Business Performance (BPI) Network: InnovatorProfiles

Innovator Profiles

Id	Summary Bio	Answer 1	Answer 2	Answer 3	Answer 4	Answer 5	Leader	Actions
30	<p>In 2012, Greg Smith became an overnight game-changer in the debate for Wall Street reform, with his sensational public resignation in the New York Times: “Why I am leaving Goldman Sachs.” The former Goldman equities vice president is again tackling systemic inefficiencies and predatory practices in the financial world, but this time it’s in the retirement savings sector. Smith recently accepted the role as President of Blooom, a Midwest startup which was named a Word Top 10 Innovative Company (2015) in the personal finance space by <em>Fast Company.</em></p> <p>The South African expatriate was motivated to move due to the realization that technology innovation had yet to be harnessed to bring down costs for consumers in the financial services sector – and his conviction that, in a gridlocked legislative environment, only innovation could trigger rapid reform.The company was created in response to these astonishing research findings: that four out of every five 401K plans are incorrectly invested, and that the average American unknowingly pays $150,000 in investment fees over their lifetime – the bulk of which are entirely needless. Also, its products were innovated on the basis of these twin conclusions: that 401K plans simply cannot be efficiently managed on a DIY basis, and that only the wealthy can afford financial advisers who can customize and maximize the investments while minimizing their costs.</p> <p>Just a year after its official launch, Blooom has already taken over management of 401K plans for clients in 48 states, using smart software which automatically rebalances investments, while lowering fees. Blooom manages close to $100 million of retirement assets, and employees at half of the Fortune 50 have already signed up as clients of Blooom.</p> <p>Blooom is also disrupting the competition with its flat fee business model charging individuals as little as $1 per month to manage and update their portfolios. Additionally, an essay was published in Time magazine this month exposing the astonishing inefficiencies in the 401k system. Smith is again giving a public jolt to conventional thinking. And his mission is nothing less than to see an entire generation of Americans harness smart technologies to secure their retirement future.</p>	<p>The US retirement space has changed significantly over the last few decades. People of a previous generation were more likely to receive a guaranteed pension either from their employer or the government. Today, Social Security is not enough to provide a stable retirement, and guaranteed pensions have largely disappeared. So Americans have to fend for themselves and are left with a legacy 401k system that was never designed for the middle class.</p> <p>It has an overwhelming amount of choice, often high fees, and often poor selections of index funds. Many people are bewildered and overwhelmed by this complexity, and make no choice, often missing out on a decade of compounding returns. Others can make bad choices and pay away up to a third of their nest egg in fees, often without knowing it. </p> <p>Blooom is the first company that has a completely fresh approach to the 401k space. We are an online service that analyzes any 401k, no matter where someone works. We then recommend the necessary changes. Finally, if the client hires us, we completely take over the management of their 401k – we make the changes for them, we keep an eye on the accounts, and we rebalance it over time. We are not a 'Do-It-Yourself' Solution. We are a 'Do-It-For-You' Solution. All for a Netflix-like subscription fee of $15/month or less.</p> <p>We use the image of a flower (hence blooom!) to represent the health of the 401k, instead of complicated jargon or charts or graphs that no one understands. Clients love the simplicity and we have grown quicker than anyone else in the automated advisory space in the first year since formal launch. We manage 401k’s for people in 48 states, from age 22 to 67. Our mission is to fix broken 401k’s for millions of Americans.</p>	<p>There are a few impediments that have really kept 401k’s in the 1980’s, despite the advancement of technology. Firstly, 401k’s and retirement are seen as an HR function in the benefits department. Therefore the executives making the decisions on 401k’s have ten other benefits to worry about and are not finance people. So the 401k’s have often been littered with poor fund selections that end up being egregiously expensive for their own employees. There was even a time when the corporation would get kick-backs or part of the very mutual fund fees that their own employees were paying for their retirement.</p> <p>Paradoxically, retirement became a profit center for the very corporation that was supposed to be providing you with benefits. The second major issue is that government largely thinks of the savings problem as a tax issue instead of a complexity issue. I.e. Government thinks if they can just offer you more attractive tax deferrals in your Roth IRA, that tens of millions more Americans will save more money. But behavioral economist after behavioral economist has told the Senate that it is not about taxes. The overwhelming majority of Americans don’t understand the complex tax system. What they need is a very simple system, without jargon, that makes making the “right” choice an easy proposition. There is no innovation, use of technology, or simplicity in the 401k system. This needs to change.</p>	<p>Well I am quite new to Blooom, but am not new to its mission. I think we try to think of every decision we make through a human lens. Finance is complicated – often purposefully – so no one can understand it and so that lots of people can continue to make lots of money off an unsuspecting general public. Our view is that anything we do needs to be understandable to someone who knows nothing about finance.</p> <p>That’s why we charge people a transparent, monthly subscription fee instead of the industry standard of “basis points” or “expense ratios” that get deducted out of people’s accounts without them knowing it. That’s why we use simple imagery to explain one’s 401k instead of a complicated chart. Because of this drive to make everything human, we are forced to keep things really simple. And in finance, keeping things extremely simple turns out to very innovative, and something that people love.</p>	<p>The biggest change will come within 5 years, when the millennial generation will constitute half the global workforce. People underestimate how differently millennials think about money versus baby boomers. Millennials like simplicity, transparency, the predictability of software, the ability to tap the wisdom of their peers and crowdsource an answer instead of paying an expensive advisor for the answer. And that advisor had to deal with lots of paperwork that also runs up the costs. All of this is going away in the investment management business. I think costs will come down and transparency will hopefully go up.</p>	<p>I think much of what is going on in the mobile banking space in developing countries around the world has been truly extraordinary. Examples like M-Pesa that started in Africa, which allows those who don’t have access to a bank to perform much of the basics of banking – sending money, paying people, saving small amounts of money. Why doesn’t the developed world follow this example and make it easier for everyone to be banked? </p> <p>I also think some of the “Nudge" practices going on around the world in national savings systems is good. For example, we know that the only proven way to make people save money is to make it easy for them. I think the 401k system for example should move in an opt-out/nudge direction. For example, when a new person joins a company, start taking some small amount out of their salary and putting it away for them in a low cost, appropriate investment. This will then escalate this percentage over time or when the person gets a raise. And the employee can absolutely opt-out. But what economists find, is that few people do opt out, and ultimately are happy that this inertia set in.<br /><br />Companies<em> are </em>allowed to automatically enroll their employees to 401k plans, yet only about half of corporate CEO’s choose to do so. This is very sad, since many people could be contributing to a nest egg, and often getting free matching from their company, yet they don’t do so because they never get over the hurdle of signing up for their 401k in the first place.</p>	Greg Smith	View Edit Delete
31	<p class="highlight">As the Director of Innovation at Vodafone Global Enterprise, Shannon Lucas focuses on empowering global Fortune 500 businesses to stay agile, competitive and sustainable.</p> <p class="highlight">One of the world’s largest telecoms companies, Vodafone has mobile operations in 26 countries; partners with networks in a further 55; and provides fixed broadband operations in 17 markets. As of June 2015, Vodafone had 449 million mobile customers.</p> <p class="highlight">Lucas is passionate about developing ecosystems which trigger collaborative innovation between multiple stakeholders, and has presented her game-changing vision at TedX.</p> <p class="highlight">Armed with the unique leadership and team lessons of having served as a mountain rescue volunteer, the Bay Area disruptor developed her career with cutting edge technology experience at companies like Microsoft and T-Mobile.</p> <p class="p1"><span class="s1">At Vodafone, she </span><span class="s2">is part of the core team that focuses on a global </span><span class="s1">program to generate innovative solutions by turning enterprise customers into collaborative partners.</span></p> Within the enterprise, Lucas has not only supported dynamic intrapreneurship and a broad culture of change, but has invited employees to take on the role of customers in a program which has generated transformative ideation and engagement models.	<p>The Vodafone Innovation team is fortunate to be positioned at the intersection of the world’s leading total telecommunications company, innovation and relationships with the largest global enterprises. Mobility is the heartbeat of today’s innovation. While not every innovation is built on mobile, mobility is transforming the way the world operates. This gives us the freedom to embark on an innovation journey with our customers.</p> <p>We run approximately 100 customer innovation workshops each year and take the radical approach of having an open conversation without an agenda and ask big questions starting with, “What if?” We are confident that no matter what emerges, we can help our enterprise customers on their innovation journeys. This approach shifts the relationship from customer-vendor to collaborative partners. The conversation is focused on business transformation, not technology. Of course, we look at ways that technology is supporting an ever-changing world. But first we collaboratively develop the vision of, “Where do you want to be in 3 years?” At the end of the workshop, we collectively ideate solutions, refine and prioritize and then execute with a lean, agile approach. The innovation program is our think-and-do tank.</p> <p>Increasingly we see disruptive ideas or solutions emerge from our workshops that cannot be tackled alone. In response to this growing need for co-creation we launched the Enterprise Studio. It’s both a physical space in Silicon Valley and a global methodology. We pull from a variety of innovation frameworks like design thinking, lean, agile, etc., but as each project is wildly unique, we have to be willing to adapt our approach. The Studio is not an “app-factory.” We tackle problems such as user-based, real-time car insurance in the UK, to financing for smallholder farmers in Africa, to holistic analytics platforms to manage supply chains.</p> <p>We have a lot of experience to draw from having run so many workshops in the last few years. At the same time, we recognize this is an iterative process and we are always looking to learn from our own experiences as well as thought leaders from across the global innovation community.</p>	<p>One of the biggest challenges to driving innovation into large enterprises is the size and complexity of these organizations. The size and scale of large corporations can enable truly transformative solutions. They have access to human and financial resources, a global footprint, and infrastructure that allows for scale. However, the complexity of navigating stakeholders, competing project priorities and finding the appropriate subject matter experts can slow down innovation. Within Vodafone Global Enterprise we are fostering a culture that embraces lean and agile concepts to help navigate the accelerating speed of change that businesses are facing today.</p>	<p>Two years ago we started running Innovation Bootcamps in Vodafone offices globally. We replicate and condense a customer innovation workshop and invite Vodafone employees to take on the role of the customer. We bring to life concepts like design thinking, divergence/convergence and personas.  We have our employees ideate as if they were a customer. The experiential learning fosters a deeper understanding of the value of innovation as a tool for internal business transformation and as a differentiated engagement model with our customers. We have also started running workshops to generate new solutions or tackle business challenges internally.</p> <p>We don’t want people to just take our word about the impact of the Vodafone innovation program. We share data regarding opportunities created, new executive customer relationships established and highlight examples of how the program has demonstrated positive impact with our customers.</p> <p>Optimization is a constant journey. The innovation team is by definition always finding ways to improve.  We pause at the end of the year to reflect on what has worked well, where we need to improve, where we see innovation as a practice heading, and then create a plan for how to improve for the following year.</p> <p>This year we have a strong focus on scaling the program. The success of the workshops and co-creation engagements has generated a large number of opportunities that require a strong global bench of Innovation Champions (Vodafone employees) to help execute. We have created tiered certification programs for both the champions and the sales teams. We believe that the training opportunities we are creating for the Champions provide excellent personal and professional development. We know that a simple “Thank you” can go a long way, so we have also created a rewards and recognition program to highlight the efforts of these employees.</p>	<p>The ubiquity of connectivity cannot be overstated. As you look at the number of people joining the connected world in emerging markets as well as the number of connected things, the question becomes, “Why do you want to connect with someone or something?” not how.</p> <p>In our world of enterprise innovation, co-creation can be game changing. Organizations that successfully tackle big challenges will simultaneously create tremendous value for their company and for society. It’s our view that this takes a new type of business relationship, where new partnership models evolve based on open innovation and co-creation to build disruptive solutions.</p> <p>Co-creation uses two companies’ current capabilities as a foundation, while building a new solution on top, creating something disruptive that could not have been easily accomplished by one company on their own. Co-creation also allows the team to tap into the collective wisdom of both organizations, de-risks the project and strengthens the relationship between the two companies. We are seeing demand for this type of engagement and are excited about the possibilities that can emerge.</p>	<p>There is no magic formula for innovation. It’s a combination of openness (to new approaches, opinions, mindsets, partners), perfectionism (how do we make this better still?), collaboration (together is easier than alone), and hard work (good innovation takes practice!). Our program has embraced iteration as a key philosophy and we are always looking for ways to improve.</p> We have the found biggest determinant to our enterprise innovation program is employee empowerment. By providing a way for top employees to channel their passion, we create a win-win for the organization. The innovation program can have large impact with a very small core team, because we foster a global community of innovators who contribute their skills to the program. Those folks, in turn, get to participate in meaningful and exciting work while developing their professional skills and increasing their visibility within Vodafone. Because their voices are heard and their ideas acted upon, they are more likely to speak up and suggest ways to improve or help our customers. Not only that, but also they become key participants in building those solutions. They are the evangelists for new ways of thinking and doing business, which is what enables the innovation program to accelerate success. It’s a virtuous circle of enterprise innovation.	Shannon Lucas	View Edit Delete
32	<p>Described as “a Renaissance man of the digital age,” Pieter Nel – Senior Vice President of Operations at YouNow – is also a pilot, a yacht skipper, a mountain rescue volunteer, and a MIT-award-winning entrepreneur. Previously, the South African-born executive and engineer was the CTO who helped propel the massive early growth of Africa’s largest social network, Mxit – which, at one point, was larger than Twitter.</p> <p>A <a href="http://www.sablenetwork.com/inspirations/advancements-achievements/why-mxit-should-be-a-source-of-both-lessons-and-pride-for-south-africans">new profile</a> on Nel on BPI’s sister platform, the SABLE Accelerator, adds: “The 40-year-old is a key innovator in three of the most coveted fields of the new economy – virtual currencies, machine learning and monetization strategy – and he’s doing it all for YouNow: a platform which defines the social connectivity revolution.” This live video social network is even disrupting the cable TV space, having recorded average active user times for its millions of subscribers at almost 50 minutes every day.</p> <p>Nel positively boils with ideas for disruptive technologies – and told BPI that he has retained his passion to innovate on mobile platforms to empower African entrepreneurs. Is this Q&A, Nel also speaks about the potential for “smart farming” in Africa, enabled by drones and smart data. He has also harnessed his experiences of leading dozens of mountain rescues for a Thought Leadership project that principle tech founders and CEOs should use in navigating the fast-changing market landscape.</p>	<p>Open communication and easy interaction between people of different backgrounds always have a net positive impact on society. We saw this at Mxit where we allowed millions of users to interact and communicate at a mere fraction of the cost of an SMS. Once again at YouNow, we are using the video medium to allow users from all over the world to socialize, meet friends and exchange ideas.  It’s an extremely interactive platform – you are chatting directly with the broadcaster and fellow viewers, live. There is this powerful need for social interaction, to share ideas and opinions, and this is a fantastic channel for that impulse.</p>	<p>I believe very few American startups have an understanding of global markets and user bases and how to serve them well.  The Internet has moved to mobile and the potential markets in Brazil, Africa, India and South East Asia are far bigger than what you find in the US.  Understanding how to be successful in those markets early on in your growth is a key differentiating factor. In that respect, the Mxit experience was extremely advantageous, as we were in many respects years ahead of the curve in terms of building mobile-first global communities.  In general I find South Africans to be much more comfortable in a global context and within a culturally diverse environment.  </p>	<p>Innovation is a culture that is driven from the top. One needs to create an environment that allows for experimentation and failure. If your team is too afraid to fail, and not incentivized to experiment, they won't do it.  It actually requires a lot of discipline too - engineers are bound to continue tinkering with something for too long and one has to have the discipline to move on to try new things.  When Herman Heunis was running R&D at his Swist Group Technologies - the directive was to try 10 new things each year.  One of them ended up being Mxit.</p>	<p>It is going to become increasingly difficult for business leaders to be effective without the ability to engage deeply in analytical thinking and understanding data, complex systems and non-linear effects.  We live in an increasingly complex world, and it's all too easy to make bad decisions based on data that is not fully understood. Every business executive should have a basic understanding of data science and statistics. </p> <p>From a technology perspective, mobile video, virtual reality and the Internet of Things are of course the big trends that most analysts agree on. In the emerging market context I believe that there is a large potential for drones combined with smart data analysis to revolutionize smart farming in Africa. Africa has enormous potential in terms of agriculture and it unfortunately doesn't come to it's full right given all the strife, corruption and policy failures like we've seen in Zimbabwe.</p>	<p>One of the successful behaviors of innovators is to bounce their new ideas off of as many people as possible. MIT professor Hal Gregersen describes this as one of the 5 traits of successful innovators in "The Innovator's DNA." Steve Jobs was always talking about his ideas to everyone - and a diverse set of people too.  Innovators continually iterate and enhance their thinking in this fashion. The opportunity to do this is of course much better in dense environments like Silicon Valley, Cambridge, MA and NYC.  It's a behavior I try to imitate all the time.</p>	Pieter Nel	View Edit Delete
