It isthose ideas that may have had thepotential to cause significant improvement in certain areas of thecompanys technology landscape. Thedifficulty however, is to manage risk andreturn.

Also owing to wide spectrum and depth of all technologies available in themarketplace, there may be conflictinginnovative ideas received from employeesin a company. Both ideas may be equallyuseful or equally destructive, but without expertise on which ideas to adopt,companies are left open to risk or to


5/16

Page 5 of 16

complete non-acceptance of innovative ideas. This is especiallya challenge for incrementaltechnology innovation since thenumber of permutations an entiretechnology infrastructure including varioushardware/network layers andvarious enterprise software layers could be mind boggling. Without an environment for controlled andformal experimentation, it isextremely difficult for companiesto evaluate the best innovativeidea that is generated byemployees.

Third, the way corporateorganizational structures aresetup are not conducive toboosting innovation. Unlesscorporations have a dedicationinnovation group within thetechnology division or at anenterprise level, whose primary

purpose is to manage innovationand to ensure that ideas areimplemented, there is very littleaccountability or responsibility forimplementation, measurement andtracking of such ideas. Lack of organizational support in terms of human resources, budget andcompany resources forimplementation of innovativeideas can be the top cause for

failure or non-implementation of innovative technology ideas. Forexample, a Network WorldwidePoll in 21 countries reveals that only 16% of companies rewardemployees for innovation vi. Thisfigure is a clear representation of the lack of organizational support

and the anti-innovation culture that companies are unknowingly fostering.There are a few companies that wholeheartedly support innovation. Forexample, Google expects its employees todevote 20% of their work times towardsinnovation vii. Companies also do not havean environment where innovative ideascould be successfully tested and valued bydedicated personnel.Fourth, in addition to the complexityinvolved with corporate cultures,organizational structures and theprioritization of ideas there is no clearprocess around the implementation of incremental technology ideas. Due to theintrinsic uncertain nature of incrementalinnovative ideas and to the uniquenessand wide span of potentialimplementation, there is no industry-benchmarked process that has beenestablished for successful implementationof such innovative ideas. While there maya generally known macro-levelimplementation process such as

identify, prioritize, obtain resources, test and implement there are no specificprocesses to manage implementation of different kinds of incremental innovation.For example, an incremental innovationcould be a reduction of redundant batchprocesses for a certain application for acertain kind of technology platform.There is no set industry-level process formanaging the implementation of such aninnovation project or a method for

allocating resources to implement such achange. Also, since most companies donot incentivize the implementation of such innovative ideas, the redundant process may go on forever causing thecompany extra resources, extra lead timeand lower competitive advantage. Thereis also no way to measure the success or


6/16

Page 6 of 16

failure of incremental innovation(which corresponds to theproductivity paradox related tomeasurement of success of information technology ingeneral).

At present, there are only a fewcompanies who are tuned into theidea of incremental innovation andvery few companies have actuallytaken aggressive steps to makeinnovation a part of the way theyoperate. However, companies areincreasingly acknowledging thevalue incremental technologyinnovation can add to theirorganizations. In general however,technologists (or technologyimplementers) are aware of cutting edge technology andusually are the first to innovate orto generate innovative ideas viii.Part of the reason for this is thefact that technology

implementation is an art ratherthan a science and there areseveral ways of achieving the sameoutcome. Therefore, there areseveral ways of innovating acompanys technologyinfrastructure that may lead toimprovement.

These employees care about innovation because they derive

satisfaction from the growth that innovation drives in a company.These set of individuals are wellaligned with a companysprinciples and hold the companysgrowth close to heart. Anotherreason why these employeesbother with innovation is the fact

they have the technical knowhow of howto bring about improvement and growthby way of innovative practices.Employees may also be dedicated tomaking processes better and morestreamlined thereby making their andtheir colleagues work simpler.

Companies that understand incrementaltechnology innovation better are moregeared towards implementing initiativesthat derive the most value from suchinitiatives. These companies are alsoabreast with cutting-edge technologytrends and strive towards establishment of a corporate culture where innovation isincented. Such corporations couldconsiderably reduce their overheadexpenses by employing innovativepractices to improve processes. Pro-innovation companies can also achievesignificant competitive advantage bylowering costs and may even be able toimprove sales by employing innovativetechnology to create new product line or

be able to introduce significant improvements in existing products. Forexample, by using incremental innovativetechnology in the supply chain area Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the worlds largest discount retailer, has enabled low-cost logistics and a highly lean and efficient supply chain technology infrastructure.This has been the foundation of theirsuccess and has caused them to be thelargest (recently) company in the world

and also one of the most profitable.

