The questions innovators should be asking right now
A recent survey from McKinsey amongst senior executives highlighted that changes brought about by Covid-19 would bring growth opportunities. On the flip side, recessionary pressures will force consumers to reassess perceived value in many categories.
However, only 1 in 5 execs report they are ready to pursue growth effectively.
HOW DO YOU REGAIN YOUR MOMENTUM AND CAPTURE GROWTH OPPORTUNITIES FROM INNOVATION-LED INITIATIVES IN THE NEAR TERM?
Some elements of your business model and customer behaviours will remain the same and bounce back post-crisis, while other aspects may change.
For example, we've all experienced how our relationship with digital technologies and e-commerce has shifted. The limited availability of some products has prompted us to reassess what we typically use and how we shop. Furthermore, social distancing will impact aspects of customer service, retail, entertainment and healthcare experiences in the near term.
These experiences will create some new norms and lasting behaviours.
A PWC survey indicates that 63% of CFOs see enhanced or new product and service offerings —i.e. innovation—a critical driving factor in achieving post COVID recovery.
TO RESPOND TO THESE DYNAMIC CHANGES, YOU NEED TO BE ASKING THREE CRITICAL QUESTIONS:
How do we adapt our core business to shifting customer needs in the near term? What new opportunities are created by the current situation? What issues need resolving?
What actions do we take to build the future pipeline to remain competitive? What is the adjusted rhythm and pacing of our innovation projects?
How do we work effectively to maintain our agility and creative problem solving capacity over the coming months?
Let's take each of these opportunities in turn.
HOW DO WE ADAPT OUR CORE BUSINESS TO SHIFTING CUSTOMER NEEDS IN THE NEAR TERM?
Commercial innovation (CI) is the lifeblood of any business—the upgrading of core products, services and customer experiences to stay relevant.
Your CI projects are close-in, near term projects which you can switch on quickly.
Start by having conversations with your consumers and customers. Connect with your target audience to empathise with their needs and examine the following:
How have behaviours, routines and attitudes changed?
What tensions and frustrations need resolving?
What barriers do we need to overcome?
What's new, what's changed, and what remains constant?
By focusing on these topics, you'll be able to identify and reprioritise the 'jobs to be done'.
These may fall into one or more of the following categories:
Access - where and how people buy and access your products, services and information
Messaging and experience - how does the message and customer experience evolve to align with changing attitudes and behaviours
Product - what adaptations to the product, range or service is required to match shifting consumer needs, and value perceptions to maintain relevance and uniqueness
Let's look at a couple of practical examples:
In healthcare, access to many services is restricted. This could result in profound problems for patients depending on their health condition. To resolve this requires creativity to devise new service solutions to remove barriers to treatment access in the near term.
For consumer products, people may be rethinking their habits, needs and where they shop. Some new requirements have emerged; some needs have become more or less relevant. This has implications for your product assortment, channel, format strategy, as well as your message, to stay connected with your core audience.
Identify and prioritise these jobs to be done. These will become your focus for near term innovation activities.
Our digital experiences during the pandemic are reshaping how we shop and interact with services. Some of these behaviours will remain when we return to normal.
WHAT ACTIONS ARE REQUIRED TO BUILD THE FUTURE PIPELINE?
Let's turn to our second question. How do you reshape of your innovation pipeline based on changing business circumstances and commercial priorities?
Some activities may need to be accelerated, some deprioritised, and gaps addressed.
Ask:
What are our new priorities?
What gaps in our knowledge do we need to fill?
What are the implications for resources?
How does the phasing of our projects change?
What do we need to stop, start, continue, delay?
By asking these questions at the same time as addressing the areas of your core business, you'll reshape your project portfolio, innovation priorities and resource allocation.
FINALLY, HOW DO YOU WORK EFFECTIVELY IN THE SHORT TERM TO MAINTAIN AGILITY WHEN PEOPLE ARE COLLABORATING REMOTELY?
Team behaviour is a key factor for innovation success.
While working from home largely continues and with travel restrictions in place, you need to determine what workflows and activities need adjusting to the current constraints.
Lockdown has been a mass experiment in home working. Many activities have been able to continue for some organisations without loss of productivity—especially routine tasks and interactions. However, some activities work less well. When creative problem solving or running idea sprints, we know teams do this best face to face—the serendipity of human interactions sparks new ideas.
How do you adapt these nuanced interactions when we are no longer able to meet up?
Innovation is all about experimentation and agility, so flex your creative muscles, and test new ways to collaborate to find what works in your circumstances.
Pose a series of questions to your team to understand what needs to change:
Are we finding creative ways to stay close to our consumers and co-create with them?
What aspects of collaboration are we struggling with?
Have we got to grips with adapting tools and techniques to run remote design sprints and creative problem-solving activities?
Let's look at a couple of examples we've recently encountered with clients.
For one innovation project, our client needed to keep up momentum when the lockdown struck. We had planned to run our trusted consumer co-creation workshops to incubate ideas with end-users. We responded by translating these sessions into a 10-day on-online consumer co-creation community. By modifying our techniques in close collaboration with the client, we could maintain momentum and achieve the desired outcomes.
For other initiatives, we have been able to use remote tools to mirror those we use in workshops. For example, scoping out projects, conducting expert interviews to spot customer pain points, and the iterative building of ideas and stimulus to explore opportunities. These have facilitated real-time collaboration to sustain momentum.
Check out more of our tips for remote innovation teams here.
To sum up:
To regain your innovation momentum and business recovery, address three questions:
How do we adapt our core business to shifting customer needs in the near term?
What actions do we take to build the future pipeline to remain competitive?
How do we work effectively to maintain our agility over the coming months?