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60 TECH MONITOR Jul-Aug 2011

Managing Innovation Business Coach

Open innovation in India

Multinational companies which are making India their second

home have brought in the culture of open innovation here.

Companies like Xerox, P&G and General Mills are already

perusing open innovation aggressively in India. Indian compa-

nies like Tata, Mahindra & Mahindra, Future Group and Biocon

are not far behind and are already engaging with employees,

vendors and customers to co-create.

While companies in the west suffered from Not Invented Here

syndrome and are working to get over it, many (not all) Indian

companies suffer from Why Invent syndrome; good news

is it is a declining tribe! There is a bigger shift in the mak-

ing. With the worlds focus shifting to Asia, the responsibility

of getting innovation done is also tagging along. And when

that happens, local companies are joining the bandwagon for

competitive reasons. In addition, Open Innovation in Service

industry and benefits of incremental innovation are getting

quite an attention for ROI reasons.

Some select Indian companies are quick to realize that there is

a lead time needed to get into the culture of open innovation and

co-creation. Companies with this foresight probably will dictate

the landscape of domain leaders and the followers in this decade.

Are Indian innovators ready for openinnovation?

Over the years, Indians have becoming more aware of their

personal intellectual capital in a global context, and connectiv-

ity is providing insight into the markets with buying powers

in turn, making Indians an irresistible choice for companies

hungry for brainpower.

So does this mean Indians are turning the table around on

the innovation front? The answer is not yet. Indians are highly

social and love to share; however, they shy away when there

is a probability of failure, specifically in a non-business envi-

ronment like creativity and innovation.

Though innovativeness of Indians is not disputable, I am spe-

cifically pointing to the volume and the impact density.

The pace at which the knowledge economy is growing,

however, clearly indicates that a certain percentage (which

accounts for quite a volume) is moving to the next orbit and

becoming hard core innovators.

Not to forget a Jugaad mindset which has produced mil-

lions of innovations in India over the years. With the market

needs beyond Jugaad there comes the supply beyond

Jugaad.

There is a huge opportunity lining up for Indian innovators

both globally and locally. And the innovators who open up to

the collaborative innovation will find themselves rewarded

both intellectually and monetarily.

Jayesh Badani, ideaken Pte. Ltd., SingaporeAre Indian companies ready for open innovation?http://www.blog.ideaken.com

National Innovation Council

India has set up of a National Innovation Council (NInC) to discuss, analyse and help implement strategies for inclusive

innovation in India and prepare a Roadmap for Innovation 20102020. NInC is the first step in creating a crosscutting

system which will provide mutually reinforcing policies, recommendations and methodologies to implement and boost

innovation performance in the country. The NInC will act as a platform to facilitate this engagement and collaboration

with domain experts, stakeholders and key participants to create an innovation movement in India. The aim is to herald

a mindset change and create a push at the grassroots level so that more and more people in education, business,

government, NGOs, urban and rural development engaged in innovative activities are co-opted and are part of shaping

the national level innovation strategy.

For more information, contact:

National Innovation Council,

Office of Advisor to the Prime Minister on Public Information Infrastructure & Innovations,

Room No. 125, Yojana Bhawan

Parliament Street, New Delhi-110001, India

Tel: +91-11-2309-6622, E-mail: officepiii@nic.in

Web: http://www.innovationcouncil.gov.in

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Business Coach Managing Innovation

Innovation in Thailand

http://www.talent-technologies.com

If your company wants to promote greater innovation in

Thailand and across Asia, this recent IBM survey of 1,541

chief executives gives some indicators as to whats required.

With feedback from more than 60 countries and 33 industries

worldwide, the message is clear: more creative people are

essential for companys future success.

Time for the creatives?

The last 20 years has seen a management super-cycle of

efficiency, operational excellence and inside out focus. Get-

ting these factors right have propelled some of the worlds

biggest companies to their biggest profit margins ever. Butwith global instability looming, is that all about to change?

The IBM study seems to suggest so. Instead of hiring leaders

who more naturally drive operational excellence, companies

need to hire those who are customer focussed and creative.

Innovation, not operations, will be the source of competitive

advantage going forward.

But this is easier said than done. The challenge many com-

panies face is not only that they have emphasised the more

operational aspects of their businesses, but, more alarmingly,

that they have turned their businesses into a place where

many creatives do not want to work.

In other words, in their drive for cost leadership and process

implementation, a long process of creative genocide has

taken place, depriving these companies of being more

innovative and customer-centric any time soon. Its the

people, not the words, that matter. The team, not the strat-

egy. Or, as Jim Collins put it in Good to Great, First Who,

then What.

The drive towards operational efficiency has created com-

panies that attract clones of a narrow talent set who find the

structure operational efficiency creates as desirable. However,

this has also created an us and them scenario where a whole

companys corporate culture becomes identified with this tal-

ent set leading to anyone no fitting in to the talent set are

also seen as not being able to fit in to the companys corporate

culture thus leading to the silent genocide spoken of earlier.

What companies can do now

To change this, companies need to become a whole lot bet-

ter at understanding the nature of talent, identifying it, and

helping their people to identify it. This will blow away many of

the talent management blind spots that exist. Doing so also

hugely promotes engagement as this one factor is considered

by Gallup to be the #1 employee engagement driver with

clear links to team and financial performance.

Having done this, companies then need to communicate the

importance of hiring on talent not individual preference (non-

creatives tend to regard creatives with mistrust as this article

has shown), with an emphasis on attracting more creatives.

They need to create an employee value proposition creatives

will find attractive. And they need to engage creatives with a

greater focus on customer engagement, not the bottom line.

These factors will dramatically help companies retain more

creatives, innovate more effectively and meet the challenges

described in the IBM study. The first step is giving your people

the capability to identify talent. One highly effective way of

doing that is through the worlds only objective talent identi-

fication tool the Highlands Ability Battery details of which

can be found following the link below.

Talent Technologies (Asia) Co., Ltd., Thailand

ASEAN SME Innovation Award 2011

ASEAN plans to identify 20 SMEs for ASEAN SME Innovation Awards, by way of promoting SMEs within and beyond

the region. Each AMS are requested to nominate 5 most innovative SMEs in their respective countries. The identi-fication of the ASEAN SMEs Innovation Awards formed part of the work plan under the strategic plan for achieving

the Promotion objective. A common eligibility criteria is available for consistency purposes among ASEAN member

states (AMS) and to enable ease of selection of Innovative SMEs. However, due to the diversity of SMEs among the

member states, AMSs have the liberty to set their own national selection criteria to nominate their respective SMEs

for the ASEAN SME Innovation Award.

For more information, contact:

Ms. Endah Srinarni,

E-mail: endahsn@yahoo.com, endahsn@depkop.go.id