On the other hand, companies that do not innovate or those that do not stress theimportance of incremental innovationthrough their corporate cultures or byway of incentive programs are at risk of losing out on competitive advantage and


7/16

Page 7 of 16

on increasing costs. Suchcompanies may also not be ablegrow as fast as their competitorssince any growth strategy wouldincur significantly higher costs.Many corporations today wouldfail to even exist was it not fortheir innovative strategies. Forexample, large corporations suchthat have rigid corporateorganizational structures andclosed-minded top management may be prone to increased costsdue to adoption of oldertechnology infrastructuremethods. The mentality of usingthe same success formula overand over again may leadcompanies to their grave.Companies that do not constantlyinnovate their business practicesusing intelligent application of technology will not be able tosurvive in the fiercely competitiveworld.

Due to these reasons, it isextremely important forcompanies to find ways toincrementally innovative intechnology and internal businessprocesses to be able to make themost of what they have availableinternally in terms of employeeknowledge and expertise withtechnology and process. The real

challenge with implementing asystem that would work is thebreadth and variety of challengesthat are faced and the degree of varying opinions help by industryexperts on a resolution for thisproblem.

The Position andPerspective

ven though there is ampleknowledge and industry best practices available on how to bring

about a culture of innovation and how tomanage such innovation, there are noagreed upon standards or best practicesabout how incremental technologyinnovation can be measured, managed,prioritized, sustained and implemented inall kinds of organizations. Part of the

reason why this question is difficult toanswer is because of the scope of thetechnologies that currently exist in theworld, the changing applications of thesetechnologies by changing businessmodels and because of the variety of practices around this process. In thecurrent economic landscape it isimperative that business adopt innovativepractices if they want to cut costs, gaincompetitive advantage, be more lean and

streamlined and simply, if they want tosurvive in the market.

As is discussed in the article - Want toCreate an Innovative Culture? Hereshow - to implement innovation at anorganization, creating a culture of innovation is the most daunting task ix. It is also the most important task in theprocess of enabling innovation. Unless acompanys managers and employees

embrace innovation and it becomes a corevalue for the organization, it will not beeffectively implemented and true valuewill not be derived from it. The WallStreet Journal presents TechnologyInnovation Awards every year to the most innovative companies x. While this goes toprove that innovation is extremely

E


8/16

Page 8 of 16

important for competitive success,it also alludes to the fact that themost information available ingeneral business journals isaround measuring the outcome of innovation and not theimplementation itself.

As was the case with Wall Street Journal, Business Week alsostresses the importance of RadicalInnovation and a high-leveloverview of its implementation inthe article Radical ServiceInnovation xi. The article describesthe importance of innovation forservice-delivery companies but stress the importance of radicalinnovation for this industrysegment. Company executivesacknowledge that there are severalinnovative ideas available within acompany but the execution of these ideas is the more difficult feat. Variables such as the

alignment of the right idea, theright team, the right development process, the right leadership, theright level of risk management, theright target, the right time tomarket are some of the factorsthat need to be considered whenmaking decisions about implementation of innovativepractices within a company. Thisarticle is geared more towards

using innovation to bring out better products in the market forthe end-consumer and not somuch about creating innovativepractices within a company tobring about cost savings andcompetitive advantages.

Just as WSJ, Business Week also releasesratings of the most innovative companieseach year in their The World's Most Innovative Companies release xii. This list describes the top innovative companies inthe world along with descriptions about what makes these companies innovative.In tandem with the earlier article about adding value to businesses by usinginnovation to create new product lines,this list too is compiled by evaluatingwhich companies have added most valueto the end customer and not to theorganization internally. However, someknowledge about incremental innovationmay be extracted from this list byaveraging out the best innovativepractices performed by these companies.

Nevertheless, there is no direct information available about howincremental technology innovation maybe managed in an enterprise.

In more Information Systems related

journals, such as in the article HP CIORandy Mott: Incremental IT 'Just Doesn't Work' in Information Week, stress isagain laid on the poor outcomes of incremental IT and the value that radicalinnovation can bring to a company xiii. Thearticle goes on to describe that by pickingand choosing (prioritizing) what needs tobe improved (aka incrementalinnovation), a company is setting itself upfor failure. There are also potential

upsides to incremental innovationthough. For example, incrementalinnovation allows smaller companies tofocus on what their pressing concern is at the moment. Also, the risk involved withinvestments in incremental technologyinnovation is considerably lower ascompared to radical innovation.


