Innovation in Practice Blog

Patterns That Predict Innovation Success

The New York Times published a list of “32 Innovations That Will Change Your Tomorrow,” an eclectic mix of concepts that range from the wild and wacky like SpeechJammer (#14) to more practical ideas like a blood test for depression (#25).
I analyzed each of the 32 concepts to see which ones could be explained by the five patterns of Systematic Inventive Thinking. These patterns are the “DNA” of products that can be extracted and applied to any product or service to create new-to-the-world innovations. Dr. Jacob Goldenberg found in his research that the majority of successful innovations conform to one or more of these patterns. Conversely, the majority of unsuccessful innovations (those that failed in the marketplace) do not conform to a pattern.

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The LAB: Creating New Logistics Packaging with SIT (May 2012)

Cardboard boxes are one of the most widely used forms of packaging in the world. 90% of all products are shipped or displayed in corrugated packaging at some point in their lifecycle. It’s a $57 billion dollar industry globally, but it is not growing. Could it be a lack of innovation?
For this month’s LAB, we will apply the corporate innovation method, SIT, to the corrugated box to see what potential innovations could fuel industry growth.

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Innovation Sighting: Toyota’s Mood-Detecting Car

Toyota is designing a new technology that will react to the driver’s mood. It will adjust how the car behaves depending on whether the driver is sad, happy, angry or neutral. The technology uses a camera to identify facial emotions by taking readings from 238 points on the driver’s face.
A driver’s mood can affect performance on the road. Research has shown that people with negative (and sometimes positive) emotions are distracted even more than those using a cell phone while driving.

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Marketing Innovation: The Extreme Consequence Tool

Commercials that show the benefits of using the product are likely to be ignored because consumers expect it. The message becomes cliche. If the advertiser shows how the consumer is transformed by using the product, consumers become skeptical. Telling viewers they will become young and adventurous by drinking a soft drink lacks credibility. It is wishful thinking, but unrealistic. The ad is tossed aside.
But show these same product benefits in an extreme, unrealistic way and the advertisement is likely to be more memorable. The message sinks in. That is the goal of the Extreme Consequence Tool. This tool creates ads that show the absurd result of using the product. Over exaggeration of the promise is viewed as clever and credible versus traditional exaggeration.

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