34	<p>Barry Money insists that the Japanese innovation concepts of kaizen and kaikaku represent the twin competitive engines for a cramped automotive market. With Toyota already hailed as a classic model of both disruptive and incremental innovation, Money says the most urgent challenge is to direct disruptive strategies toward creating lifelong customers, and to transforming the used vehicle market.</p> <p>Scores of dealerships in Australia are already reaping the rewards of offering personalized benefits to repeat customers, driven by integrated big data tools, and a laser-focus on loyalty. While some brands are offering car sales directly online, Toyota is using digital resources to enrich person-to-person relationships throughout the dealer network, including an innovative sales and service collaboration.</p> <p>Money tells BPI that other connectivity technologies are also being piloted. However – having worked everywhere from the production line to the logistics desk at Toyota – Money believes that trust remains the one truly indispensable asset.</p>	<p>Toyota has the largest number of units in operation in the Australian automotive market. We have more owners on the road than any other brand. Our strong dealer network services many of these customers. With innovative service, finance and repurchase products, we have the ability to move customers from their existing vehicle into a newer vehicle – which provides the customers with that Oh What A Feeling emotion as well as great value.</p> <p>The specific innovation that my team has delivered is combining the best of our service and sales departments and assisting our customers to move from their current vehicle to a new vehicle. We call this sales and service collaboration. It’s been tried before in the market, but this time we have strong system support, combined with training, on site consulting, KPI management and follow up and most importantly segmentation and one-to-one marketing that tailors the offering to the needs of the customers.</p>	<p>The dealer network and the automotive franchises have a strong culture and process that has worked well for a long time. But with an increase in the competition in the market from new entrants such as newer manufacturers as well as newer technologies that facilitate the automotive buying process, plus the threat of policy changes by government, it is important that the industry continues to adapt and change in a dynamically changing economy and market. Therefore, the biggest issue is creating an innovative and dynamic culture that looks to new ideas, new ways, new opportunities and challenges the status quo head on. Risk is part of business and understanding and managing that risk is important. But progress in the face of risk is mandatory. Standing still is not an option.</p>	<p>Toyota is synonymous with kaizen – continuous improvement. After ten years in Japan, I saw with my own eyes the lengths to which Toyota goes in order to create even better products and services. I was captured as a young executive by the passion and intelligence of my kaizen mentors and I have tried to bring that to the Australian market. <br /><br />Toyota practices kaizen in every thing it does. However, sometimes, incremental improvements are not enough – that is when “kaikaku” or revolutionary innovation is required. As part of the Retail Development team at Toyota, we are trying new technologies and processes in order to transform the way we do business with our dealers and more importantly how we engage with and satisfy our customers.</p>	<p>Consumers shop across brands and industries. They expect to be able to experience the same levels of excellence in any category – they carry their expectations horizontally across different industries. This expectation has been facilitated through the internet.</p> <p>As the new vehicle market has plateau’d, the franchises will be looking to capitalize on their existing owners, the loyalty from these owners and products and services that optimize the customer experience for this segment of the franchise’s market. </p>	<p>Recently we have undertaken a study of various technology-based products in the market that would be useful for our dealer network. WIFI based customer tracking and profiling, sales process support technologies, MAC address tracking on handheld devices among others.</p> <p>While each technology has great merit in the right context, the key is not in the technology. It is in the connection to the consumer on a one-to-one basis. Technology that can support and facilitate that type of tailored connection with our customers is the next step for automotive franchises, in my opinion.</p>	Barry Money	View Edit Delete
35	<p>With more than 15 years in R&D, Francois Ragnet specializes in successful transfer of innovation into Business. More recently, he focuses on pre-sales and is a technology evangelist, as well as managing an R&D group within Xerox Global Services in charge of transferring breakthrough innovation. Francois has spent almost his entire career at Xerox, and understands Xerox's innovation strategy from many angles. For the past 8 years, he has focused his innovation experience at Xerox Services, and received the Netherlands National Contact Centre Association (NCCS) Innovation Award for the technology developed & deployed by Raganets’ team in call centers in the Netherlands. He also currently holds 21 patents in the United States for various technologies he has developed since 2008 with various team members within Xerox. Francois holds a Masters in Telecommunications from the <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/edu/school?id=12465&trk=prof-edu-school-name">Institut national des Télécommunications</a> in France. </p>	<p>Xerox has a long, well-known innovation tradition; it’s widely known for producing game changing inventions in particularly the 70s and 80s, with light lens copiers for instance, and the mouse. But, historically, we were not always so effective in capitalizing on those innovations. But while the culture has been maintained, and deepened to all levels, Xerox has transformed dramatically in recent years. We are now the leading enterprise globally in BPO services in areas like healthcare, financial services, education and even transportation.</p> <p>In terms of traditional innovation and also blue sky research, we have 5000 scientists and engineers generating truly amazing things. The Xerox Innovation Group is a dynamic network of centers worldwide, including in the US, Canada, and France. We also have our major partnership in Japan with Fuji Xerox, and a center in India to capitalize on emerging markets.</p> <p>We have a strong innovation culture company-wide, making sure the blue sky research we have going in Xerox Innovation Group is repeated and amplified across our services business. Some of this work does not relate directly to our core business today, but we want to keep that flexibility of researchers to come up with totally new ideas.</p> <p>Innovation has been incremental in the BPO area, with profound results – you don’t have millions to spend on R&D in the service world, but the nice thing is that it is much more disruptive; you can innovate without multi-year projects. On the downside you have to be much quicker – you don’t have multiple years to develop those inventions.</p> <p>Recently I’ve been involved more in customer care – an area we’ve invested quite a lot in, and where we place a lot of our innovation focus. Evidence of this is the Call Centre Association Innovation Award that went to our Xerox Virtual Performance Indicator product in 2013 – which is now deploying across the corporation, and which we plan to sell to external customers.</p> <p>The indicator is really a small innovation, technically – but it does make a huge difference, once you make it right, you make 50,000 agents deployed more motivated, more productive, and more into their job. We have invested a lot in gamification – we’re motivating those agents by bringing an element of games and fun into their day-to-day work. They have key performance indicators, but we don’t want it to be a case of ‘Big Brother watching you’ – we want to use gamification in a positive way, and get people into their jobs. We are finding that agents are enjoying the spirit so much that they virtually belong to the customer company.</p> <p>Turnover rates can be 100% for traditional call centers, with people too stressed or bored. With these technologies, you ensure they stay longer; they are more competent; I suspect there is even less sick leave taken. We have created a real sense of community and engagement in the call centers.</p> <p>I believe we are able to make innovation work in a very difficult domain – Business Process Services - but are also able to deliver economies of scale, and even create potential new business for our customer.</p>	<p>The challenge the Business and Document Process Services sector is that it is a fast paced domain, which is constantly evolving with “mini” fixes – large, breakthrough innovation, although well needed, is not possible. Large corporations outsource largely to cut costs, and so “cost-down” is the primary driver for innovation. Reducing costs is a difficult driver for innovation – you start a project, put small fixes here and there; test and build successful innovations, and quickly drop those that aren’t working.</p> <p>There is also a danger of deploying technology for its own sake. So we have ethnographers and scientists who study how work is being done; to tell us where technology can help, and be effective; and not just be technology for its own sake.</p> <p>We increasingly have a mix of ethnography, user-centric design, research, and “Agile Innovation” - part of this was to learn to fail quickly. Furthermore, innovation models were quite rigid – planned, multi-year innovations which are focused on industrial design; not adapted to services.</p>	<p>Innovation has been part of Xerox’s DNA forever. Indeed, although Xerox has a long-standing tradition being focused on industrial products, the ACS acquisition in 2009 took us into a totally new world. We had to rethink processes - including innovation - totally.</p> <p>When we moved into Services and acquired Affiliated Computer Services we had to adapt drastically our vision for innovation – in ACS it was happening at a grass roots level, in small pockets. We have homogenized and built processes that touch just about everyone across the organization.</p> <p>Within our services business, it is important to have the right structures, so we have the office of the CIO for Services; we have executives in charge of bringing innovations to maturity. Each line of business has its own CIO, and each group proposes new innovation projects that make the whole company more agile, and the creative energy cascades down to everyone.</p> <p>We also like to be very customer-focused – so we have different ways of reaching out to and collaborating with our customers. For some of our top customers, we have Innovation Councils; we also have what we call “Dreaming Sessions”, where we bring customers out to our home in Grenoble (France), and show them some of our cutting edge research, and they talk to us about potential applications.</p> <p>Internally, we’ve got processes for IP generation and for ideation, which encourages just about anyone, from call center agents to executive, to provide inputs.</p>	<p>A lot of technologies / models are potential game changers – cloud, mobility, SOA, BPM - the buzzword list is long! But at the end of the day, in our business, work is performed by humans and agents. I personally think technology alone will not be sufficient – we need to find other biggest leverage for motivation is gamification.</p> <p>Another key technology area is automation – to understand business processes and automate as much as possible with technologies such as Robotic Process Automation.</p>	<p>We want to revolutionize the call center arena, and making machines ever more intelligent in satisfying a customers’ request is a worthwhile goal. We haven’t yet passed the “Turing test” – where, if you make a customer service call, you would not realize that you were talking to a machine. But we will be getting there someday hopefully -  and there might be times where you actually will prefer talking to a machine, in terms of the speed and accuracy of the solution. The key will be that Machines could detect when frustration is growing in the voice of the caller, and hand it over smoothly to a human.</p>	Francois Ragnet	View Edit Delete
36	<p>Tim Gilchrist is a Fellow at The Health Innovation Technology LAB (HITLAB.org), which is part of Columbia University and conducts grant work in healthcare research and technology, consults to organizations, governments, startups, and hosts the Health Innovators summit (<a href="http://www.hitlabsummit.com/">hitlabsummit.com</a>). HITLAB helps organizations ideate, create, and evaluate innovative technologies to improve healthcare around the world. Tim's involvement with the Lab and Columbia stretches back to 1999 when he first started guest lecturing on health informatics.    </p>	<p>One of the areas I am most active in is the application of machine learning to health care, specifically interpreting individual’s social media feeds and determining their health status. This sounds odd but social media provides a unique environment where people openly discuss their personal lives: how they feel, what they eat, their activities, etc. Social solves a big problem in health data in that it is immediate where most health data are not immediate and often take months to gather and process. At the same time hospitals and individual physicians are moving from fee for service to quality based programs that place emphasis on health outcomes, not how many procedures were performed. This tectonic shift in health care creates a need for information regarding the health of people around; let’s say a hospital, not just the people who come in the front door, but the ones living miles away.</p> <p>To meet this challenge I developed a system that listens to social media posts within a certain geographically defined area and deconstructs the stream of posts to predict who displays signs of having diabetes. It works by looking for word patterns in the text of the post and then matching that information to the person’s profile information. In tests involving thousands of posts, it is 74% accurate. Some of the interesting patterns that emerge is that diabetics tend to have many friends on social media – over 1,900, but they don’t tend to status very often – less than 65 times in a year. They also tend to say really funny things regarding their disease. Actual tweet:</p> <p><strong>“Lets play a game called how many times will my relatives ask about my diabetes. #byyyyeeee”</strong></p> <p>This system could be helpful to health providers who are looking to engage with at risk populations as problems emerge, not just when patients end up in the ER.</p> <p>The HITLAB is also active internationally and is part of (<a href="http://www.grameenfoundation.org/what-we-do/technology/mobile-health">MOTECH</a>), the groundbreaking mHealth initiative designed to increase the quantity and quality of pre- and post-natal care in Ghana.</p> <p>MOTECH uses mobile phone technology to improve maternal and child health knowledge and health-seeking behavior in rural Ghana. The program’s Mobile Midwife Initiative provides pregnant women and new mothers with information on pregnancy and infant care, nutrition, malaria, maternal and childhood immunizations, and family planning, as well as reminders to seek timely health care. The initiative offers these services in either SMS or voice option, in multiple regional languages. MOTECH also helps community health workers identify women and newborns in their area who need healthcare services, while enabling these health workers to cut down on paperwork and increase accuracy by giving them the ability to enter patient data via their mobile phone.</p>	<p>Given the passage of the ACA and the increasing cultural focus on wellness, we are in a very supportive environment for our services. The major hurdle that remains is data. In the United States we just don’t have a standard format for health data or a central repository to keep it in. This is unlikely to change anytime soon so we use the data we have to fill in the gaps and create as accurate a picture of someone’s health as we can. Again, machine learning plays a big role here. </p>	<p>Many of us at HITLAB have classical training in the sciences (MDs, nurses, psychologists, statisticians) so we tend to approach challenges from the scientific point of view. You won’t find anyone at the HITLAB who believes there is an unsolvable problem in health.</p>	<p>As I mentioned earlier, access to a standard set of data is one of our limitations. The market is rushing in to fill this gap as more people create and share health data through cell phones, wearables and medical devices. Not only are these data real-time, they capture aspects of health that no one has ever seen before in such quality and quantity. For example, a detailed record of an individual’s movements and physical activity, the actual locations of where that activity took place. </p>	<p>When the HITLAB takes on a grant project or health study, the team always includes people from ‘outside’ healthcare. We include musicians, artists, HR people in solving some very deep technical health issues and it never ceases to amaze me how these people from varying backgrounds contribute so effectively to our work. This practice is actually codified in HITLAB procedures.</p> <p>I’ve also seen research on what motivates people to change and develop healthy habits. Traditionally, healthcare looked at people with a disease such as type II diabetes and immediately focused on their need to lose weight, which seems logical but ignores the root cause of the disease. The root cause may be something very different, the person may be lonely or depressed. To directly attack the root cause researchers offered pet adoption to type II diabetics. This may seem unorthodox but what’s the first thing you need to do with a puppy? Chase it around and walk it. Perfect! I would expect to see great progress in the field of behavior change through similar methods as the one above. </p>	Tim Gilchrist	View Edit Delete
