|
Executive Interviews: Interview with Sam Kogan on Innovation
November 2006
-
By Dr. Nagendra V Chowdary
Dr. Sam Kogan President & Chief Operating Officer of GEN3 Partners 
We work with a lot of companies that
follow this approach. I donot like the
word training, so at GEN3 Partners
we call it creating an innovation
leadership program in a company. It is
a process of building internal
competence. It starts from introducing
people into an innovation discipline.
Then we help create a center of
innovation excellence. This is
important because it creates a nucleus
from which you will start building
your innovation function in the
company. It is very important to give
people a chance to work side by side
with the best in the business, with
professional innovators. So, it is
important that you have both. I think
it is wrong to think you can go one
way or another.
|
|
One example is P&G. Fifteen years
ago, P&G didnot have anyone in the
company that was in charge of
innovation. They used professional
innovators, and GEN3 Partners was
part of that, to build their innovation
capabilities. Now, they have people in
the organization who do it for a living.
The answer is you have to have both. -
For innovation culture to be effective
and yielding desired results what
measures need to be taken?
At the end of the day, there is only one
measure: company performance.
When you see a company that is
growing and stays competitive in the
marketplace, I guarantee you that is a
company where innovation works.
Interestingly enough these are the
companies that are among the first to
embrace new innovation processes
and tools. Siemens, P&G, Intel, Unilever,
Google—these are the companies that
are really successful. If you look at
their website and talk with executives
they will all say innovation is critical.
If you listen to what their CEOs say
when they talk with analysts, youd
think they worked for GEN3 Partners
or some kind of innovation group.
They all say that innovation is what
they need to do to succeed and to have
a strong future. But, how do you make innovation
successful? For that, I donot know that
there is a silver bullet. My rules for
making innovation successful have
been simple and to make sure the
company involved has enough
discipline to follow them. First, define and focus innovation.
Donot invent technological wonder,
donot chase mythical markets. Define
the main parameters of customer
value and focus on your goal. Its a
discipline you have to follow in order
to succeed. Invest in innovation. As
long as its the first line item that is
erased out of the budget when things
donot go right, things will continue to
go badly. Make innovation a senior
management priority. We talked about
natural resistance that people have to
any change. Bringing innovation to
the company is a significant change.
So it requires leadership and
persistence. And finally, donot put
innovation in a box or in a corner.
Innovation must be cross functional
and you should use innovation as a
means to align the company to act
differently.
1.
ICMR Innovation Case Studies
2. ICMR
Case Collection
3.
Case Study Volumes
|
The Interview was conducted by Dr. Nagendra V Chowdary, Consulting Editor, Effective
Executive and Dean, IBSCDC, Hyderabad. This Interview was originally published in Effective Executive, IUP, November 2006. Copyright © November 2006, IBSCDC
No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced or distributed, stored in a retrieval
system, used in a spreadsheet, or transmitted in any form or medium electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the permission of IBSCDC. |