9/16

Page 9 of 16

In another article From Idea toInnovation in Information Week,David Greenfield attacks theinnovation management problemhead on xiv. Some ways to manageincremental innovation arestrikingly interesting as per thisarticle. For example, GE Researchused a unique form of onlinevoting where they let 85 of theirresearches trade innovativeideas on a virtual exchange to seewhich of the 62 innovative ideashad the highest priority. This is avery unique way of prioritizinginnovative ideas in a company andcaptures the collective wisdomof the actual people that are most knowledgeable about it. But thisapproach worked for GE alone andthat too in a specific setting and aspecific genre of innovative ideasfor research . With that level of specificity such a method cannot be deemed a best practice and

viewed as an industry-leveltheorem. As the article also pointsout is not an everyday part of its innovation process. Thealgorithm itself was basic researchand not a product. Similarly, Delland Starbucks also used onlinevoting platforms to get theircustomers to vote on the ideas that they thought would be most usefulfor these companies. HP and other

companies use concepts from TheWisdom of Crowds by enablingvoting techniques to prioritizethe most useful innovativeconcepts. However, due to theintricacies involved in making surethat predications are accurate,such methods are difficult to

employ as a cookie-cutter approach. Thearticle does highlight the benefit of usingthe GE methodology of the stock market approach since voters would give morecareful thought to the decisions theymake since there may be virtual (or real)money involved. The article thenhighlights information around the risksand rewards of the Prediction Marketsapproach and discusses some vendorsthat are involved in this market. Thedrawback of this approach is that there isno penalty for a bad idea and popularitymay not reflect the likelihood of market success. Therefore, voting may not alwayswork. Another instance described in thearticle is of Qualcomm where thecompany wanted to implement innovative ideas and have the ideagenerators owns the ideas from inceptionto implementation. However, a simplecollection of ideas led to an overwhelmingCraigslist type list. The company thenimplemented a voting process that wouldcut ideas into a list of the top 30 or 40

most popular ones. These ideas were thentraded in Consensus Point predictionmarket software. The 10 highest-valueideas are presented to the CEO and thenthe final list of implementable ideas isselected. While these may be some waysof prioritizing innovation, there is somediscussion on actual implementation of innovation technology in companies aswell. For example, at HarrahsEntertainment, incremental innovation

ideas are tested as a separate unit, withdifferent IT and simulated conditions totest the likelihood of success and chancesof failure of different ideas generatedwithin the company. As is clear from theabove summary of the article, it isextremely difficult to come up with aproven approach for managing and


10/16

Page 10 of 16

sustaining incremental technologyinnovation in a company. Eventhough there may be successstories and failure reports, it isdifficult to come up with the oneapproach that works for everyone.

In yet another Information Week article, The ROI Of Innovation,Rob Preston describes theimportance of technologyinnovation and the problems withimplementation of the same xv. Thearticle describes the culturearound incremental innovation incompanies and what makesimplementation difficult. Most executives pay lip service toinnovation, but few take the timeto really manage and measure it.The metrics that would drivebetter performance -- time tomarket and return on innovationinvestment -- are used by only18% and 22% of respondents. The

most popular metrics -- customersatisfaction (57%) and overallrevenue growth (51%) -- are moreafter the fact. This ties in wellwith the information gatheredfrom general business journalsabout there being more stress oninnovation to bring new productsto satisfy customers in the market rather than on improvingconditions within the company by

enabling a new way of doingthings. The article goes on todescribe that creating aninnovation company requires acomplete shift in perception or therewiring of the company DNA.Also, innovation is the surest wayto build shareholder value.

Further, technology innovation isdescribed as something that needs to be apart of the entire organization and that funding for IT innovation should flowthrough a single organizational unit which lies outside of IT. There is alsodiscussion about the need forincentivizing innovation to ensure itssuccess, adoption and sustenance.

Quocirca Ltd. agrees that creation of ideasand implementing them for innovation isthe right way to maximize the value of intellectual property xvi. The white paperdescribes that innovation has to be thevery part of an organizations DNA for it to be successfully implemented. Thepaper concludes by saying that byinvolving the crowd and having THEMcome up with innovative ideas as well asimplement them is the best way to goforward. However, not much informationis offered on what may be the best process to go about this except for takingeach organizational vertical at a time and

then implementing best practices for that particular branch of the company. Thepaper brings out an interesting point about there being no single approachthat will create a well-rounded solution.This comment is consistent with what hasbeen discovered from other sources of information.