37	<p>Andria Long - VP of Innovation at Johnsonville Sausage - believes that effective innovation is, most centrally, about delivering on the ideas which actually solve consumer needs in a differentiated way. When it comes to innovation, her first question is: "what differentiators are consumers actually willing to pay for?"</p>	<p>We are a deeply entrepreneurial company, founded by a family of entrepreneurs and we are still family-owned today. It’s no accident that we are ranked number one in our category. Ideas are not the hard part; rather, the challenge arises from actually delivering on those ideas.</p> <p>Everything can be made better, and I do mean everything. Differentiation is critical, but we’ve found that you can skip some traditional steps in innovation: weeding through ideas and holding ideation sessions, and waiting for “perfect information” can hold up the process needlessly. We are focused on the front end – delivering on real insights of what consumers need. </p> <p>In the CPG industry, driving competitive advantage from innovation techniques is all about figuring out and meeting a consumer's unmet need in some new or different way. It is learning how to balance the risk and reward of how much you know with the amount and depth of information and research you need in order to make a decision. You're never going to have perfect information. You need to achieve that precarious balance of using good business judgment combined with enough consumer research to confidently approach the market. </p> <p>The success we’ve had with the Fully Cooked Breakfast Sausage is a great example of delivering against a trifecta of insights. We found that convenience really is key for time-pressed consumers. We also thought about how consumers actually use products. It turns out that not everyone eats 12 sausages at a time, so we used re-sealable packs. And consumers want to see their foods, so we use clear packs. In essence, we lean in on where and what we need to know versus what is nice to know. Companies that do this well will have competitive advantage over others in their industry and will have greater speed to market. </p>	<p>The fear of failure impedes innovation because it is always easier on an existing business to know what lever to pull versus leaning in on a completely new initiative. Innovation is fundamentally contrary to human nature in that it requires willingness to change, willingness to fail, and a willingness to accept the unknown. Add to those challenges the natural inclination to form attachments to one's own projects. Innovators have to be able to kill initiatives, be agile, and shift when necessary. Failure is not failure if you learn from it. But if you fail and don't know why, then that is a concern. </p> <p>Another impediment to innovation is cross-functional collaboration. Innovation needs to be a top priority cross-functionally, but cross-functional teams often have multiple projects and initiatives across different business units, so ensuring that all of the leaders across those business units are working together towards similar goals with similar priorities can be a major challenge. </p>	<p>In recent years we have seen a dramatic increase in innovation-centric roles. This is due to the recognition that companies need dedicated resources, both people and financial, and dedicated leadership to accomplish innovation. In the past, innovation was a part of someone's job, and it is really hard to manage a base business with short-term goals and also try to deliver longer-term innovation goals. Also, not every person who manages a base business is also the right person to do innovation. So it wasn't that innovation didn't exist before, but the shift is in the discovery that it is essential to have those dedicated roles for innovation. The growth in the importance of designated roles has also led to higher visibility of those roles and as such we are seeing higher involvement from the C-Suite - which helps innovation to become better integrated in the overall company structure. Now, there are dedicated resources - both people and financial - dedicated roles, dedicated cross-functional teams, and a designated executive leader.</p> <p>At Johnsonville Sausage, we have found that the fundamental requirement is giving employees the freedom to fail. We've talked about the fact that fear of failure impedes progress. With the plethora of information out there, it is easy to iterate something to death in order to decrease risk, but not only can that iterative process dilute down what was once a great idea, we've also seen that in a rapidly-changing environment, those iterative processes can impede agility and speed to market, thereby contributing to a loss of competitive advantage. We've found that our organization itself and the people within it need to be comfortable with a rapid pace of change, and a lot of change, and as innovation leaders we have to be the champions of that change. </p>	<p>The pace and rate of change in our industry is dramatic. Three of the companies I worked for in the past 10 years no longer exist. The churn rate is phenomenal. The average lifespan of an S&P 500 company used to be 61 years; now it is 16 to 18 years. Fortunately, Johnsonville is already over 70 years old, and more relevant to consumers than ever.</p> <p>I like the comment by Peter Senge, from “The Fifth Discipline,” which may help account for the success we’ve had: “The ability to learn faster than your competition may be the only sustainable competitive advantage than you can ever achieve.” CPG companies who are able to shift and respond to the rapidly changing environment, use relevant consumer insights without getting bogged down in process, and get to market quickly will succeed.  The ones that don't have a very good chance of being replaced by more agile competitors. </p>	<p>Well, as a commuter in Chicago, I can tell you that one innovation I particularly like is Passport Mobile Pay. Its revealing for me that, on top of a $3 parking fee, consumers are also willing to pay at extra 50 cents “convenience fee,” to pay their parking from their device, and not have to bother locating the parking pay station. And as a beer drinker, I like Yeti colster. I’m always on the lookout for something to keep beverages cold, and I bought a Yeti colster, and it is phenomenal. Again, it tells you something that consumers like me are willing to spend $35 to keep their drink cold – that’s amazing. I’m also a fan of what Hello Products are doing in the oral care space – breaking category molds with design and consumer-centric thinking.</p>	Andria Long	View Edit Delete
38	<p>Serving as Arla’s Head of Open Innovation, Barraza is a chemical engineer by training who is passionate about collaborations between enterprises, academia and entrepreneurs. He studied intellectual property law to arm himself with a tool that has since proved critical in his work on open innovation, both at Unilever and now at Arla.</p>	<p>Historically, an export mindset, the focus on quality and the embrace of innovation have been competitive advantages for Arla.  In general, a strong export focus in Sweden and Denmark was a big difference from co-operative movements in other countries. In Denmark, for example, one driver was exports to the UK of butter and bacon, which originated two of the biggest companies in Denmark today: Danish Crown and Arla</p> <p>I see the DNA of the company as not just being a co-op, but innovative in terms of product quality. That continues today – to be able to maintain our dominant position in markets like the UK, and bolster our ability to enter new markets in China and the Middle East and U.S. as well. Particularly in China and the Middle East, the credentials of being high quality about products really helps our exports  – stemming from the famously stringent laws we have (in Scandinavia and Europe).</p> <p>In addition to having strong dairy products, we are also manufacturers for other companies, so we also need to be competitive in technologies and efficiencies for production.</p> <p>What I do is often researching about research – how can we find new ways to interact with other types of research partners, such as academic partners and smaller companies, to unlock ecosystems of innovation. A big game changer for us has been the ability to translate the Scandinavian traditions of dairy products and foods to deepen appeal within diverse global markets. One of these products is Skyr, which is based on an old Nordic tradition: translating Skyr according to the taste of other parts of world, like the UK and Holland – that’s been a game changer. Another has been the change in formulation in some of our high protein products, which have allowed very successful recent launches in China.</p> <p>We are also moving toward more strategic partnerships with universities. Last year, we partnered with Copenhagen University and Aarhus University to launch the Arla Dairy Health and Nutrition Excellence Center. I believe dairy can unlock major global problems in terms of nutrition, and we have only begun to tap the potential applications of natural milk proteins. We actively seek out disruptive ideas from both internal and external sources; connecting with small companies and entrepreneurs. Our approach is based around ‘technology push; consumer pull” – so that potential new products must see a deep collaboration between from both scientists and marketers before launch.</p> <p>Last year, we put together the Arla Food Innovation Challenge, in partnership with the Creative Business Cup. This challenged entrepreneurial ideas in competition, and brought winners to Copenhagen – and we were able to see fantastic ideas from preexisting businesses as well as from early-stage entrepreneurs. Stimulating entrepreneurs in this way gives us a new way of thinking about our products – providing new insights from external sources. I am very passionate about working with small and medium enterprises, which is what we will be pushing going forward.</p>	<p>Innovating in the dairy products space may seem less sexy than creating the next digital app, so it is a challenge to attract top entrepreneurial talent to the industry. And yet we are doing so at Arla. Our goal – to create the future of dairy – offers the kind of ambition that interests young innovators. And our potential for positive impact on societies around the globe is immense, in terms of health and nutrition in particular. We are trying to raise the level of expectation of what we need from small companies in the food industry, and showing that we can create opportunities for innovation. We also challenge entrepreneurs directly through competitions like the Innovation Challenge.</p> <p>Another potential impediment to innovation in the industry is the traction of ideas between seniority levels. In some companies, just the fact that, say, a junior scientist comes up with an idea may mean that idea does not go forward. But while that is a barrier present in other companies, I see it as a big positive contrast for us. At Arla, everybody has a say, and the weighting is the same for good ideas, no matter where it comes from.</p> <p>I also think that having gurus on innovation does not suit our industry – it is more about what works. The ability for anyone to put forward a proposal leads to a broader source of internal ideas. On the flip side, there is a greater challenge to reach a consensus – you may think that breaking consensus would be a barrier to innovation in a conservative environment, but the way we try to address that is to harness external sources.</p> <p>I learned so much during my time at Unilever, which was one of the initial drivers worldwide of open innovation, together with Procter & Gamble. Unilever was creating new models of innovation before they appeared in textbooks. But the pace was such that there was time to experiment and develop iterations of prototypes. At Arla, open innovation is also a major feature, but the culture is a little different, partly because the speed at which things need to happen is greater. We try different things and must make almost instantaneous decisions on what works and what does not work, which, at times, may be a challenge.</p>	<p>Arla, of course, has a long history of innovation, but I think our roots in the Nordic countries really promotes this culture, and that culture itself also presents Arla with a big advantage in foreign markets.</p> <p>To be successful in the future, dairy companies will need to have strong credentials on sustainability. Consumers and customers in foreign markets know that the emphasis on sustainability in the Nordics is way ahead of other parts of the world. Already, Arla is the biggest organic milk producer in Europe, and those efforts in sustainability are being recognized abroad.</p> <p>Within the company, there is already a deeply collaborative culture, and part of my role is to try to bring Arla to working closer with SMEs and entrepreneurs, and finding new ways of approaching products and business models outside our own. We invite our large customers to come and innovate with us at the lab. We want to duplicate this more and more, and also to be involved in the incubation of start-ups.</p>	<p>I think the main driver for our business in the future will be people’s concern in living longer and healthier lives – health will be the big driver throughout the food industry. There are increasingly effective technologies being developed to measure your health and fitness, which will impact the type of products we introduce in the market.</p> <p>There will soon be constant monitoring of all of your vital signs – technology which may tell you: “this week, your calcium levels are lower and you may need x grams of cheese.” There is going to be a big connection between products with strong health credentials and the maintenance and self-reporting of heath. Arla is in the right place in terms of understanding consumption and health-monitoring technologies.</p> <p>3-D printing offers some interesting opportunities, linked to new digital challenges. One possibility which is interesting for me, for instance, is whether new technologies can bring back old traditions – such as the popular tradition in the UK, in particular, of having your dairy product and bottle of milk delivered by the milkman to your front step. These are things that might come back in the digital world, and we have some people researching in that space – but aerial drones delivery are not part of that research just yet!</p>	<p>Well, we saw a series of outstanding innovations at the Arla Food Innovation Challenge. The Challenge winner – Miss Can, from Portugal – was a great example of the importance of creative consumer-focused innovation in an industry that may not seem sexy for entrepreneurs; in this case, canned fish.</p> <p>I am also really inspired by the innovations Arla is creating in terms of producing products which are not only ‘nutrient dense’, as our scientists call it, but are also about enjoying your life. It is not just about counting calories – so butter for instance, can be enjoyed as part of the rich life experience, with the right formulation and balance.</p> <p>But top of my list might be Arla’s successful translation of Nordic products into markets and cultures from the U.S. to China.</p>	Harry Barraza	View Edit Delete
39	<p>Alex Blanter is a partner and leader of A.T. Kearney's innovation practice. Armed with over 20 years’ experience in driving high-tech business growth in Silicon Valley and beyond, Blanter is a global thought leader on new technology deployment for enterprise-scale businesses, and on novel solutions for complex problems.</p>	<p>This technological and business model transformation we are living through actually requires companies to innovate differently. The set of innovation practices companies could rely on to stay in the game – even recently – are no longer sufficient. In the past, and even the most recent past, the main philosophy was that innovation is a science – that you can go through a number of predictable steps: create new ideas; decide which ones to invest in; have an efficient development engine that gets those ideas to market; and manage your portfolio in the marketplace.</p> <p>What’s happening now is that the level of disruption is such – and the level of fluidity is such – that this is no longer enough: you now need to plug into the ecosystem of these new technologies, and monitor your broader role in the marketplace. I explain it to companies this way, especially for larger enterprises: you need to play the long game fast.</p> <p>As we know, the capabilities deployed from new technologies allow you to do amazing things. But out of those 50 amazing things you can do, we assess which of those will actually deliver the most value within your timeframe, and what you need to do within that timeframe to take maximum advantage. Some of these technologies, and corresponding opportunities, are mature enough that you actually need to jump on the bandwagon and start developing a product right away, or start implementing a feature. Some technologies (and business models) are farther out, and therefore you shouldn’t do that – but you do need to engage with the ecosystem and monitor the development of those technologies so you are in the flow, and are not left behind.</p> <p>Whether you look at IoT, or AI, or Big Data, or any one of those fundamental tech shifts – and even the business model shifts – we see that they are affecting the majority of the industries in a way those industries are not used to. Companies are either seeing real benefits or are suffering.</p> <p>Take IoT, for example. If you think about being able to source granular data in real time, process it and effect change back in the physical environment, you can think about all kinds of examples of solutions. Look at LA, where drivers lose millions of hours a year just looking for a parking space.</p> <p>If I can instrument my parking garages so that they can show the absence and presence of cars in specific parking spaces, and if I can couple it with positioning sensors in the cars so I can understand where they are going, I can actually create predictive models where I can direct drivers to the places which <em>most likely</em> have open spaces at the time of their arrival. I can even predict when a space will likely <em>become</em> available, or at least predict turnover on average stays. I’ll know that 15 cars are leaving every 5 minutes. If I install sensors in various places in this whole use case – then think of it as a use case with multiple players – parking garage; traffic controls; individual drivers. I can actually collect and connect that information to optimize the whole use case and deliver value to multiple players at the same time.</p> <p>At a strategic level, we’re helping companies figure out how technologies like IoT present a potential for disruption: in some cases, fairly minor, which can be dealt with in the normal course of business, but in other cases, the disruption will be fundamental. And the challenge is not just that they will be fundamental, the challenge is that they will sneak up on you. These start as an interesting curiosity, but before you know it, you are behind the curve.</p> <p>Industries with significant capital assets like oil & gas are not going to be displaced by the next Internet company, but they can be materially affected from a competitiveness point of view. If some competitors start instrumenting their assets and increasing their asset utilizations – e.g., predictive maintenance based on predicted wear – that will be a competitive game changer that will demand a response.</p> <p>Let me give you another example. Let’s say you have a logistics company with warehouses, which you might think is not a very cutting edge business. You will find that as simple a thing as a garage door can be the focus point for a significant opportunity. Residential garage doors in the U.S. have some level of automation at around 80%, but only about 30% of commercial doors are instrumented in any way. By 'simply' installing automation and the sensors on the garage door, you can significantly reduce energy consumption, because you’re otherwise losing all that heat or AC to the environment – and who thinks about keeping the door closed? There is nobody in charge of closing the door within 10 seconds of a truck coming in. Then you go a step beyond that – with algorithms that allow me optimize goods and truck flow through those doors, and that creates additional opportunities from the same technological solution.</p> <p>At A.T. Kearney, when it comes to innovation and disruption our differentiators are three-fold.</p> <p>First, we have a very deep understanding and knowledge of the industries in which we operate. So, for a project we did recently for an insurance company, we brought our financial services group and our high-tech group together, both to the pitch and the project.</p> <p>Also, because many of us here are engineers or technologists by training, we come into all of that with a very pragmatic lens. Its very easy to get completely absorbed into the hype: “Okay, robots and Big Data are taking over the world; AI is the next best thing since sliced bread; IoT is nirvana.“ And to present big messages and great forecasts.  But where it becomes valuable for our clients is our ability to actually translate that into what it means for their business, now and in the medium and long term, and how they need to respond to it in very pragmatic terms. Very few companies have unlimited money – therefore, while you can have the best strategy, you still need to be able to make the right choices.</p> <p>A third differentiator is that we are truly a single global partnership; there is no friction in bringing together our capabilities in the Silicon Valley and in Korea or Germany. Many of our competitors are regionally or even locally structured, so they have a more difficult time in bringing a global perspective to bear. What we can help companies in a very collaborative, open way, is to really drive to a better set of choices that will allow them to do what they need to be successful in this ever-changing landscape.