My impression from quickly scanning my Google alerts is that O.I. is pretty boring right now.  Most any web link you get leads to a repeat story, another strategy for gaining corporate acceptance (against increasing odds), another big company telling small innovators how honored they should be to be courted, or another do-nothing conference (see above.)  Or so it seems.

So I decided to record and weight the hits for a month and see if my hypothesis holds.  Scientific?  Probably not very.  But interesting.

“Replay” conference announcement or recap (can tell from the agenda that is is a yawner) – 35%

“Novel” conference announcement or recap (something interesting or new) – 2%

Presentation by a corporation telling innovators how to work with them – 5%

Announcement or story on a government body either implementing or endorsing “openness” – 15%

Vendor activity (somebody trying to sell O.I. something or another) – 20%

Something critical of O.I. – 2%

Announcement of a challenge – %15

Hard to categorize – 5% (usually an incoherent blog article)

A cheap knockoff of a Tin Whiskers blog post – 1%

I suppose I might conclude  lots of things from this obviously quick-and-dirty analysis.  But surely it endorses my supposition that activity and effort is being to double back on itself.  Aren’t we through the “adoption” effort for Open Innovation?  If not, will we ever be?

When do we start talking about success?  Probably when my analysis shows fewer endorsement strategies, fewer point solutions, and fewer conferences.  Open innovation needs to become so common and ingrained that it is too boring to warrant such an effort.

The article discusses 3M CEO George Buckley’s approach to driving innovation during a recession.  I’m impressive by his observations because they are devoid of the drivel so common among executives when asked about innovation.  Pulling out three examples:

• When asked where he cut to preserved R&D investment, Mr. Buckley states clearly “sales.”  He is under no illusion that he sell himself out of a poor sales situation.  Too often, executives mouth the words “maintainable R&D investment” but their cash flow statements don’t reflect it.
• When asked how he gets his people to be creative, he says:

Everybody wants to find out how to can creativity. You can’t. Creativity comes from freedom, not control. We let all the people in the R&D community spend 15% of their time researching whatever they like.

And later,

Six Sigma’s worked wonderfully in our factories, but we tried it in our labs and it doesn’t work. It’s obvious why. The creative process, whether it is with me or anybody else,is a discontinuous process. You can’t say if I put more money in it I am going to get more out.

Most executives would have spoken about how they are institutionalizing innovation and implementing control and measurement systems for it.

• When asked about he influences his R&D team, he says by walking through the labs and talking to them.  Most executives would point to an offsite strategy session, a new innovation network, and some bizarre ideation training class or similar.  Mr. Buckley’s R&D staff knows he supports innovation.  Most R&D staffs are just waiting on the next initiative coming down from on high to replace the one they are subjected to now.

Mr. Buckley obvious thinks innovation is important.  But he isn’t proposing some new business process, a focus that wasn’t always at 3M, nor (heaven forbid) some new social networking strategy that will “change the way we do business.”   He is realistic to economic conditions and focused on the bottom line.  He is the kind of innovator that will prevail in this economic climate.

I despise pop-up ads, spam e-mails, and all the other ways advertisers utilize the free and ubiquitous nature of the internet to get us to pay attention to their message.  I have had the misfortune of having my computer infected with a Trojan (a form of virus which can make advertisements pop up randomly) which made me want to throw my computer out a window.  I generally tune out the Apple commercial where Justin Long humiliates the “PC guy.”  Perhaps the only saving grace of these forms of advertising is that you can easily delete, close, or otherwise ignore them.  Now imagine a world where if you want your computer or handheld device to work, you MUST let the advertisement run.  Steve Jobs has essentially requested 20 years of government-provided protection for a Trojan that he will intentionally install on his products.

As someone who worked in pharmaceutical R&D, I understand the critical need for innovation, especially with respect to small molecules where the universe of possibilities is dwindling.  In this case, this seems to be an example of, just because you can create and/or patent something, doesn’t mean you necessarily should.

Even if Apple patents this method, that doesn’t mean it will see the light of day.  This would probably qualify as a business method which could cease to be patentable subject matter once the Supreme Court rules on Bilski.  However, I couldn’t resist posting this entry in response to Kevin’s previous entry about Apple’s innovativeness.  I can’t argue about their innovativeness and why a company would want to have some of the “Apple magic” rub off on them, but this is an instance where Apple should use their powers for good and not evil.

The take-home message here is, even if you come across a patent reference which seems to describe what you wanted to patent, you should still call the patent office where protection is sought to see if the patent reference has lapsed or is still active.  This is particularly true if the patent reference is a US patent that granted 11.5 or more years ago, at which point only about 40% of the US patents are still active (the range is from approximately 38-45% depending on when the patent issued).  Patents that granted 7.5-9 years ago should also have their status checked because this is the group that saw the sharpest decline in paid maintenance fees, to approximately 60%.  As with any issue related to patent infringement, the inventor should consult with a patent attorney to verify patent status before engaging in potentially infringing activities, because while one patent may have been allowed to lapse, another one may still exist which could form the basis for infringement.