The DeSai Group in their whitepaperMastering Innovation also argue that

the most burning issue around innovationis how to institutionalize innovation i.e. how to build a climate and culture of innovation while maintaining standardsand controls necessary for ongoinggovernance xvii. Also stressed in the paperis the usefulness of harvesting internalinnovation that arises from a companys


11/16

Page 11 of 16

own workforce that is intimatewith the technology and with thebusiness processes. The DeSaiGroup provides its clients on aStrategy Driven Innovation (SDI)framework that is tweakedaccording to how its clients wish tomaximize value Top LineGrowth, Shareholder Value orBottom-Line Optimization. The SDIframework can help DeSais clientsdesign a customized roadmap for innovation . The framework iscomposed of four levers Venturing for Best, Agility forSpeed, Behaviors for Growth andClimate & Culture for Success.Within each of these levers aredescribed the opportunities forinnovation, barriers andchallenges to overcome and thetarget outcome.

Even though various vendors offerservices and frameworks around

management of innovation, toaddress the scale and breadth of technology innovation possible, tocustomize innovation management solutions to fit each companyscorporate culture, line of businessand vision statement and toprioritize innovative ideas to best fit a companys needs continue tobe puzzles that are yet to be solvedby consultants or vendors.

However, in one or another form,there is general agreement withinformation that is available ingeneral and information systemsspecific trade press and journals.

In general, this issue is related tomanagement of innovation and ideageneration within a company from thepoint of reception, prioritization,enablement, implementation, culture andfinally outcome. More specifically, thepaper deals with technology innovationthat is brought about in an incrementalfashion. These specifics introduce evenmore difficulties because of the nature of technology and different applications of it. Further, incremental innovation putsthe problems in the hands of theorganizational workforce and not a fewenlightened souls. Therefore,incremental technology innovationmanagement becomes even a harderproblem to solve.

As per the article Assessment methodology to prioritize knowledgemanagement related activities to support organizational excellence by ManfredBornemann and Martin Sammer, So far,a systematic and comprehensive

assessment tool to prioritizeorganizational development activities,especially in the currently intenselydiscussed domain of knowledgemanagement is not available in theliterature xviii . Clearly in academicliterature, this is generally accepted as ahard problem to solve. Theaforementioned paper also goes on todescribe a proposed methodology whichis based on utilizing knowledge that is

existent within a company. Themethodology stresses four levels of potential intervention, starting with thestrategy focused target level, next aknowledge level covering all knowledgeworkers of an organization, then anaction level focusing on operations andprocesses and finally a data level with the


12/16


13/16


14/16

Page 14 of 16

consensus on the set of the best ideas to be accepted for piloting.This process is democratic and istherefore more inclined to boost employee satisfaction and a feelingof fairness amongst the idea-generators. Other factors used tojudge an idea could be returnon investment, scope of impact,business unit it pertains to, howwell it aligns with the companysvision, which stakeholders does it affect/benefit, risk implication andprobability, future implications,etc.

Technical infrastructure could beinstalled that facilitates the ideageneration, reception andprioritization process. Forexample, a web-based applicationcan be designed that helps classify(to some extent) the ideas beinggenerated by employees and thenscreens out (automatically) the

most relevant ideas as defined by apredetermined set of organizational priorities. Further,these ideas could then be traded or could be evaluated as per a pre-designed matrix/framework beforefinally deciding which ideas wouldneed to go into production or pilot.


15/16

Page 15 of 16

Referencesi http://weblog.tekrati.com/?p=4937

This article mentions that two-thirds of Global 1000 companies will haveformalized technology innovation processes

by 2010.

ii http://college.cengage.com/business/griffin/management/7e/students/glossary/ch13.html Management by Ricky W. Griffin (TexasA&M University)Managing Organization Change andInnovation - Chapter 13This is a definition of various innovativeorganizational management concepts andterminology.

iii Managing Technology Innovation byFrederick Betzhttp://books.google.com/books?id=KnpGtu-R77UC&pg=PA73&lpg=PA73&dq=incremental+technology+innovation&source=web&ots=R-QRfsgfyx&sig=WOAbARIsIgCwtUpoTbFEYsT_Mfc&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&r esnum=5&ct=result This book describes the differences betweenradical and incremental innovation.

iv http://www.johnstark.com/in21.html Innovation Management by John Stark This website has information about thevarious kinds of innovation and difficultiesaround management of the same.

v http://innovation.corante.com/editorial/archives/2006/04/should_companies_have_a_chief.php Should Companies have a Chief InnovationOfficer by Renee Hopkins Callahan

This article describes why organizationsshould or shouldnt have a dedicated personresponsible for innovation. It also talksabout the difficulties of managinginnovation and importance of having it for organizations.

vi http://www.the-network.com/content/en/news/show/?artid=88

Does Your Company Reward Innovative IdeasThis article describes some figures about the presentlevel of innovation across global corporations. It goesdirectly to support the premise of the paper thatfostering a culture of innovation is difficult.