</p> <p>Beyond the right choices, companies are faced with the need to incubate things that have a much longer gestation period. If you are an automotive insurance company, for instance, instrumenting all the cars in order to take all their information will change your business model, from a statistical, actuarial model to an individual use model. But you’re not going to instrument old cars en masse, only new cars, and you’ll need to achieve fleet thresholds  – so its a 5 or 7-year horizon. Look at what’s happening at Intel – the pre-eminent chip company is laying off 12,000 people, and its because they were not fast enough; not agile within the ecosystem when it came to mobile. With the new technologies, that agility will be even more important.</p> <p>I have looked at how innovation has evolved, going way back. In the Middle Ages innovation was mostly considered magic, and the winner became a tribal chief and the loser possibly was burned at the stake. In later centuries it was then driven as art, and it evolved to a more or less a science by the end of the 20<sup>th</sup> century. We are in transition right now, and it is now fundamentally culture driven – a culture that requires rapid experimentation and constant involvement in the ecosystem.</p> <p>Even the recent past, when you were innovative, your prize was your position of dominance in the market.  What you have now as a prize is simply an opportunity to innovate again; that’s all you actually get. Just science isn’t enough; you actually have to change the DNA of the company to innovate differently.</p> <p>Different industries will move at different speeds. The number of technologies that are now available for a broader set of industries and how those technologies interplay with each other is fundamentally changing the business environment.</p> <p>Before, you had communications and computing at certain speeds, and sensors at a certain cost – when you put them together, each of those things was useful, but they were not reinforcing each other. Now they are all at the level of cost/performance where you can put them together in a way that creates completely novel outcomes. They are no longer additive; they are multiplicative.</p>	<p><em>In a major presentation to executives in Silicon Valley last year, entitled “Rethinking the 'How' of enterprise innovation,” Blanter listed some key obstacles to innovation within large organizations, including:</em></p> <ul> <li><em>Stable – and somewhat frozen – business models;</em></li> <li><em>A complex regulatory environment, and resulting risk aversion;</em></li> <li><em>Culture of large organizations – with its premium on current performance and business stability;</em></li> <li><em>Legacy infrastructure – and significant costs to re--platform.</em></li> </ul> <p><em>He added: “Addressing these challenges one-by-one is a losing proposition. A change in DNA is required.”</em></p> <p>Blanter told BPI:</p> <p>“The incumbency curse is real. And old innovation methods will deliver old innovation results." Organizational inertia is a real challenge; every large enterprise is struggling with the notion of delivering value today, with adapting and adjusting to delivering value tomorrow. And the metrics are built for the very short term.</p> <p>Playing the long game fast. The majority of innovations, when they are just starting out, are not material enough to a big company to matter. Therefore, one of the biggest challenges to innovation is to figure out how to stay the course with these small but very new projects, while at the same time executing on the business plan for revenue. You simply don’t know which of the twenty small projects are going to be the next great thing.</p> <p>Look at Amazon – one reason they are so successful is that, for many years, they told a story to the street that they were not expecting to be profitable in near future. That allowed them to plough money back into the business – like echo device or cloud services. Most regular companies would never have had the foresight to do that.</p> How many companies are actually able pull off not just the story, but the execution? It comes down to DNA of the company.	<p>Culture isn’t an objective; it's a means to something bigger – growth or profitability or competitive advantage. We don’t want to destroy value – there are countless examples of new CEOs turning companies upside down just for the sake of change, and destroying value.</p> <p>But many large enterprises are clearly not evolving fast enough, with average tenure of companies in the S&P500 dropping by 80%. So we look at the culture through the lens of the journey the company has taken; where the CEO and the executive team wants to take the firm, and what things need to change, and for what purpose.</p> <p>To measure innovation the right way, you are actually introducing a level of discomfort into the organization, because that’s a mechanism to change culture. You can’t just delegate innovation to people in the corner, you actually need to change the culture – and that is probably the most difficult thing to do; certainly, more difficult than changing strategy. You want to amplify the right messages and behaviors, and to create barriers for the wrong ones. One interesting metric for innovation is revenue from new products. But what is a new product? – that’s actually not a trivial determination.</p> <p>Removing organizational barriers and silos, and all the normal problems enterprises grow up to have – difficulty in collaborating across regions; difficulties in taking risk; difficulty in connecting engineering with manufacturing; difficulty in driving revenue from new products; it is all a challenge for changing culture.</p> <p>On metrics: We worked with a semiconductor equipment company, whose main business is equipment, but they also have a significant services and spares businesses. We found that the innovation measure for their equipment business needed to be very different from their innovation measure for their services business.</p> <p>Conversations with our clients start at the business problem level – some of those are actually big enough to require culture change.  Within Kearney itself, we try very hard to practice what we preach in terms of an innovative culture. We have put in place mechanisms for collecting ideas; we have a global innovator competition, where winners get real resources to implement those ideas. We look across our client portfolio, and look at which project was most innovative, and what lessons can be learned from that.</p> <p>But we found that the infectious impetus of personal passion can also drive culture change. We do a lot of work in the digital space, but we started with a number of partners and staff who were simply passionate about innovations in that space, personally, and that had its own momentum. </p>	<p>The transition we are in is being triggered by a collection of new technologies, not a single one. But, okay, take 3-D printing.  Some people believe that this will disrupt manufacturing overall in the near term. Yes, it will materially impact how manufacturing is done, and, yes, it will allow people to make things locally, versus globally. But I don’t think it will change manufacturing in the near term; the installed base is just too great.</p> <p>That said, I would argue that the impact of 3-D printing will be much greater on design: it will allow design engineers to design parts that could not be made now, and especially in designing simpler, more reliable products with fewer parts. Its value is disruptive in nature in the short term, rather than a huge monetary impact. Cars are not going to be 3-D printed in 3 or 5 years, but the design of cars will start changing because of it.</p> <p>Big data and analytics will bring a level of insight that was never possible before, for a broad range of industries, and in ways those companies can start taking advantage of it in more explicit ways. I think the number and variety if business models companies will be able to deploy will increase significantly. Insurance is a good example – when companies start to charge on actual use, rather than on statistical models, that’s a very different business model, leading to a very different relationship with the customer.</p> <p>If I look at large industrial equipment: at the moment I make it, I sell it; you pay me to use it. What if, now, I can instrument that equipment to better manage it, so that I can guarantee things to you that I could not guarantee before?</p> <p>The Nest Thermostat started as a replacement for individual consumers to regulate their private heating and cooling. Yet it is emerging as a remarkable tool for power utilities – because it has information from individual homes, the company can go to the power utility and say: “in this part of the grid, by making very minor automatic adjustment to the temperature, we can reduce your peak load requirements, so you don’t have to bring additional power plants online, or build them.”</p> <p>Business models based on a combination of integrated technologies – that’s the game of the future. Its not jumping on the bandwagon of a single technology, partly because none will deploy fast enough, especially in the industrial space. A lot of companies underestimate this potential.</p>	<p>The whole proliferation of sharing business models, enabled by technology, is something no one saw coming at this level.  You have a set of underutilized assets – like homes or cars – and what is fundamental about this is that a set of technologies and business models increase utilization of physical assets, and that is profound. Because if you can do it with cars and homes, you can do it with anything.</p> <p>The whole notion of AI is exciting, in terms of the convergence of technologies. Look at what Kaiser is doing in Healthcare; they are at at forefront making patient records not only electronic, but minable.</p> <p>With a good enough data structure, you can start to look at prevention, not just  treatment. A patient was recently diagnosed in an emergency room by referring to data from the person’s FitBit.</p> <p>Novel ways to use technologies; that’s what is exciting for me.</p>	Alex Blanter	View Edit Delete
40	Schell is a Member of the Board of Directors of the German speaking SAP user group (DSAG), specializing in business processes and digital transformation. Beside this, he also runs the bi-yearly Globalization Symposium for international user communities.	<p>Others try to be on the political side; some try to be advisors, but what we really offer is the practice. What we can deliver on is the knowledge and experience of 3000 company members – both large and also midsized.</p> <p>We ask – are you prepared for 24/7? Are you prepared for changing from products to services? Are you really cyber-ready? I am talking a lot about IoT – we need to change in terms of its promise. How do we motivate this group of people who are doing IT business processes to adopt new business models to reflect these capabilities?</p> <p>Many leading companies are evaluating the importance of digitization, and new business models, and I see a responsibility with vendors such as SAP to inform and accompany them in their transition to a digital future. I want to ensure people are aware of what they need to think about – to get from digital to practice. We don’t know everything, but we do know there will be huge change. Companies will really be out of the game if they don’t change their business models. There are companies which do sensoric very well, but they don’t understand the business models, and there are those with good business models, but no clue about sensoric. We must bring those together.</p> <p>Business model development and innovation needs to have an iterative approach, not a sequential process. I think IoT will change asset-rich industries in a positive way – you’ll know the usage and change in your assets. You can add sensoric to 10 year-old assets and derive a longer lifecycle. The question is how you change your business model around it.</p> <p>In terms of the mix of skills sets companies will need, what we see going on in the European ecosystem, for example – universities; schools – is that there is a lot of momentum to embrace a positive attitude about change. The question is only how far to take this attack mode. It is difficult to understand what’s going on regarding China and India – they are so huge. Everyone in the west knew Amazon; not many knew Alibaba, and yet Alibaba is much bigger than Amazon ever will get.</p> <p>In Germany and Switzerland, and really Europe in general, there is nothing we can do anymore in terms of extracting materials from the ground. All we can provide is knowledge. In recent decades, our exports have been dominated by engineering; by producing the best machines. But knowledge is the future. Nevertheless, too many executives tend not to take the opportunity, and wait for others, which is a pitfall. More acting than (worrying) is the right thing to do.</p> <p>Some organizations still believe they can run with isolated strategies – with marketing/sales and production/purchasing in isolation. I firmly believe you can no longer do this alone. Companies need to have a clear glide path of where they want to go; they need clear buy-in that transformation is both top-down and bottom-up. What I think companies normally don’t do, and what they should do, is to really attack markets. Uber attacked.  Do you really believe that if Uber had entered the market in the normal, slow way, analyzing and checking everything – they would have succeeded?  They did not wait. Many other companies should also move away from a risk-awareness position to attack mode.</p> <p>They need to ask: How can I attack other areas where I am strong? Many companies believe they are world-leading, and then some company in China, or Korea, or India has already overhauled them from an income perspective.</p> <p>Executives must ask: are we ready for the shared economy? Are we truly cyber-ready? A lot of people talk about data analysis and big data, but at the end of the day its not about the big data – its about finding a pattern from the data which creates a new business model.</p> <p>Too often, this is not what companies do. We analyze to death; we prepare for a presentation, and we wait for someone to make a decision. And when the CEO makes the decision, they are not ready for that decision because they are too large. The way of working together needs to change.</p>	<p>Companies need to move away from risk aversion and towards attacking markets. Also, companies need to involve the youth and their perspectives into the discussion. There are cultural barriers. We cannot truly go into the digital world in healthcare – which I would like, certainly – if we don’t change the rules of engagement. We will never get 100% security, but we never had 100% security anyway.</p> <p>I see that some people are overloaded with what’s going on – take the most talented marketing people: they need to understand that CRM will completely change everything in that field. So it is most important that people stay open.</p> <p>Will people lose their jobs? Maybe – but there will also be new jobs, and there will be a bridge between old skills sets and the new skill sets.</p>	<p>Within our organization, the culture of innovation runs very deep – because we have been doing this for the past 30 years; we do business processes; we do transition management. This is our advantage – we are practiced at this.</p> <p>There is real excitement about how we can use assets in a different way. There is a passion about the business value being brought by digitalized business models. About smart cities and automated driving, and many others.</p> <p>Open minds are the key. Imagine you are at door of a supermarket: it will already recover your data from your smartphone, knowing your behavior and your previous buying patterns – and you will be guided. This will happen much faster than we expect – and the next generation already expects it, and does not fear these kinds of changes.</p> <p>When we order from Amazon – do we wonder about security and reliability?  No, we already know they are reliable. So trust in new technologies does not take decades, or even years.</p>	<p>Real Time. It will be a real-time world. You will get information in real time and make decisions in real time, because you have the capabilities and skills, and because consumers will expect it. You will be in front of a shop and they will know what you want.</p> <p>Business models will change – often, toward technology-enabled services. We had analytics before – just not this quickly. Now you have all this discussion about data, but what about business models? That is the next discussion.</p>	<p>What I find really cool is the potential in healthcare devices to actually do what we saw in Star Trek in the ‘70s. Remember that noise – <em>doo-da-doo</em> – when they would go over someone’s body with a handheld device to detect a defect? I think its great that that will happen. When I go to a doctor, I don’t want to answer questions about my age; what I’ve been eating and how much I have been exercising – I want them to know that already.</p> <p>As a consumer, I love to be recognized. I don’t worry about old notions of privacy, when there are such amazing benefits.</p>	Otto Schell	View Edit Delete
41	<p>Look at almost any plastic soda bottle, and you will find that it stands on five ribs that are integral to the walls. The invention of the “petaloid base” in the 1970s offers crucial insight into an innovation process that is highly relevant to business today, and to the growing movement away from functional roles and toward value creation. Because pressurized plastic expands like a balloon under pressure, bottles at the time were two-piece products that stood on a rigid cup – and efforts to create a one-piece bottle had cost tens of millions, without success.</p> <p>Gautam Mahajan—the co-inventor of the petaloid base, then head of research and engineering at Continental Can— told BPI that his team solved the problem by reframing it in this way: where does the bottle <em>want</em> to go when under pressure, and using the concept of entropy, where everyone including the bottle resists being forced into an ordered state? It had been assumed in the industry that the bottle would need an incremental innovation, and that the machines that make them would require an expensive disruptive innovation—since they would have to create far more pressure to force out those five bulges. Mahajan proved the opposite: the disruptive petaloid solution changed the entire industry, while the machines needed only affordable shock-absorbing improvements, and timing changes.</p> <p>Now a leading author and thought leader, Mahajan moves executives and academics globally to his belief that the purpose of companies is not to generate profit, but to create value—where profit and competitiveness are by-products. “We all know the purpose of attending college is education, not grades. Grades are a measure of how well you have studied,” he says. “Why then do business leaders still insist that the purpose of a business is profits? Indeed, why do we study for a Masters of Business Administration when it should be a Masters in Value Creation? Everything is process-driven at present, but we want the mind-set to be changed.”</p> <p>Mahajan’s new book, “Value Creation: The Definitive Guide for Business Leaders”, was introduced this month by the Director of the Indian Institute of Management in Bangalore, and received high praise at a recent business literary festival. Gautam is setting up Value Creation Forums around the world and catalyzing colleges to conduct research on Value Creation. He believes values create value, and that efforts beyond formal job descriptions—efforts as small as a smile— generate brand equity for both the employee and the company.</p> <p>Mahajan is now the Founding Editor of the Journal of Creating Value, which enables academic research become more responsive and relevant to business practitioners, while promoting value creation as the new “true north” compass heading for executives. This approach echoes recent findings at Harvard Business School, in which Michael W. Toffel noted that, “The lack of practical relevance of much of our research might suggest that few of us also have the ambition to improve the decisions of the managers and policymakers whose actions we study.” The business leader who Harvard quoted on the issue—Donovan Neale-May, executive director of the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council—also noted that, “There is often a disconnect between practitioners and academics, who tend to be far removed from operational complexities and market dynamics”.