Well documented on this blog, we’ll see more posts like this as time goes on.  Trying to run an innovation program in a transactional model assumes that innovation is a transactional endeavor (predictable, deterministic, and easily measured.)  It is not.

Not to be outdone….

Actually, I don’t have dog in the fight. Innovation is important, but buzzwords and acronyms come and go.  I’ll let others philosophize.

But one thing that catches my attention is that Jobs is so often cited as one of the best innovators of all time. He certainly is now. But he hasn’t always been. And innovators can learn from his mistakes.

Early on Jobs was a gadget man. Let me define that: a gadget is a new invention. It isn’t necessarily a successful innovation. Usually due to one of two reasons: a competitor beats your gadget in functionality or beats your economic model.

Most of Jobs early products (early Macintosh, Newton) were world class gadgets. They had features that were unparalled. He buried the needle on the Wiz-bang meter. But, while some had early success, they usually were eventually displaced by competitors with a better economic model (most notably the open architecture of the IBM PC and later the focus away from hardware towards the operating system as the definition of the computer, and even later that the internet was the computer.) (Disclaimer: I realize that Jobs wasn’t always working for Apple when some of these products were introduced but, like the rest of the world, I use Jobs and Apple interchangeably.)

More recently, Jobs has focused very squarely on innovation, using invention only to propel that cause. Neither IPod, IPhone, or now IPad introduced groundbreaking new technology or features. Well, with the exception maybe of packaging/form/fit. But otherwise he aggregated existing features/functions into a platform. Mainly, ITunes.

IPad seems to be the quintessential example. From what I can tell, it is an ITouch/IPhone with a bigger screen. The Wiz-bang meter barely measures it. But the innovation meter is reading strong.

I believe smaller innovators are learning this lesson. I’ve seen great examples of simple technology advances that expressed in ways that are disruptive because of the network effects of a newly created platform.

Examples? Take rising crust pizza. Hardly noble-prize worthy, I would say. But its technology has propagated throughout the processed food world. It is a platform, not just a new food mixture.

Take Pomegranate juice. Tastes awful, I would say. But it has become a nutrition platform that is expanding beyond fruit juice to vitamin development, neutriceuticals, etc. It is positioned differently than other fruit juices. It loses taste tests but wins clinical tests for nutritional benefit.

So what is next for Apple? I haven’t heard it elsewhere but seems straightforward to me. They’ll make Hi-Def TVs. It makes no sense because there are so many HD TV vendors and the price on them is falling through the floor, right. But Apple has ITunes! After all, an HD-TV is just a super-sized IPad.

I’d say Friedman is right in that President Obama should focus on job creation through innovation and revitalization.  But Friedman ignores a problem:  government will see the problem as “what should government do?” rather than “what are we doing to impeded business that we should stop?”

Friedman says:

Obama should bring together the country’s leading innovators and ask them: “What legislation, what tax incentives, do we need right now to replicate you all a million times over” — and make that his No. 1 priority. Inspiring, reviving and empowering Start-up America is his moon shot.

But the problem with that is the answer:  lower taxes, rational immigration reform, tort reform, lower deficits, and flexibility to innovate in ways that benefits consumers rather than targets pet government projects.

I realize now that my reaction is derived from several opinions, assumptions, and experiences that are at odds with tide of hysteria on the subject.  First, while I write somewhat philosophically about the subject on this blog, I live the struggles of a practitioner day-to-day.  My visibility into many companies implementing new innovation strategies indicates that the investment isn’t paying off.  There are exceptions, but the average is low.

Secondly, I’m  aware than Tin Whiskers is one of the very few innovation strategy blogs that questions how far open innovation will go.  As with most over-hyped business concepts, the pull-back is clear and extreme.  Mind that I’m not saying it will die.  I’m saying those struggling will give up while those that are succeeding will keep going and their advantage will increase.  But, on average, there will be a pull back to a more healthy level of investment and focus.

Thirdly, I try to keep in mind that there seems to be more examples of success in open innovation BEFORE Mr. Chesbrough wrote his book than there have been since.  Licensing of patents, co-development partnerships, and venture capital investments aren’t new.  Chesbrough just says they should be strategic endeavors, not opportunistic.

Lastly, I’m cognizant that this college student sees all of the web hype of consumer contribution to innovation and believes that “more heads are better than one.”  In short, I lean heavily towards “the best head is worth more than most of the rest.”  If I ask people who manage R&D and similar “would you trade the external innovation programs you have now for another clone of your best internal innovator?” – they overwhelmingly would make that trade.

So, after giving the student a non-answer on the spot (just trying not to look stupid), I took the time later to better frame the question and will direct them to this blog post.  Perhaps her conception of me will improve.