vii The Google Story by David A. Vise and Mark MalseedThis book describes Google Inc. and the methodsthey employ to foster a culture of innovation withintheir company.

viii http://lessig.org/blog/2004/08/who_cares_about_innovation.html Who cares about innovationThis weblog talks about personnel withinorganizations to whom innovation is important.

ix http://blogs.wsj.com/independentstreet/2008/11/20/want-to-create-an-innovative-culture-heres-how/ Want to Create an Innovative Culture? Heres How

by Kelly SporsThis article describes why it is important for companies to adopt innovation and how they can useinnovation to their advantage in these tougheconomic times. Even though the article stresses onthe use of radical innovation it does make some

salient points about the importance of creating aculture for enabling adoption of innovation in anorganization. Even though the article talks about whythis is important, it does not go into any detaileddescriptions of how this can actually be implementedin organizations.

x http://www.dowjones.com/innovation/ Technology Innovation AwardsThis website maintains a list of award recipients for

being the most technologically innovative companies.WSJ presents companies with these awards year after year. This is useful for the purpose of this article as it

alludes to the fact that while there is knowledgeavailable about how to rate the output of innovation,there is not enough information about how to bringabout innovation itself.

xi http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/oct2008/id20081020_368485.htm


16/16

P 16 f 16

Radical Service Innovation: Strategies onthe frontiers of service design demand a

blend of creativity and discipline. Here arefive steps to leverage positive resultsThis article in Business Week describes thesteps one can take to bring about radicalservice innovation in their companies.However, the information described in thisarticle is very high level and does not talk about the benefits of incremental innovation.

xii http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_17/b3981401.htm The World's Most Innovative Companies:Their creativity goes beyond products torewiring themselves. BusinessWeek and theBoston Consulting Group rank the best.This is a release by Business Week andcontains a list of the most innovativecompanies. In addition, it containsdescriptions of the things that thesecompanies have done to bring aboutinnovation within the company.

xiii http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2008/01/hp_cio_randy_mo.html HP CIO Randy Mott: Incremental IT 'JustDoesn't Work' By John Soat

This article describes how HP istransforming its internal IT practices byusing radical innovation. The article alsotakes a strong stand against incrementaltechnology innovation by terming it as arecipe for failure. The article also talksabout some benefits of incrementalinnovation such as low risk andimprovement in existing infrastructure. It isuseful from for this paper as it shows thatthe knowledge that is available in such

journals is more geared towards only acertain point of view.

xiv Information Week November 10 , 2008 From Inkling to InnovationFrom Idea to Innovation by DavidGreenfieldThis article is very useful for the context of this paper as it discusses experiments andmethods by which large corporations havetried to tame innovation management. It alsodiscusses an impact assessment of managed

incremental innovation and lays stress on thedifferent methods employed by different companies thus lending direct support to the chief premise of this research paper (that incremental innovation isdifficult to manage and sustain due to lack of standards and proven best practices).

xv http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2007/08/the_roi_of_inno.html The ROI of Innovation by Rob PrestonThis article is a description of the fact that thoughthere is awareness amongst top management aboutthe usefulness of innovation, not much is being doneto support it because of lack of knowledge aroundimplementation of innovation and because of thedifficulty in predicting the outcome of implementation of innovation.

xvi http://www.innovationtools.com/PDF/idea-mgmt-and-culture.pdf From Problems to Ideas through to InnovationThis is a consultant white paper from Quocirca thatdescribes how idea generation can be managed andwhat value it can add for an organization. Further, thewhitepaper also describes HOW idea managementcan take place effectively in an organization. There isan underlying theme of creating a culture of ideageneration in a company.

xvii

http://www.innovationtools.com/PDF/innovation-roadmap.pdf Mastering Innovation The DeSai GroupThis whitepaper describes that the burning issuearound innovation is institutionalizing it and fitting itin a corporate framework. Also discussed is theusefulness of harvesting internal innovation thatarises from a companys own workforce.

xviii Assessment methodology to prioritizeknowledge management related activities to supportorganizational excellencehttp://www.emeraldinsight.com/Insight/viewContentI

tem.do?contentType=Article&hdAction=lnkhtml&contentId=843744 By Manfred Bornemann and Martin Sammer So far, a systematic and comprehensive assessmenttool to prioritize organizational developmentactivities, especially in the currently intenselydiscussed domain of knowledge management is notavailable in the literature. This article also describesa potential methodology which will address theaforementioned problem.

saahil goel - formal and sustained management of incremental technology innovation

Documents