</p> <p>“I see myself as a generalist, as someone who has created and who thinks differently, who doesn’t get stuck with the run of the mill thinking,” says Mahajan. Previously, he was President of the Indo-American Chamber of Commerce, which is the only bilateral chamber between the US and India, and includes 14 offices between the two countries. He is also President of Inter-Link India and Customer Value Foundation and went on to become a leading consultant to top Indian companies, as well as the author of three seminal books on value. Mahajan told BPI that his consistent advice to innovators is to ban any concerns about cost when at the early, explorative end of the innovation process. Conversely, he also advises executives to free themselves from the fear of making incremental increases on the prices of their products, since customers will pay for value.</p> <p>Mahajan poses a fundamental thought challenge to companies innovating in areas like customer experience and “customer journey”—where customers are provided ever-better experiences when returning defecting products. “They forget that customers do not want that journey in the first place,” he says. “Why not rather innovate toward zero complaints, and zero product returns?”</p>	<p>Value Creation is a distinctive mind-set. It is a mentality driven by enhanced self-esteem, awareness, and pro-activeness. It goes beyond just doing your job, it is doing something extra. Value Creation is executing proactive, imaginative, or inspired actions that increase the net worth of products, services, or an entire business. This creates better gains or value for customers, stakeholders, and shareholders. Value Creation stimulates executives and business leaders to generate improved value for customers, driving success for the organization; it creates customer-conscious companies.</p> <p>Value Creation Forums have been started in the US, Europe and Asia, along with Value Creation research. Programs are underway to modify MBA teaching to become less functional and more value creation oriented. The role of an executive is not just to be a good manager, administrator, or a good efficiency expert; his or her role is to create value. Ahead of my most recent book, I realized that value is completely misunderstood. Everyone has a meaning for it—some think value means price, benefits, or importance— you can think of it in any way. In business jargon, value is creating financial benefits, and for people around you, which will eventually create greater financial benefit for you. You cannot set out and say you’re going to create value for yourself; you have to create value for others, such that they recognize you are a person of greater value.</p> <p>You hear words like CRM, customer satisfaction, customer experience, customer journey, customer this and that, yet all are only one part of what the customer is looking for. When you start investing heavily in things like customer experience and customer journey, you are essentially saying that they are very important—and they are—but you forget the context of their importance.</p> <p>Once I have bought a cellphone, what is the experience I really want? I want it to work; I don’t want to waste a lot of time on maintenance. The moment I have to go back to the company—and that’s the experience companies are investing on improving but not the experience I as a customer want in the first place—I am making an extra journey. I just want to be left alone. Companies tend to glorify a journey that customers don’t want in the first place instead of making sure I do not have a problem. The real thing they should be working on is how to prevent that journey. Companies should be innovating toward zero complaints, toward zero defects.</p> <p>It is easier to give examples of value destruction because they are so obvious. Value creation in a very simplistic sense is everything that goes beyond your job. You could be an accountant who does efficient work, you can’t fault his numbers, but the guy comes up to you and says, you know the tax laws are going to change and maybe we should do something with our investments and our accounting practice so we get an advantage. He’s done something extra. Everyone whose career progresses is creating value, but often he does not know that because he is doing it unconsciously. If you were conscious about it, you might create a little more value, and might destroy a little less.</p> <p>Stephen Vargo is on the board of our journal, and he coined the phrase, ‘service-dominant logic’. Before that, there were other concepts, but he said no, it is not about products. Everyone is serving everyone and the product is just part of the service. This year, there might be thousands of papers written on service dominant logic, talking about value co-creation, but few people seem to know what value co-creation is. Many see it as some kind of a vague thing that is nice to think about.</p> <p>We first started a journal that addresses both academics and practitioners: that’s a difficult mix because academics like to write in journals, and practitioners generally don’t like to write. They like to read. What we want is for academics to write in the way that business people can really understand, that is relevant. Then we encourage the practitioners to use this. On the other hand, we want practitioners to write about things that make academics pay notice. So if I write about zero complaints, they may wish to do research and find the best way to get to zero complaints. The second thing we have done is start Value Creation Forums around the world, and we have leaders in their fields come together and discuss value creation.</p> <p>We set up one in the Benelux with academics and practitioners, and many universities in the Netherlands came together and discussed three things: one, how can you create value for the student in the present courses. The second was to look at courses like HR and IT and see if you can just add one lecture on value creation for those courses. The third was to have a general management elective which is based on value creation. If you look at HR, it is probably one of the most important functions in the company since people--employees, partners and customers— are really important. The question I always ask is, ‘Why don’t HR guys become CEOs? Why are they called a staff function?’ That is because they do their functional work; they really do not do their value creation work. Once they start to do it, they begin to create immense value for the company.</p> <p>We have asked a college in India to look at values and value—what you stand for, such as ethics, morals, and integrity). The idea is that if you are a college that talks about values, do your students who become teachers do better than teachers for whom values were never inculcated? There is a professor at Wharton that does customer lifetime value; we want to work together so that he can correlate customer value-added with customer lifetime value. </p>	<p>Let’s look at small things that prevent people from being innovators. One is self-esteem. If you do not believe in yourself, you cannot create value. Two, you really have to become aware; if you don’t notice things around you, it becomes difficult to innovate. Most people who truly create value do not need a financial incentive to innovate; they are natural innovators because they have awareness and believe in themselves. Fear of failure comes in when you are concerned only about keeping your job.</p> <p>Another thing I find really slows down innovation is bringing the financial thought process onto the innovation table. You sit at the table, and someone comes up with an idea, and the guy next to him says, ‘That can never work because it is going to be too expensive.’ You then discard it because you have forgotten that things become cheaper and cheaper. So, my advice to innovators is to forget the cost part of it and say, ‘What is the best way of doing this?’ Then ask how to make it practical from a cost point of view. Too many good ideas just go away because some joker says it will hurt cash flow or will be too expensive.</p> <p>I am not sure that disruptive innovation is the only way to go. A few years ago, I went with students in an innovation course and suggested they work with the long distance taxi service to prevent one way hiring, and ensure the taxi guy got a return ride. It would save costs for the passenger and increase profits for the taxi person. This was like a pre-Uber move, but no one looked at it. Would this be called disruptive or an add on? Today, Uber would call it disruptive.</p> <p>With the development of the petaloid bottle base, we had machines that were taking a pounding, because the pressures required to blow the petaloid bottle were much higher than the simpler bottle. The design group came up with a way that would cost $75,000 per machine—in the late 70’s—and we had about 45 machines. They were redoing the machine. That’s disruptive. I said that is the wrong approach. We ended up doing everything at a cost of only about $8,000. We studied the machine and asked, ‘What is the machine actually doing?’ Why not just reduce the shock impact on the machines with cheap shock absorbers, and proper timing and then they will stop braking?</p>	<p>I suppose we could have called value creation, value innovation. To me, creation is a little more basic, more intrinsic. Innovation is something that takes something and goes to the next step. The goal is to take something that exists and try modify it a little. If the core of an MBA course should completely change, from one of teaching people to be good managers or efficient administrators, to becoming value creators that could be disruptive.</p> <p>Because many of the functional courses would start to disappear, and people would really start to learn how to create real value in HRD—instead of measuring whether the guy comes to work on time, or try to measure his performance— you are really doing something that increases the value to customers and society. Many functions could get outsourced into administration departments, and true HR Value Creation would remain in HR. If your brand equity increases, the brand equity of the company increases. People notice when value is created. In the Netherlands, we are currently doing a program with Microsoft with finance managers. Oracle is going to do something in this area on the West coast in the US.</p>	<p>I think it is about mind-set. One is business schools moving toward value creation, and away from doing functional teaching. Instead of a masters of business administration, you have a masters of value creation, or value management. A second thing is that companies start to drive their businesses from the point of view of long term value creation. One example was the CEO of Unilever, Paul Polman, who was able to convince his board that they should look at long term results—one to five years—rather than quarterly. What they got was a higher rate of growth overall, and fewer perturbations in share prices.</p> <p>One of the things I fear is the impact of automation. Too many of the younger generation are so smart at using tools that they forget the fundamentals. Data analytics is a great tool as long as you understand what lies behind. It is great if you analyze and measure the customer journey to a fine science, except you might miss the fact that customers might not want that journey, and you are actually making the journey more important. The focus goes away from zero complaints. Everything is process driven; we want the mind-set to be changed. We emphasize the better mind-set through our value creation councils.</p> <p>In India, the Tata companies are moving from business excellence to value creation thought processes. Unilever is doing good thinking. When they decided not to buy palm oil from a group of growers in Malaysia and Thailand because of the ecological impact, the fear was that prices would go up and customers would not buy. However, customers continued to buy because they favored sustainability. We found at Tata Power that values create value. </p>	<p>This morning, I got a call from a wrong number, and I then received six calls from the same number. I thought: how do I block this guy? I would pay for an app that allowed me to do that! All jokes aside, the real disruptive thing will be when we start to build things the way the human body is built. Today, the structures we build are external, and our body is internal.</p> <p>There is complex innovation and complicated innovation. With complex, we are talking about moving targets. In a complicated one, we know it is only a matter of putting all the known pieces together, like a jigsaw puzzle. A complicated problem might be building a big building, but all the steps are known. On the other hand, if you are trying to make a building that is a living building—perhaps a self-healing building—that is complex. Again, if you look at great innovations, you’ll tend to find a value creation mindset behind them.</p>	Gautam Mahajan	View Edit Delete
42	<p>Sebastian Herzog constantly moves between corporate culture and startup spirit. Herzog has more than 10 years of work experience within Lufthansa, including being the former executive assistant to the CEO of Lufthansa Group, while also founding his own fashion ecommerce startup OfficePunk.</p> <p>In 2014, Herzog finally bridged both worlds by becoming a true corporate entrepreneur, initiating and founding the Lufthansa Innovation Hub jointly with internal and external top talents as a separate legal entity. Asked about the focus fields of the Lufthansa Innovation Hub, Herzog explains that he is not a believer in focusing on specific trends or technologies. “If you really want to change things, you have to focus on a specific customer,” he says. “Innovation starts with empathy and only with understanding the needs of a customer, one will be able to derive real improvements and innovations. In that sense, our only focus is the traveler and his or her needs. In an exaggerated way, I would say, 'customer interest beats company interest.'”</p> <p>One very concrete example is the pain of travelers having to check-in for their flights manually. Instead of supporting the Lufthansa core business with state of the art self-check in solutions, the Lufthansa Innovation Hub built www.airlinecheckins.com-- an industry-wide solution that allows travelers to be checked automatically for more than 100 airlines based on their preferences. Herzog says, “While it might sound contra-intuitive in the beginning, we are now learning a lot about the traveler behavior when they use other airlines than Lufthansa. And of course, this knowledge helps Lufthansa as well.”</p> <p>Herzog is also advising and consulting other corporates on the topics of digital transformation and corporate entrepreneurship. He adds, “Regardless of the industry I am working for, they all struggle on how to cope with the incredible speed and rate of change out there. That is why corporations such as Lufthansa can fully exploit the full potential of an Innovation Hub by setting it up as a second operating system of the corporate that runs with a different speed, based on different talents and framed with a different set of budgeting rules. If you then develop the right links to the mothership – Innovation Hubs can become a major driver of commercial and strategic impact.”</p>	<p>Three main differentiating factors between the Lufthansa Innovation Hub and other corporate innovation activities are:</p> <p>1. Talent: Instead of “just relocating” existing line-managers to a fancy tech-location – we managed the challenge to get significant amount of entrepreneurial talent on board. Currently 80% of the Lufthansa Innovation Hub consists of people that have not worked for Lufthansa before.</p> <p>2. Tool set: Instead of being a pure incubator, accelerator, technology lab, or corporate VC, we are deeply linked with the Lufthansa Corporate Strategy and pursue whatever innovation setup that is suited to a specific challenge.</p> <p>3. Test-driven culture: Instead of writing five-year plans on whiteboards, we try to get instant market feedback, regardless if we are building prototypes and products or developing broader strategies.</p> <p>This unique combination really allows us to support and drive the digital transformation within Lufthansa by supporting the existing business with startup partnerships and new products, (“better business”) as well as pursuing topics out of current business boundaries (“new business”).</p>	<p>There are three levels one has to consider:</p> <p>First – The Innovation Team. In general, you often see innovation teams pursuing something they are passionate about but that customers do not really care about, or teams unwilling to kill off ideas that aren’t working. Within the Lufthansa Innovation Hub we try to rapidly kill our projects if they do not meet our initial hypotheses.</p> <p>Second – The Industry. You always have to consider the industry you are working in. The aviation industry for example highly relies on safety—we build systems to be backed up by systems to be backed up by systems. You don’t want us to do fail-fast. Fail early, when it comes to building or running aircraft or engines. Even within development, safety is drilled down with the manufacturers and airlines at a level only otherwise seen in nuclear energy. This is understandable, but it has implications for innovation potential. </p> <p>Third – The Corporate. Corporates in general have a lot of things to lose – for them it is so hard to innovate. Start-ups can fail fast, because you have no customers to lose, no brand to lose, no package to lose. At big corporates, you have everything to lose, and that keeps you from pushing the boundaries. That is where corporates have to find their own platforms where they can be explorative, and that is where we come in.</p>	<p>The history of the Lufthansa Innovation Hub is quite a unique one. In May 2014, a small group of internal Lufthansa colleagues convinced the Lufthansa Board about the relevance of travel tech startups as driver of innovation in our industry. That time, we were looking for the commitment to acknowledge those startups as a very relevant stakeholder for Lufthansa. Based on these very early and initial findings, I personally had the chance to set up a team of three internal and three external colleagues to move to Berlin for three months and try to figure out what is needed and what is suitable for Lufthansa.</p> <p>The six of us spent the time in a shared apartment in Berlin: meeting various startups, corporate entrepreneurs, building the first prototypes, and finally convincing Lufthansa to move this initiative to its next level with founding the Lufthansa Innovation Hub as a separate legal entity in January 2015. While we were equipped with an initial budget for one year, Lufthansa just recently increased their commitment with a three and a half-year funding and more resources focusing on commercial and strategic impact. To summarize, these intense 30 months since the days within the joint apartment one can say that the Lufthansa Innovation Hub moved from an internal experiment towards a fully integrated part of the digital transformation of Lufthansa. </p>	<p>Speaking of technologies, we live in a world with some very interesting technologies all with the ability to change major parts of our daily lives. For example, there is voice recognition, artificial intelligence, virtual and augmented reality, blockchain. One could name every fancy buzzword here, but the question I am really asking is, what´s the impact on business models and customer interaction?</p> <p>Take travel booking as an example. As the consumer, you are confronted with numerous choices from airline websites, meta-searches and online travel agencies. Whether you are on a leisure or business trip, you could spend endless hours comparing offers and trying to find the best deal. Even if you found what you are looking for, it is not convenient to book. You are forced to type in passport credentials and personal data over and over again. This high degree of inconvenience is a perfect open door when it comes to disruption.</p> <p>We see a change in the interface: travelers are very eager to use their existing communication channels such Email, Whatsapp, or Facebook, and rather deal with one travel-focused concierge service than with a broad set of various travel providers, each with his own communication. That observation and anticipation of customer behavior then led to the launch of www.hellomissioncontrol.com – a travel concierge built by the Lufthansa Innovation Hub.</p> <p>Talking about the future, will we still have airline booking websites around in five years? I don’t know. I literally cannot imagine people who still enter an airline website domain and manually type in where they want to go. I just don’t see it because there are so many trends towards much more convenient frontends with massive data-driven backend that actually can perform the task you want them to do.</p>	<p>I am impressed by innovation strategies that are able to adapt according to what is happening out there. Just as if you would be building a prototype: you build, you learn, you measure, you build again. Considering the uncertainty and speed we are living in, I am convinced that five year plans are not worth the paper they are written on. Strategy has to be as agile as product development.</p>	Sebastian Herzog	View Edit Delete
