T-shaped people and their areas of expertise

A great deal of success in Open / Collaborative Innovation depends on winning the „right people“ for driving the change. Studies have shown that T-shaped experts are pivotal in this approach. We came across an interesting question in our recent project work: How does one evaluate efficiently the expertise base of an individual?” In other words: How could you efficiently …

Software for the fuzzy front-end: Focus areas and how to make it fly

Judging by Our project pipeline, leading firms are intensifying their efforts in developing the fuzzy front-end of the innovation funnel. We are currently conducting a study to better understand where things are going. First, preliminary results suggest that development efforts are targeted at This does not mean, of course that other issues such as e.g. extending the innovation ecosystem and …

The 7 principles of highly effective innovation culture change programs (Part 1 of 2)

Nothing is more constant than change. Furthermore, the speed of change is accelerating. So for instance, the global knowledge is growing exponentially, disruptive megatrends (e.g. Internet Of Things, urbanization, demographic shifts) are shaping the innovation agendas and new approaches for capturing value by innovation (e.g. Business Model Innovation, Design Thinking) are becoming mainstream. Thus, new realities for innovation management are …

Leading firms are discussing with innovation-3 about “Open Innovation inside the firm”

Open Innovation inside the firm (sometimes also called intra-firm Open Innovation) is an extremely hot topic in Central Europe. And innovation-3 is in the sweet spot of helping leading firms to use the “wisdom of the internal crowd” for driving innovation performance. In the second half of May, innovation-3 will conduct a one-day workshop on this issue with clients and …

2-day Open Innovation Masterclass at Dresden International University

On May 10-11, 2014 innovation-3’s Frank Mattes will facilitate a 1.5 days Masterclass for alumni of the Dresden International University. These work for large multinational firms as well as for SMEs. The event has a B2B focus and is also open for non-alumni (more information below). In designing the agenda, we followed our proven approach for a Senior Management workshop …

HR departments take the driver’s seat in Open Innovation

One way of looking at Open Innovation is to have an open mind in the search for new opportunities / solutions and in connecting with the best innovators. These best innovators may be found in the firm’s org chart or outside the company walls. The Open Innovation paradigm says that the organizational background of the innovators is secondary – one …

New publication: Achieving excellence in Open Innovation

Business + Innovation, the Executive magazine of the German research foundation Steinbeis, just published an article from innovation-3’s Frank Mattes on “Achieving excellence in Open Innovation”. This article, that Frank Mattes co-wrote with Dr. Philip Wagner from RWTH university at Aachen, explains why leading firms are opening up their innovation activities, which strategies they pursue and what makes up excellence …

Recording of Expert Panel discussion now online

On May 31, innovation-3’s Frank Mattes moderated an Expert Panel Discussion on making innovation pay. The session focused on methods to increase the rate of innovation, reduce individual level costs per innovation and encourage fail fast methods. This session was also looking for unusual ways that organizations have managed to drive innovation execution to make returns on their innovation investments …

How to design an Open Innovation roll-out project: 4 scenarios

In 2011, we saw an increasing Open Innovation maturity. Most have passed the threshold of conceptual discussions. Many have gone beyond testing some new approaches, such as e.g. using an Open Innovation intermediary. The “Early Adopters”, if we borrow this term from the theory of technology diffusion, see Open Innovation NOT as a one-size-fits-all strategy; rather they see it as …

HR departments take the driver’s seat in Open Innovation

One way of looking at Open Innovation is to have an open mind in the search for new opportunities / solutions and in connecting with the best innovators. These best innovators may be found in the firm’s org chart or outside the company walls. The Open Innovation paradigm says that the organizational background of the innovators is secondary – one …

Report from the OI Masterclass – Part II

We then went on and discussed about the basic factors for successful OI, i.e. having a clear Intellectual Property approach and finding / managing external innovators. In this context I showed my proven approach to cross-industry innovation that helps in finding innovation partners from other industries. What surprised most of the participants in this section is that there are clear …

Open Innovation in Germany: The 2011 agenda

2011 has started with a huge uptake in Open Innovation in Germany. Firms are investing much more energy and budget for innovating their innovation management than they did last year. Based on discussions and projects within Germany’s largest firms and a formal questionnaire sent out to 80 German Open Innovation managers I see six issues on the German 2011 Open …

A roadmap for implementing R&D-driven Open Innovation

Almost in any client discussion I have about implementation of R&D-driven Open Innovation we discuss questions like „How long does it take to implement it? When is the appropriate time to start with organizational change? When should we install metrics to measure success in Open Innovation?” My typical first reply is, usually presented with a smile “It takes longer”. From …