The Difference Between Innovation and Creativity
What is innovation? It’s one of those words that gets bandied about as if we all know what it means.
And, perhaps, at a casual conversational level, we do. But when it comes time to be innovative or execute innovation, opinions vary regarding what it is and how to put it into action. Nevertheless, there seems to be a general consensus that innovation entails two key elements:
- The creation or discovery of something new
- It must be something that adds value
I know many people believe that innovation begins with a good idea. But if you want to turn innovation into a predictable business process, then it must be executed needs-first. Allow me to offer an alternative definition as it pertains to developing new products and services:
“Innovation is the process of discovering customers’ unmet needs and then developing solutions to address them.”
I like this definition because it illustrates three essential points about predictable innovation:
- It is a process, not an epiphany.
- It starts with discovering the target customers’ unmet needs.
- The customer’s unmet needs can then be used to focus creativity to create new value.
Doctors diagnose patients before prescribing treatment plans. To prescribe a treatment plan without first conducting a diagnosis would be considered medical malpractice. As Clayton Christensen has pointed out, companies that generate solutions before understanding what customers are trying to get done are committing marketing malpractice.
Scientists conduct experiments on solution hypotheses only after they have defined the problem. Pharmaceutical companies, for example, define the problem they want to address — such as the build-up of plaque in arteries — and then develop hypotheses about how to address it. Good science requires a solid understanding of the problem before generating solution hypotheses and conducting experiments.
Sharpshooters consistently hit the bullseye by executing each shot in the same sequence: Get ready, take aim, fire. Note – they “take aim” at the target before they shoot. Executing the process, “get ready – fire!” and then asking if you hit something is far less effective.
Unmet customer needs are our targets for new or improved offerings, so we must take aim at them before we “shoot” solution ideas and prototypes at them. It’s hard to hit a bullseye if you don’t know where the target lies.
Some people believe that launching “minimally viable products” as experiments before identifying the target customers’ unmet needs brings science to entrepreneurialism and innovation. But, in fact, this unwittingly confounds two experiments — one experiment that attempts to validate a hypothesis about the customers’ need(s) and another that attempts to validate a hypothesis about the efficacy of a solution. This muddles the results and seriously impairs whatever learning we might have gleaned from an experiment had it tested a hypothesis about a solution only.
Thomas Edison understood this. The reason that Edison could say “I have not failed. I’ve just have found 10,000 ways that didn’t work,” is because he always validated customer need before experimenting on potential solutions. His experiments were conducted on a solution hypothesis only, never on a hypothesis about the customers’ needs. (Dyer, Frank Lewis. Edison, His Life and Inventions. New York: Harper & Bros., 2010, p. 42). By executing innovation in this sequence, he avoided wasting time and resources developing solutions that people didn’t want.
Creativity is part of, but different from, innovation
Many people confuse creativity with innovation. Creativity is the process of making connections between customers’ unmet needs and solution capabilities that can address those needs. Making such connections can be an epiphany, but leading companies know that they must prepare the soil for those eureka moments by identifying their target customers’ unmet needs in a form that is actionable for the creative solution team to address. It’s virtually impossible to be creative addressing a customer need if you’re unaware of it, or if you misunderstand it. Creativity won’t help you fix a customer problem or achieve an objective that remains unknown or misunderstood.
The key to success at innovation is learning how to discover customers’ unmet needs in an actionable form. When this is done well, these needs can be used to:
- Generate breakthrough ideas
- Guide the development of new and improved offerings
- Create better messaging and positioning
- Establish a tight fit between what customers want and what is actually delivered
(This article first appeared in The Business Journals, June 14, 2016)
Hi Urko,
Great follow-up to the Innovate New Albany presentation on June 24th. I’m wondering about incorporating two ideas. The first thought is the one presented here. You have to come know your target before you shoot. Without understanding the need, goal, or problem how will you ever be able to EFFECTIVELY determine a solution?
At the presentation you spoke about the somewhat backward, hit and miss approach to lean processes. My thought is to combine the two. Once the need, goal, or problem is determined, establish a lean process as the firing mechanism to hit that now, firmly established target.
I think that this might effectively reduce the number of lean cycles while more purposefully and effectively achieving the goal. After all lean is more geared towards production, and production presumes a determined goal. Where it has come to lack effectiveness is in industries like software, where production is knowledge based as opposed to physical. Innovation (growth oriented consulting) then points towards the target while lean (agile) process cycles work at hitting the target.
Thoughts?
Ron