43	<p>Prith Banerjee is Group CTO of Schneider Electric, a global leader in energy management and automation, with operations in more than 100 countries. With an EcoStruxure platform that defines its “Innovation at Every Level” business philosophy, Schneider leverages the most advanced data technologies—and an open, standards-based innovation strategy—for next-generation solutions and efficiencies. Its commitment to innovation is illustrated in an R&D budget of 5 percent of revenue and a dedicated architecture for incremental, new-market, and disruptive innovation, defined as Horizon 1 (core or short-term), Horizon 2 (adjacent or medium-term), and Horizon 3 (disruptive or long-term). Historically, its disruptive initiatives include pioneering aspects of IoT itself in 1996, and with recent technologies like arc-fault detection and its new IoT-enabled M580 automation controller. Today, its connected circuit breakers, protection relays and variable speed drives are already reducing machine downtime for customers with remote reporting of actionable data, while pilot projects are underway to slash downtime even further, with asset performance management IoT systems predicting faults before they happen.</p> <p>Meanwhile, Schneider is now looking at business model transformations, in which guarantees of production outcomes can be sold as services. Seeing access to energy as a basic human right, the company’s “Life is On” vision is to ensure that energy is available to everyone in a safe, reliable, and sustainable manner. Anticipating global megatrends like rapid urbanization and digitization as the defining parameters for this vision, Schneider recruited Banerjee as Group CTO specifically to drive digital innovation and the transformation to IoT. Banerjee was previously MD for Global Technology R&D at Accenture, after serving as CTO for ABB and Senior VP for Research and Director of HP Labs at Hewlett Packard. In driving innovation and technology differentiation for these leading companies, he also leveraged significant academic experience. Banerjee has served as Dean of the College of Engineering at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and the Walter Murphy Professor and Chairman of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Northwestern University. He is also the author of 350 research papers.</p> <p>In an interview with BPI, Banerjee says that despite the massive strides already made with IoT-enabled solutions, the truly game-changing innovations will come from next-generation analytics on big data. And he says those leaps in efficiency are not only required for competitive advantage, but also for the macro challenges of demand and sustainability facing the industry. Banerjee also mentions a 300 percent increase in efficiency is required to deal with a 50 percent increase in global energy consumption in 40 years without significantly increasing carbon emissions. Fortunately, the company’s portfolio of innovative products has vast consumption efficiency gaps to eat into, including 50 percent energy inefficiencies in asset-intensive industries and a stunning rate of 80 percent inefficiencies in the world’s buildings.</p> <p>Banerjee says the bringing together of smart energy management, automation, and software could not only achieve the required efficiencies, but also lead to exciting new business models.</p>	<p>We deliver to our customers low and medium voltage products and automation systems that are all integrated in several end markets: buildings, data centers, asset intensive industries, and utilities. We have a host of innovations throughout those areas, and we invest 1.3 billion euros on R&D. It is about faster, cheaper, better, so why do we need that deep level of innovation?</p> <p>Over the next 10 years, the energy consumption in the world will increase by about 40 percent, and electricity consumption will increase 80 percent thanks to things like urbanization, industrialization, and digitalization; you must be three times more efficient to keep carbon emissions near neutral. We found that in the domain of buildings, only 18 percent are energy efficient, so there is an opportunity for 82 percent of untapped energy efficiency in buildings. Data centers are 30 percent energy efficient. Asset intensive industries such as oil and gas, mining, and metals are about 50 percent efficient. The grand problem we are trying to solve is making sure your energy efficiency is running close to 100 percent.</p> <p>I work with the five business CTOs to harness the innovations springing from that $1.3 billion investment. Connectivity is a major part of the solution. We are on the IoT journey, and our innovation chain is tied to IoT and digital transformation. Connectivity is about bringing value to our customers, and it can be cost reduction, efficiencies, performance, or all of the above. It also promotes safety, and safety has always been a core value in our customer proposition.</p> <p>We look at innovation in the portfolio approach. A large percentage of investment—about 70 percent—is on Horizon 1: short term innovations on our core products. With Horizon 2, we have products like Masterpact MTZ, which has an IoT and power monitoring capability. This is Horizon 2 or adjacent and medium-term innovations: bringing new technologies to the same product. H-2 also includes bringing the same product to a new geography, meaning bringing these circuit breakers to China or India with modifications. H-2 is about 20 percent of our innovation investment. Horizon 3 is truly disruptive and long-term innovations, and represents a lot of the stuff we are driving today, and is about 10 percent of our R&D spend. Some of them are seemingly crazy, but with huge potential to completely disrupt our industry.</p> <p>I am responsible for all innovation, not just the digital parts. We are on the journey of IoT and digital transformation, and almost all our products—from automation systems to circuit breakers—are integrated with digital technologies. We are absolutely the market leader.</p> <p>Our new products are taking the industry by storm, and I am completely proud.</p>	<p>We are moving toward IT/OT convergence, so all of a sudden engineers who had been very focused on the physics of arc breaking and switching in circuit breakers find themselves in the world of cyber security and cyber trends, of analytics, and machine learning. How do you bridge the gap from the old physics-based engineering to new world technologies or social media, machine learning and data analytics? That’s a challenge, and it needs a multi-disciplinary approach. Finding people who have knowledge in all areas is tough. Obviously, you do not need individuals fluent in all areas, but you do need individuals who can collaborate in large teams to solve customers’ problems effectively. The competency of people in our area is in the IT/OT convergence. We are an operational technology company, so we take care of the actual operations of the company—whether it is operating wells for Shell or what have you, whereas the IT companies like Oracle or SAP or Microsoft do the company back office.</p> <p>Siloes also present a problem, because in many organizations, each line of business is so focused on their own vertical that they don’t think about the broader ecosystem. Companies that don’t invest enough in innovation have an even greater challenge. If I had only the industry average of 2 percent of sales for R&D, I would not be able to compete with the Schneinders of this world!</p> <p>Also, with a risk-intolerant culture, you get only incremental innovation. The only way to get disruptive innovation is to create a culture of risk tolerance, where it is okay to try crazy things. We have a culture where it is okay to fail, and even encouraged to celebrate early failures—but only early failures, not just putting hundreds of millions of dollars into a stubborn mule project. We try to spend on lots of wacky things, knowing that most will fail, and when they do I give the team a pat on the back and say thanks for trying that, and what have we learned? Knowing something does not work also adds to our knowledge. Organizations who do not tolerate failure become very incremental.</p> <p>For IoT, there are three main challenges: cyber security; inter-operability, or standardization; and legacy systems. There are systems you build on that could be 30 years old (brownfield systems) or one day old (greenfield systems). I think data security is a very big problem. The perimeter for attack is increasing daily with the 50 billion connected devices in the world of IOT. Cyber terrorists can create more havoc with cyber attacks than with bombs. We are giving a lot of attention to cyber security.</p>	<p>One of the things we pride ourselves on is the concept of open innovation, and that is something I have been practicing and preaching for years. Open innovation is a very big part of what we do, and we try build solutions for our customers with partners. Before we open an R&D project, we always ask if there is any start-up in the world that is doing something related to what we are trying to do? If there is, lets investigate and possibly collaborate with or bring that start-up into our fold. We can innovate much faster with this approach. It took three years and 10 million dollars to bring a solution to customers before; now we can spend, say, one extra million and bring it to market in six months. That’s the value of open innovation.</p> <p>We have partnerships with the top 50 companies in Silicon Valley and relationships with top venture capital firms, and we ask all of them: “what are the top start-ups you are working with in the IoT space? In the sensor space? In the cyber space or in the drive space?” We ask them for their technology strategy—what is it they are trying to do? From this, we typically identify three or four start-ups, and we try to identify the technology that best matches with our system. Conferences are also helpful. A week ago, I gave a keynote in Barcelona at the IoT world congress. We tell the world, “this is where we are headed,” and then 15 start-up founders came to me and talked about possible synergies.</p>	<p>As Group CTO, I am driving IoT, and there are four pillars that are part of my organization. One is working with the five divisional CTOs on driving about 1.3 billion euros in R&D spend. The second is programs like open innovation. The third pillar is our corporate research center, where we look at Horizon-3—disruptive innovation. The fourth pillar is IoT. I was recruited at Schneider fundamentally to drive our IoT development, along three levels. One is connected products, which is fundamental, but not where the real value is.The next level is edge control, where in our application, our customers do not expect these IoT products to be connected and controlled from the cloud. We want to have local control. The third level is apps, analytics, and services, which we are building on top of the cloud.</p> <p>The first value is in services. In the past, if a transformer failed, you as the customer would have to alert Schneider and ask if we can fix it. Today, we will tell you your transformer has failed, and ask if you would like me to fix it. Remote services are the low hanging fruit we are going after. But the next level is having the transformer give signals before it fails so we can inform the customer that the transformer will fail Thursday, and replace it Wednesday. Now there is no downtime. It is called asset performance management with predictive analytics, and we are doing it with a whole range of products. The cost of 15 minutes of downtime for an Amazon data center can be a hundred million, so the value is enormous. The third value is outcome-based services—if you can guarantee the outcome. If you’re making widgets in your factory, we can guarantee you will make 20,000 widgets per minute, no matter what. So rather than selling the 1,000-dollar transformer, we can sell the guarantee of 20,000 widgets per minute. You lease our products which we install for free, and you pay for the service of productivity. We are currently running pilots on this model. The IoT area will journey from products to connected products to services to guaranteed outcomes. We are increasingly moving toward a world where people will not own products, and instead will get services on demand where and when they need it.</p> <p>IoT also offers enormous benefits for continuous customer engagements. In the past, when we sold you a circuit breaker or panel that lasts seven years, the next time we would talk would be in seven years. With IoT, you have a 24/7 connection with the customer. We know exactly what is going on. Continuous engagement with customers is an amazing new opportunity for marketers, and the best thing you can do for your CMO. IoT is just the plumbing. The technology that will be truly disruptive will be the analytics on that big data you are collecting. How to use data is the most important question we discuss every day. Initially, you are collecting small data, but with data coming in 24/7 from 50 billion connected devices. How do you do artificial intelligence and machine learning on all that data? This is going to be the most exciting thing. Connectivity is the easier part; analytics on the big data is going to be the game changer.</p>	<p>I am very excited with some of the latest innovations in areas such as augmented reality/virtual reality, cognitive computing and machine learning, 3D printing, robotics and drone technology.</p>	Prith Banerjee	View Edit Delete
44	<p>As CEO of Modria—the pioneering Online Dispute Resolution (ODR) platform—Scott Carr provides businesses and government agencies globally with a transformational tool for fast and fair resolutions, customer service efficiency, and even brand loyalty. The model provides a unique pathway to justice and institutional trust for global consumers, and is rapidly growing beyond transactional disputes. After 15 years of development and technological enablement, ODR itself has surged beyond its initial brief of legal cost savings and eCommerce complaint solutions to become a game-changing catalyst for brand building, civil justice access, and marketing intelligence. Carr says that between one and three percent of all transactions go wrong each year, and that clogged Small Claims courts are unable to cope with either the volume or the cross-border jurisdictional nature of online disputes, while consumers have neither the time nor the resources to pursue them through traditional channels.</p>	<p>We have created an online platform for online dispute resolution (ODR) that can resolve disputes of all kinds from eCommerce to relational disputes, and we are available to companies, government agencies, and ADR organizations, to deliver fast and fair resolutions across these categories. We have done a couple of things that I think are unique. One is that we built a configurable platform that has all the modules of dispute resolution that can be snapped together in different ways to solve particular needs. No one else has built a platform like this. We think of online dispute resolution as a business process or a civil justice process, and it is kind of like how salesforce.com created the CRM category—we have not seen anyone else do that for DR; it is like this underserved business process. Secondly, we built a team with a unique composition of experts, mediators, arbitrators, and technologists. Some are experts in building technologies in start-up environments, some have done international Mediation and Arbitration work, and some are just experts in ODR. No one else has assembled a combination of talents like this. We design the resolution journey, and in that way, we bring people together.</p> <p>The platform is a click away on websites where you are transacting your business: an online marketplace, or a merchant’s website, and in some jurisdictions on an ombudsman site. We are increasingly working with ombuds organizations, especially in European jurisdictions. Europe has started to pass laws that require online businesses to provide online dispute resolution. In addition, we have innovated a SaaS-based business model focused on the value of making our customers’ customers happy. We deliver our platform as a service subscription, and the price depends on the number of disputes the customer runs through the platform. The more disputes you have, and the less you pay per dispute. We deliver value by making it more efficient for you to resolve a dispute—including resolving it through automate software—and making your customer happier.</p> <p>ODR is changing the traditional customer service role: Modria is reducing the number of customer contacts in the call center for a problem transaction, and freeing the agents up to do more account management, up-selling and outreach into the customer base. In customer service, for a typical US company, if I pick the phone up and call, and they answer my call and try get me a basic outcome, it is going to cost the company about 12 dollars for labor, technology, telecommunications, and overhead. That is before they pay me any compensation. Our system brings that cost down from 12 dollars to four dollars and eighty cents. We do that through the reduced contacts because we are resolving issues in software; for marketplaces, we resolve issues between buyers and sellers without CS having to get in the middle. We typically serve the space that you might classically think of as Small Claims. Our disputes usually involve 25,000 dollars or less, but resolutions are tailored and often involve solutions beyond dollars that might satisfy the customer. With an eCommerce site, the value is often 25 dollars to 150 dollars, but we also, for example, resolve insurance disputes. We have a large caseload in the state of New York, and with New York No Fault insurance those claims are higher because they are related to medical bills, but they are still not millions of dollars.</p> <p>We have spent a lot of time innovating the user experience, and trying to package up what we call resolution flows. What we see is that there are patterns of commerce and the disputes that arise from them. A typical problem we see from customers is that they didn’t get their item. Or they did get their item, but it was not the way it was described on the website. We innovate by pre-building the resolution process, so we give our customers a jump-start when it comes to deploying online dispute resolution. They do not have to start from a blank piece of paper. We synthesize decades of experience in this. We are working with major airline companies on delayed flight compensation, and so far it is working well. If your flight was six hours late, and you missed a meeting, how do you build that resolution flow and make it available to multiple jurisdictions?</p> <p>Most disputes are resolved in the diagnosis and negotiation phases, and then there is also a neutral party in the mediation module. Beyond that, there is the arbitration pathway that also sees resolution in a short time, relative to the courts. We are now in a regulated process; decisions are typically given by retired judges who are arbitrators. All their decisions are published online, and are searchable. In a lot of ways, it looks like an online court, and is legally binding—a process the injured party opts into.</p>	<p>I think there are two things that hold back innovation. One is that people look at disputes as just customer service—to answer the phone and quickly dispatch an answer—as opposed to realizing that when a transaction goes wrong, companies or government agencies need to provide a resolution process that’s not just giving them a return. We have a bit of resistance, and you need a change in people’s thinking to realize that what customers want are resolutions, not talking to customer service agents. When our customers shift our thinking in that simple way, we can suddenly use technology to deliver resolutions with benefits for both parties.</p> <p>Also, customer service is usually seen as a cost center. When we try to bring innovation here, customer service teams see how this can transform the customer journey, and they can see how the economics are aligned. Our service often reduces the number of contacts into the customer service center, because people just work it out, or our software provides a resolution for the customer without a customer agent having to interact. Part of the enterprise challenge is to get companies to realize this is a sales and marketing benefit. This goes directly to your brand, to your customer retention, and it goes to Net Promoter Score (NPS) or customer referral. You must think broadly, and that can be a challenge to adoption.</p>	<p>We always have a bit of R&D running, even though we are a young company. Innovation is encouraged within a framework we call “Listen, Learn and Innovate.” We drive innovation based on what our customers are telling us, and we use that to enhance the technology and the product. We aggregate data across the disputes platforms, in an anonymized fashion, for the benefit of all customers to improve the platform. What I have learned at Modria is that every time I turn to anther industry, I discover a category of disputes that have probably impacted my own life in the past, and that I wish I had had a mechanism to resolve.</p>	<p>Technology innovations you will see from us is the use of machine learning and AI to learn from our customer dispute volumes, and to tune policies to auto-resolve issues when we can. Based on the pattern and behavior our customer’s customer has shown via the platform, if we know what the answer is going to be, then why are we sending them to a customer service agent? Let’s say we are serving an online marketplace: when a customer clicks “I have a problem,” we ask them some questions. We take them through this diagnosis process. If in answering these questions, we realize 99 percent of the time the answer is going to be X, we can offer that solution right then and there. It might be as simple as telling them: “A replacement is on the way; it’ll be there overnight.”</p>	<p>I think this use of data and AI is changing our lives in ways we don’t even expect. I watch my granddaughter interact with technology, and people talking to their phones, and I watch Uber self-driving cars in San Francisco. The most interesting innovation to me is the way that software is going to become intelligent, and essentially become our companion as we travel through life. And it is sneaking up on us from a social perspective in ways people are not anticipating.</p>	Scott Carr	View Edit Delete
