The First Thing Every Innovation Team Should Do

Until an organization establishes accurate, precise, and agreed-upon meanings for the key concepts of innovation, its innovation efforts will flounder.

“The beginning of wisdom is the definition of terms.” – Socrates

Can you imagine an attorney attempting to prosecute a negligence case without a clear and agreed-upon definition for “negligence?” It would not go well. And yet, companies are attempting to execute innovation without a clear and agreed-upon definition every day. Not surprisingly, it does not go well for them, either.

“Innovation” is one of those words that we use as if we have a general consensus about what it means when, in fact, we often hold very different understandings. This may be fine for everyday conversations but, if you want to turn innovation and growth into a repeatable business process that consistently delivers results, then we need to be precise about what it is and how it should be executed. We also need to define all the other important concepts related to innovation such as: market, market segment, customer need, job, criteria, unmet need, opportunity, and creativity. Other professions have their own lexicon; innovation needs its own lexicon, too.

Defining our terms is foundational for innovation success because words are the conceptual tools that enable us to do things that are otherwise impossible. Just as an attorney cannot prosecute a negligence case without a clear and agreed-upon definition of negligence and other related terms, innovators cannot consistently drive innovation and growth without a clear and agreed-upon definition of innovation and other related terms. Here are some of the definitions we use*:

Innovation: the process of discovering customers’ unmet needs and then generating solution ideas to address them.

Market: a group of people who share a job to be done.

Market segment: a subgroup of people who share a job to be done and shared opportunities

Customer need: the functional, emotional, and social jobs people want to get done in a given circumstance and the criteria they use to measure success.

Job: a task, objective, or goal to be accomplished; a problem to be resolved or prevented.

Criteria: the metrics customers inherently use to evaluate success executing a job.

Unmet need: an important unsatisfied need, i.e., a job/criterion that is important to get done yet remains unsatisfied by current product or service solutions.

Opportunity: an unmet (important and unsatisfied) need. The more important and less satisfied a need is, the more unmet it is, and the greater the opportunity for innovation and growth it presents.

Creativity: the mental process of making connections or reconfigurations between unmet needs and solution capabilities.

* Many of these definitions were first developed by Tony Ulwick, CEO and Founder of Strategyn where I worked for seven years. I am grateful for the many things I learned from Tony and the Strategyn team.

Want some help gaining a shared worldview among your leadership team about innovation and growth? Let’s talk: 614-309-1231.

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