The assumption that someone can have a career in “innovation” is vague.  Does that mean:

• A product designer?  If so, study engineering or human factors.  I don’t believe a college professor can make you “insightful” as it relates to what customers will appreciate in your design.  That will exist (or not) naturally but can be enhanced with experience.
• A social networking guru?  As relates to innovation, empowering people to communicate (especially virtually) is an important part of open innovation.  But I can’t tell you what courses to take towards that end.  I’m sure many universities have tailored courses to leverage the hysteria that FaceBook is going to allow people to colonize Mars.  But I’m even more sure that those courses would suck.  If you want to take this course, study software engineering.  REAL software engineering:  programming, object oriented design, network theory, and data management.  Skip the transient junk about social networking that will change before you graduate.  (I studied computer science and laughed at the old timers who reminisced about punch cards.  Won’t be long until software engineering students are laughing that you called Twitter a vital part of your education.)
• A manager of innovation.  This student definitely came from an angle of “what courses do I take to get a job directing innovation?”  I draw a blank on this one.  If someone told me they wanted to be a “quality guru,” I could help them out.  Take statistics.  Complement with behavior and organizational design, finance, and quantitative analysis.  But that is the problem with “innovation” as an academic discipline – it lacks a differentiated set of building block capabilities that distinguishes it from other fields.  It would be good to understand intellectual property law but that isn’t covered in any practical detail except for law school.  And negotiation skills are important but, again, hardly differentiated from other fields.

Which leads me to conclude that “innovation” isn’t a field or a job function.  It is a gift.  Some have it continuously and others have flashes of brilliance.  Business should appreciate and exploit both.  Those few, prized positions that lead this exploitation are transient; just waiting for the organization to do organically what is being dictated and directed in the short run.

I came to understand that software patents were rare in 1989 and so my application had to be written as though it was a non-computer machine.   That the real-world implementation involved a computer had to be incidental.

As information technology became more prevalent, software patents became more common.  And, over the past ten years, an even more abstract patent became common:  the business process patent.  These started as more abstract software patents but have migrated more towards just “ways of doing things” that may or may not even involve a machine (computer or otherwise).   Many patent professions consider them obstructive to innovation.  They add to the burden of ever-increasing applications to the patent office which means all patent applicants have longer approval process.  And they stifle the flexibility of a business to change business procedures (think shipping, customer service, and quality management.)

That is my understanding of this legal phenomenon.  A limited understanding, no doubt.  But there is a pending decision before the US Supreme Court which patent professions are watching closely and for which open innovation practitioners (other than IP related) seem generally unaware:  in Re Bilski.

In layman’s terms, Bilski filed a patent for a business process for  methods related to risk hedging in commodities trading.  The details bore me but you can take the link above if your life is less exciting than mine.  (Scary thought.)  The patent office refused to give him a patent so he sued and now the Supreme Court is deciding.  Legal insiders expect a decision just any time now.

Innovation scouts should be aware of this pending decision since it affects any business process patents which are being evaluated as innovation candidates.  My experience is that the overwhelming number of innovation candidates are based on technology patents that are not in question in Re Bilski, but any patents which describe a business process could be.  In addition, any company looking to license its own business process patents may find their value in question after the Bilski case is sorted out.

Here is a link to an informative (but not so interesting) blog on the subject:  in re Bilski blog

Opinions vary greatly.  While generally positive news, many cynics point out that many sectors and demographics continue to experience job loss while most of the offsetting positive effects are due to government and temporary jobs.  Few economists debate that government jobs point to better economic conditions but the temporary jobs data does spur a lot of debate.  From the BLS report:

Employment in professional and business services rose by 86,000 in November.  Temporary help services accounted for the majority of the increase, adding 52,000 jobs. Since July, temporary help services employment has risen by
117,000.

So, these jobs aren’t seasonal cashier jobs at Wal-Mart.  They are professional positions such as IT staff, accountants, and engineers.

Arguments on the blogosphere vary from:

• this is political spin from the White House trying to grasp at good news while businesses continue to avoid permanent hiring due to lack of confidence in the economy,
• this is cautiously optimistic news because businesses add such temporary employees in anticipation of hiring them full-time when the economy improves,
• this is fairly positive news because temporary professional employees are the future – the recovery is simply an inflection point since companies need to hire additional help.

Supposing that the third perspective is at least partially true, it means that companies will become more dependent on temporary employees for game-changing innovation.  And I can’t draw much distinction between the concept of open innovation (partnering with third-party companies to share technology and ideas) and temporary professional employees responsible for innovation.

In either case, you are attempting to build an effective and trustworthy relationship with an entity for which you have limited and temporary control.  Intellectual property rights are more complex.  Loyalty to you (and not to your competitor) is harder to enforce.  And you suffer from the potential to make this generation of your innovation based on outsiders’ talents and ideas with less confidence that those outsiders’ will be part of your next generation.