45	<p>Ayad sees a trend in the retail landscape where the front end registers disappear, and where check-out lines are eliminated through predictive data analytics, sensors, and artificial intelligence – and, eventually, where self-driving shopping carts meet you at the entrance of the store with your shopping list already uploaded into the cart screen, and even direct you to the items you need. </p>	<p>I really don't know whether we are changing the game or the game is changing us. Success in business, today, is all about the optimal intersection of the physical and digitals worlds, and the interaction between humans and intelligent machines.</p> <p>If you really think about the retail industry, so many innovations have compelled companies to start to think different, to act different, and to plan for potentially different outcomes. Within workforce management, for example, the industry is going through tremendous shifts due to the expansion in internet selling coupled with rapidly changing demographics and regulations. Thus, brick and mortar stores are under a different type of pressure. And it is said that necessity is the mother of all inventions, so many organizations find the dynamics of the environment and the accelerated speed by which innovation is happening a threat and an opportunity leading to new strategies and innovations.</p> <p>I’m of the opinion that societies change slowly, and despite so many years in e-commerce rapid growth, e-commerce is still a fraction of the total retail and service industries. So, it is going to continue to be a combination of digital and physical for the retail industry. Many organizations are utilizing data - predictive modeling, advanced algorithms - to better forecast work in the stores. And once work is forecasted and measured, then it becomes easier to schedule people to be at the right places and times - either when the truck is coming to the store to deliver products, or when customers are coming to the stores to receive a service.</p> <p>You need optimizing software to help deliver efficiency. But no one platform is going to be the only and the ultimate solution. I think what's so clear, at least in my mind, is that the future is a blend of the digital and physical capabilities.</p> <p>Based on my academic and my industry knowledge, I can tell you that customers want to shop anytime and anywhere. Leading retailers, including Bed-Bath, want to serve customers wherever, whenever, and however they wish to be served.  Leading retailers want to be there for customers when they want to shop, the way they want to shop, and the way they want to complete the transaction, whether it is “ship it to my home” or “let me pick it from the store”, or a combination of both.</p> <p>What's exciting about the current technology is how friendly it is to everyone involved. For example, 10 years ago you had to go to the store to see your schedule as an employee. And the manager of the store ultimately decided who worked when. There was little freedom or flexibility. Today, technology allows you to see your schedule on your phone, and even to opt for available shifts. Employees can swap shifts with their coworkers if they need to, without disrupting operations. This is a significant win-win change.</p> <p>The technology is not only allowing organizations to respond better to customer needs, but also to employee's needs and situations. It's becoming more participatory versus top-down. And it is proven in research and in practice that happy employees create an environment of happiness for the customers. Efficient workforce management is beneficial to customers, and to the business. That's why companies invest in them.</p> <p>In terms of benefiting from customer insights, today, you can measure and map customers’ movement in the stores from the entry point to the exit point through sensors. Based on data, you would know exactly, or on average, know how long the customers will be shopping in your store. Eventually, you would know when they're going to get to the register. Ultimately, you will be able to know the number of employees that need to be at the front end to help the customers exit the building and pay for the merchandise. So, it is not just long-term predictive modeling, but on-time, live, as you go, so that there will be totally no long lines up front for customers who choose to interact with an employee, and managers would be able to respond faster to customers’ needs. </p>	<p>I’m very familiar with two industries: the retail industry and the academic industry. Luckily, both industries have adopted and encouraged innovation, perhaps because of the competitive nature of the retail industry, and the critical thinking nature of academia.</p> <p>Fear of failure and siloes are often common challenges.  Financial obstacles and opportunities are both drivers and blockers of embracing innovation. You might go after an innovation because it's financially rewarding, but then you may not embrace it fully because it's financially burdening on the short term.<br /><br />Some are short-sighted; they might think about the quarterly results, and not necessarily look at the long term. The other fascinating aspect is the speed of innovations. Some companies are hesitant to embrace innovation because today's innovative solutions may become obsolete quickly, which add burdens on the organization; especially from a change management perspective.  However, perhaps the biggest impediment lies is the culture of the organization; organizational culture is the make or break for innovation. </p>	<p>The retail industry was among the first industries to benefit from (disruptive) innovation. Take Walmart for example, it started with Sam Walton’s innovative ideas about the nature of the retail store - the role of transportation and logistics, and the mindset of trying new things. Walmart optimized innovation by supporting its people to become owners of the business and by techniques such as profit sharing and career planning. You see, employees are called associates, and associates call Walmart stores “my store”. A culture that's built on the idea that the employee is the owner of the business unit, not the keeper of the business unit, is positioned to benefit from the unlimited creativity of people.</p> <p>Another example from Walmart: They have a practice called VPI, or Value Producing Items, where employees compete and have fun adopting and promoting specific items. Employees get recognized on results. All this infuse tremendous amounts of energy, engagement, pride, and innovation into organizational culture.</p>	<p>The Internet of things, robots, artificial intelligence, brick and mortar store closure, regulations, and the entry of new organizations to the marketplace. For example, the entry of Lidl from Europe to USA.</p> <p>Lidl already has 10,000 stores in Europe, and they’re coming to the United States like Aldi did, and Aldi already has 1,600 stores in the US, and by some reports, in the 2018, they may have another 400 stores, reaching 2,000 stores. That's almost half the size of Walmart! Granted, the stores are smaller, but they are everyday low-price, because of their competitive pricing and their business model Walmart has to respond, and they are. Walmart recently announced drops in the price, and  Target - a couple of days ago - announced a significant investment in price. So that entry of new organizations, and new regulations will significantly impact the retail industry.</p>	<p>From my perspective, one of the innovative strategies that I find very compelling is the idea of underground delivery of freight, supported by drones and self-driven cars and robots. The idea of moving freight underground by a magnetic field that's created by electrified coils, when complemented by drones and self-driven cars seems fascinating and disruptive. Research is happening, especially in the UK, around the concept of underground fright delivery. Why not, water and electricity are delivered to homes underground; why not packages! Imagine that! </p>	Amine Ayad	View Edit Delete
46	<p>CA Technologies has emerged as one of the world’s largest independent software companies, based on a mission to "create software that fuels transformation for companies.” Its consistent approach, across 40 countries of operation, is to remove obstacles in companies’ journey to success within the application economy, providing solutions on everything from digital transformation and security to customer experience and speed-to-market – and to bridge the gap between ideas and business outcomes. In March of this year, CA Technologies was recognized among software leaders as a “2017 World’s Most Ethical Company” by Ethisphere Institute.</p>	<p>The CA Technologies Business Analytics team is a global corporate team that provides business insights to stakeholders across the company, including sales, marketing, customer support, customer success, product engineering, HR, finance – you know: everybody.</p> <p>The charter of my team is to help improve the top line of the company by changing our culture so that decision-making is very data and insight-centric, enabled by analytics. We have been quite successful in that goal.</p> <p>Today my team is changing the game by influencing the strategy and operations of the company. We are helping personalize the customer experience at every touchpoint by injecting customer insights at every point of engagement. In that regard, especially when it comes to large enterprise software companies, we are unique. In fact, over the last year, Forrester has published 'best practice' reports that have cited what we are doing at CA.</p> <p>If you think about retailers like the Amazons, e-tailers, and Googles, they all have B2C models that have used analytics to propel their business forward. We are leveraging concepts from the B2C world and bringing them to B2B, specifically in an initiative to transform CA from a traditional B2B enterprise software company to what we call a B2I, or “business to individual.”</p> <p>This is a response to how buying software has changed drastically. Millennial buyers have a very different mindset, even when it comes to enterprise buying. They are higher risk takers as compared to the traditional CIOs and the baby boomer buyers, which means they will not sign very large enterprise deals. They want smaller scale deals that they can test and get in and out of quickly. For enterprise software, companies need to foster a better connection with millennial buyers and engage them continuously throughout the buyer’s journey. This means marketing and selling to them in the digital realm in a way that recognizes them as individuals and personalizes their experience.</p> <p>Our strategy calls for analyzing our customers not just from a firmographics standpoint, but also demographics, psychographics, and technographics perspective. Many companies are thinking about this approach, but they haven't embarked on this path because this type of transformation is a very difficult thing to accomplish. It requires top leadership, a very thoughtful process, and the right team geared towards innovation.</p> <p>To deliver the value our internal customers have now come to expect, we put a significant emphasis behind educating people in the art of possible. Our stakeholders don’t always know what is possible with analytics. It is my job to show them. For example, last year we were able to pinpoint customers who will not renew contracts with a high degree of accuracy. This was a first in the company, and opened many eyes. Another example: Our chief customer support officer wanted to reduce the number of calls coming into his call center, and have more collaboration occur in the online communities where customers can discuss and solve their own problems. Essentially, he wanted to go into an omnichannel direction for support. With analytics, we were able to offer insights as to why people call the call center and suggest solutions to best leverage online communities. Calls have since been dropping, and engagement through online communities has increased.</p>	<p>Culture is the biggest barrier to innovation. If you are in a legacy company, there can be a certain mindset that I call the "not-invented-here" syndrome, or “this is how we do it because this is how it has always been done,” ideology. That to me is one of the biggest impediments, because it means that no matter how the world is changing, we are insular and we will keep doing things the same way. </p>	<p>The culture that I found when I arrived two and a half years ago is drastically different from what CA’s Business Analytics organization is today. Many companies are controlled by top-down policies, but I believe to foster innovation, you need to set people free; let them think. Senior leaders can establish aggressive goals, but then need to let employees go on their own. They will make mistakes, so leaders must provide the air cover. Of course, if somebody makes the same mistake again and again, then there is a problem. But if an organization wants to succeed in innovation, employees cannot be afraid to try new things and sometimes fail.</p> <p>In my opinion, innovation is a drug. Once people get used to that mindset, the feeling of moving fast and being creative thinkers, you can’t stop that, or people will actually leave.</p> <p>A start-up environment is a good example – they are free, they are innovative, they do cool stuff. You have to change the way an enterprise company operates to mimic that mindset and create an environment of innovation.</p> <p>So, we essentially created a start-up within CA’s Business Analytics organization. Innovation is key at CA, and our culture, as defined by our internal Mission & DNA, is one of innovation, customer-centricity, and collaboration. When it comes to hiring new employees, I look less at their technical skills because in our industry technology changes very fast. Instead, I ask: “Are they passionate about what they do? Are they customer-centric? Are they collaborative? Are they curious? And do they have the willingness to learn and grow?”</p>	<p>Artificial intelligence and robotics are the two things that will change the game in our industry and the world at large. In a succession planning discussion with my boss last year, he asked, "Who's your successor?" and I sent, in jest, a picture of a robot.</p> <p>I've been in technology for about 28 years now, and I have never seen a pace of change as rapid as I am seeing now. If you think back to the Hewlett-Packards and IBMs, why were they successful? Because they created something a customer valued. That measure of success hasn't changed.</p> <p>What has changed is the definition of value. We Baby Boomers used to value automation. There was a focus on productivity improvement, which was of value. But now, when I talk to my daughters, when I talk to the millennials, they value Snapchat or Instagram. The value system, and how long that value lasts, is fickle and rapidly changing.</p> <p>To be successful in this new millennial-driven market, companies must track their value system. It is not humanly possible to do that, due to our own internal biases. So, when it comes to artificial intelligence, it's not just about having data, analytics and insights - it’s about using that information to analyze: How are values changing, and thus how are buying patterns changing? How does that influence your products and services? The only way to do that is through artificial intelligence.</p>	<p>Start-ups are entirely focused on product innovation and creating products or services that solve people’s problems. Innovation is not an easy task, but it is simply easier to innovate when you are a start-up and don't have quarterly pressure to report performance to shareholders.</p> <p>Innovation must be customer-centric, and you should think about it as solving somebody's problem. To me, a perfect innovation strategy is when not only are you creating products and services that are absolutely moving the world in a new direction, but also satisfying shareholders and customers.</p> <p>I think two companies that are doing this successfully today are Tesla and Amazon. That is the magic sauce for innovation. </p>	Saum Mathur	View Edit Delete
47	<p>Nic Vu, GM and SVP for Direct-to-Consumer for Adidas North America, discusses how building relationships is today's number one sales strategy. Through this game changer interview, he discusses what customer-centricity really means in today’s data-enabled, hyper-competitive brand environment, from the perspective of one of the premier performers in the global retail landscape.</p>	It's global change: our entire company worldwide, as well as the North American team. We specifically set out three major strategies, which include speed, cities, and open sourcing, and it really has changed the behavior and frankly the entire game in which we play. Before, we would create products and push them out and try to sell to customers, in the traditional model. But as we started to open source and invite our consumers to help us within our journey in a new innovative way, which has created a shift in the ecosystem that has been applied throughout the entire organization.<br /><br />We're obviously very well known for Kanye West, and co-creating products with his fashion, style and expertise. By leveraging our globally recognized brand and expertise with his product and personal brand, we are going to market with a tailored product that leverages the best of both sides.  We strategically made a choice that we would co-create with our key partners to deliver the best products to their consumers, and we are now leveraging that open source strategy with a variety of different key partners.<br /><br />We have opened up a product creation design house in Brooklyn called the Brooklyn Farm. We put our best designers there, and we are allowing customers – anybody who has a creative thought, anybody who wants to work with our brand – to walk in off the street and help us design products, give us new ideas; fresh thinking. We created an ecosystem internally with internal websites that allowed people to generate ideas, and their peers can vote it on their ideas. And that ultimately has driven thousands of ideas, including the very successful Avenue A initiative.<br /><br />With Avenue A, I have to give credit to Mark King, my boss, who's the CEO of North America. He is well known as a major innovator in the golf industry, and he has subsequently initiated and built this relentless innovation culture for Adidas North America in the past three years. In year one, we were all raising awareness, educating people on the process around innovation. In year two, we started to cultivate this ecosystem of openness. And now that we're in year three, you're seeing the net results organizationally, both within the North American marketplace but also on a global organizational level. At the same time, we launched the Innovation Academy, wherein we created an environment in which people can learn, get an education; effectively get an MBA in innovation.<br /><br />As the GM of Direct-to-Consumer for North America, I spend half of my time understanding consumer sentiment and listening to the ideas they have, and the other half of my time around merchandising and product.<br /><br />What's unique about Adidas Group is that we were born in sport, and we're sporting goods athletic apparel and footwear company. We can basically be an athlete’s entire wardrobe, on-court and on-pitch, or as soon as they get off: we're there to support them through their own style and fashion as well. And we're a brand that wants to co-create.	People need to be educated and aware that they have the ability to contribute within their own organization, and to try new things. You can't create an ecosystem organizationally that shuts that down. You need to allow votes on people’s ideas by their peers, not by their supervisors – so, their confidantes, if you will. And employees need to know that it is safe to fail, and they need to fail fast and frequently. Unfortunately, I would say the majority of organizations still penalize mistakes, despite the knowledge that innovation requires an ability to fail. <br /><br />Really, the impediment that I see within the industry is that, too often, people feel they have to have a 100% plan, ready-to-go, and that it has to be successful. Today, we have an innovation board within every single one of our brick-and-mortar stores and we invite not only our consumers to put ideas on there but we invite our own team members, our internal consumers, to give us ideas, and those ideas then are surfaced all the way up the "chain of command." Then, ultimately we create games that feature competition and collaborations, and then all of a sudden people feel like, "Wow. I'm a one-week-old employee internal to Adidas, and I submitted my idea and two months later, the top guy in the organization is reviewing my ideas! How cool is that?"	What I would say is we have to create a incentivized change-management process to induce innovation. I think you can't introduce innovation as a top-down mandate or even execute it in that form. I  think you have to win hearts and minds within the organization, and you have to start by developing a budget or resources that are dedicated to it.    <br /><br /> So our newsletter four or five years ago was driven by functional heads and it was kind of like this laborious mandate from the top – me, in this case – where every function gave and updated them, and we’d we post a static document and that would go out to the organization. We thought that was communication. Today, in contrast, the employees within each function, regardless of level, drive what content they want to express to the organization. And it's this living, breathing document that goes out every week now.	<p>Mobile technology will remain key – almost every consumer today has some level of smartphone in their hand, and the information that they can get via Google or other search engines is so quick and so fast that brands like us, Adidas Group, will need to make sure that we are there to help cultivate that experience for the consumer and answer those questions, or even anticipate those questions. So I would say mobile technology and all the apps that can be developed to connect the consumer's experience, is really the key in the future.</p> <p>We already have virtual reality in our stores today, which help educate and create a great experience for our consumers. So when we opened up our world flagship on Fifth Avenue, we had virtual reality in there wherein NBA superstar James Harden in a VR space was giving them – the consumers – the experience of a lifetime, because it felt like you were actually speaking with James Harden.</p> <p>Meanwhile, we’re leveraging technologies from 3D printing to AI, and I think the key is to make sure that our digital and social ecosystem remains connected for the end-user experience. We're starting to implement local market manufacturing wherein we can bring speed of product-to-market faster. And we're talking months and weeks, we're not talking years and months.</p>	<p>My personal favorites include Tesla and also Faraday Future, that just came out with an innovation where you can basically sit in the car, and it will self-drive, self-park, and you can talk on your social platforms. And ultimately what I learned from the car industry – in this case, electric car companies – is that they're chasing the very same thing we are: a connected experience for the consumer in which they can interact with your brand, any which way they like, and for us to be prepared to be able to interact with them any which way they like: digital communities, hubs, and apps.</p>	Nicholas Vu	View Edit Delete
48	<p>Digital marketing entrepreneur and strategy innovator Sean Shoffstall is pioneering a more relevant and measurable approach to messaging in today’s multi-channel world of engagement. Shoffstall formerly delivered data-driven marketing strategies for Fortune 500 brands at Teradata. Now, he is a prominent speaker and thought leader who is widely credited for successfully leveraging the “Quantifiable Creativity” marketing approach.</p> <p>Despite the emergence of numerous new marketing technologies, Shoffstall told BPI he sees the state of innovation in digital marketing as stagnant, with training that lags the landscape, and marketers who spend too much time mastering complex technologies and too little time on messaging and strategy. </p> <p>Sean founded his own company, Crave Metrics, which will serve as the host for a software product with game changing potential. Having decoded both B2B and B2C customer brand engagement within growing channels, data and devices, Shoffstall is writing the code that he believes will automatically cut to the relevant numbers.</p> <p>Sean tells BPI: “My ultimate goal is to benefit the marketer and the end consumer. The marketer wanting to create an awareness campaign should be able to log into our platform Crave Metrics, and find the top five awareness campaigns that have run in the last six months. The marketer can then find the right marketing mix that is perfect for a given audience and truly considers how to help the end consumer. If we start messaging customers with the right marketing message mix, then we can send fewer messages to consumers." He adds “Our goal is to have an alpha out at the end of June, and we have already identified a few key customers to be working on that pilot with. We will hopefully have an open beta in mid-September.”</p> <p>Shoffstall says the past seven years has seen a significant consolidation of platforms. Marketers are spending more time on technology than on messaging. He believes we need to bring the power of the marketing message back, leveraged by the power of platforms.</p>	<p>I started Crave Metrics to focus on customer journey analytics. We are trying to solve misleading data with Crave Metrics by giving people a broader view of their campaign’s effectiveness across all their channels, because many marketers do not realize every campaign drives brand awareness and the end value that it creates.</p> <p>Marketers look at a campaign and might see the click-through rate and the open rate, but they are not instantly able to see how it compares against other similar campaigns, or against their company's benchmarks.</p> <p>Our platform will allow customers that review a campaign to not only see what their score is against the Crave Metrics key marketing measures, but also to see how it performs against the company benchmarks, and against similar campaign benchmarks. This answers the marketer’s question that many platforms miss today, I’ve got a metric but what does it mean?</p>	<p>There is an influx of so much new technology. Companies must constantly go from Paid Search, to Twitter, to Facebook, to Email, to Instagram, and be prepared to adapt and market to any and all other digital marketing technologies that develop popular user platforms. Current digital marketing technologies are complicated and ever changing: this leads to siloed information and messaging, and can lead to paralysis for marketing teams who get stuck with basic batch and blast marketing.</p> <p>In spite of all this, universities and colleges are still primarily teaching traditional marketing strategies. Companies then hire young people simply because they know how to use certain media platforms or marketing tools, which can be problematic on its own. New educational and training systems will be vital to success in coming years to help bridge the talent gap. </p>	<p>The leadership of a given team drives its innovation. One thing I have always done with my teams whenever someone new joins us, is bring up the top three to five trends I am seeing succeed with our customers or elsewhere, and ask them questions about its success, which opens the door for them to bring their own ideas to the conversation. </p> <p>At the same time, I am willing to pilot certain ideas. I am willing to invest 8 percent, 10 percent, 12 percent of my team’s time to pilot one of these ideas. We cannot always go after the newest platforms, but we can test new platforms on campaigns. If a campaign fails, at least we learn something.  </p> <p>I have also seen mid to large size companies create a sandbox marketing environment that allows a safe atmosphere to test the latest social platform or API integration, just to see if it breaks. If it works in the sandbox, we bring it in. You need a partnership between leadership, the IT group, and the marketing department to try something new.</p>	<p>VR and augmented reality will change marketing. In-game marketing is another platform that is similar, these immersive environments is where we are going to see the most growth and change. Marketers will need to again focus on the message and make sure it fits in these environments without being obtrusive or obnoxious.</p> <p>I believe another key business trend will be, I hope, a focus more on consumer data privacy. We protect financial and healthcare data and have seen the repercussions when it isn’t secured. Consumers give marketers their trust by accepting cookies, by signing up for our newsletters, by purchasing and registering their products. They entrust marketers with their data, so marketers have a responsibility to use the data for marketing without releasing potentially sensitive information. I think customers will start to demand more protections like other sensitive data. </p>	<p>Amazon's Alexa. The simplicity of voice activation to access music at any time, to interact with different lists and calendars, to listen to podcasts or news sources, and to use fewer screens, is a game changer for the consumer marketplace. </p>	Sean Shoffstall	View Edit Delete
49	<p>In the UK’s world of IT, Martin Summerhayes is known as “The Billion Dollar Man,” having once innovated a billion dollar business for HP while also working as a field engineer.</p> <p>His expertise in customer experience and service needs derive from innumerable physical visits from his field engineer days, which have enabled him to create enhanced service models with a customer-friendly but up-front extended warranty. This innovation became a huge new revenue stream for Fujitsu, and a model emulated by many companies since its inception. His service ideas stem from customer-centric realizations like this: Why should a customer have to deal with the complexity of choosing between hardware, software or warranty departments in seeking solutions from their provider? Surely the provider should be able to take their problem – or, better still, already know or anticipate the problem – and refer them to the right channels to solve it.</p> <p>Summerhayes is now Head of Delivery Strategy and Service Improvement for Fujitsu – one of the world’s top five IT service providers, with products and services available in more than 100 countries. The company’s “human-centric” tech innovation is far-reaching, ranging from farming sensors for better harvests to software for the hearing impaired, and augmented reality systems to reduce truck rolls for field engineers. Its slew of recent awards includes the Citrix Award for Partners, in which Fujitsu managed to get a key agency of the New Zealand government back online within days of the country’s 7.8 magnitude earthquake, with a cloud-based desktop-as-a-service solution.</p> <p>Rather than seeing their tech portfolios managed in a series of add-ons and piecemeal updates in response to changing needs and improved software, enterprise customers routinely hail the fact that Fujitsu IT services are continuously up-to-date thereby enhancing personalization for the client’s needs.</p> <p>One of Fujitsu’s most famous clients in the UK is McDonald’s. At a recent Fujitsu Forum event, Doug Baker, head of IT for McDonald's UK, said the partnership had gone beyond the traditional “break-fix” contracts of the past, and toward a flexible service which enabled a personalized, optimized customer experience for its 1260 restaurants.</p> <p>The partnership, including the new CARE program, is enabling kiosk-driven table service – and the remarkable recognition that “the biggest focus for technology innovation in restaurants is leveraging a customer’s own device,” – as well as a very human kind of load-balancing, where drive-thrus take simultaneous orders in two lanes and deliver efficiently in one.</p> <p>Having learned some high traffic retail customers do not like the disruption of even rapid response site visits by predictive IT engineers, Fujitsu responded with “invisible service provision.” Martin Smithen, head of Fujitsu’s TMS Offering Development, notes to ensure the success of the remote, invisible support, the service requires customers are kept fully informed. Despite the benefits of optimized engineering support, the role of human intelligence remained on a par with technology in formulating business strategy, Doug Baker, head of IT for McDonald's UK, says, “The most powerful data we have had comes from CARE engineers who go to sites, talk to the stores, and brief us on how the systems are being used.”</p> <p>No one knows the value of both human intelligence and technology better than Summerhayes, who remarks, “The consumer is driving changes like the opportunity for prediction, the cost of IT, and the spread of the Internet of Things. Thirty years ago, we could monitor container ship’s location. Twenty years ago, we could monitor the containers. Ten years ago, we could monitor the pallets in the containers. Now, we are talking about tracking products throughout their entire journey, through lower cost RFID tags on value-based consumer items. Lower levels of granularity present huge opportunities for customers.”</p>	<p>Fujitsu is an organization that manufactures everything from telephony systems to PCs, mobile phones, enterprise servers, mainframes - and much more. It operates in a software development space and provides solutions for customers.</p> <p>In Fujitsu, we hope to bring intelligence, big data, analytics, predictability, and predictive tools together to answer big questions: How can we better track trends and anomalies? How can we predict failure before failure occurs? How can we drive preventative programs? How can we use our engineering workforce, our partner workforce, and our repair workforce to ensure our customers do not experience downtime? My team is leveraging software tools and partners, plus the knowledge we have developed to be able to look at that space.</p> <p>A new type of service model called CARE uses intelligent engineering to drive and support the customer’s changing requirements. One of our prominent customers, McDonald's, is leveraging our CARE service to allow customers to pre-order and select a time for pick up before the customer gets to the store via an app on their phone; the customer can use a connected kiosk; customers have a choice.</p> <p>Fujitsu ensures uptime and availability to those stores, which often operate 24/7.</p> <p>As a part of the outsourcing space within my team, I look in how Fujitsu provides managed services to customers who have either IT products or It services provided by another partner we can take over.</p> <p>From a game-changing perspective, ten years ago, there was IT outsourcing version 1.0 – where the company decided to move it to a partner who managed its IT provision on a holistic basis. Outsourcing moved through a tower model called IT managed services or outsourcing version 2.0, in which the IT provision breaks up into various towers. It is like an orchestra of independent companies playing together, or the company orchestrating it themselves.</p> <p>My team is looking at how we provision engineering-type services, provided either remotely or on customer sites. It is <em>how</em> we provision and make available those engineering services to customers that is a key game changer. We hope to provide a service before the customer realizes they have a problem.</p> <p>Fujitsu tries and pilots programs like an intelligent error engineering deployment for one of their customers in the UK. Their goal is to take it from white screen concepts to a working prototype within two weeks.</p> <p>We are looking at augmented reality from our engineering workforce perspective. The ability to use a smartphone, and point at another device for both visual and providing verbal instructions to the engineer in the terms of how best to resolve the problem.</p> <p>Fujitsu hopes to use virtual reality tools to train our engineers like "just in time training" - broadly scaling our engineering workforce in terms of a core set of skills.</p>	<p>Speed is the biggest hurdle to overcome when it comes to IT services, as our customers expect rapid deployment and zero downtime. The complications of adopting speed of change with the challenge of demonstrating return on investment limit innovation. It becomes difficult to clearly articulate the value of innovation without taking the C-suite on a customer experience journey, where they can clearly articulate those savings.</p>	<p>Fujitsu’s innovation depends on the speed of adoption versus the speed of change. Most companies, whether banks, retail institutions, or manufacturers, have a legacy environment plus a small element of new code, and its service models vary dependent on those factors.</p> <p>Amazon is a disruptor in retailing and supermarkets. In the UK, Amazon states they are the online supermarket. Consumers can even order fresh produce from Amazon. Many companies are seeing disruption within their industry by new competitors.</p> <p>There is little to consider as first generation, innovative. Small pocket organizations create an innovative idea, it develops, and then it is realized as a blue ocean market opportunity or a disruptive market opportunity. That is how innovation happens, and how innovation gets inculcated in an organization.</p> <p>I see innovation in Fujitsu and in many of its competitors. Fujitsu implements an encouraging culture for innovation. The challenge is in demonstrating the business case and the return on investment.</p>	<p>Within IT services, the Internet of Things, the connectivity of many devices, and the integration of big data through analytics will be the major industry disruptors.</p> <p>Augmented reality and virtual reality will have an impact, although AR will be more prevalent. It is how companies bring those various elements together around industry vertical solutions. How vertical solutions are brought together to offer a solution to the customer is key.</p>	<p>Google’s innovations are highly compelling. When traveling, Google gives online recommendations through Google Maps in terms of products and services nearby the user. A consumer can submit photographs and narratives of places they have visited via social media channels, and contribute to shared information.</p>	Martin Summerhayes	View Edit Delete
50	<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Kim Smyth works for AstraZeneca, a global biopharmaceutical company, where she leads a Silicon-Valley-based Technology Innovation Lab. Kim’s team explores emerging trends, scouts new companies, and delivers innovative proof-of-concepts for stakeholders within AstraZeneca’s science and business units.</span></p> <p class="p1"><span class="s1">Kim has more than twenty years of broad cross-industry experience in consulting and operational roles, focused on how to help large companies take advantage of new technology to improve top and bottom lines. She joined AstraZeneca in Australia in 2010, where she led strategy, digital innovation and patient program functions. She moved to Silicon Valley in the office of the CTO to help accelerate technology innovation across the full company life cycle from discovery through clinical trials and commercialization.</span></p> <p>While Kim can’t yet speak in detail about the exciting new partnerships and initiatives her new team is spearheading, she says that the pace of technology change – driven by advances in computing, machine intelligence, data analytics, and connected devices – is creating many opportunities for life sciences companies and the healthcare delivery system. </p> <p>Smyth tells BPI:</p> <ul> <li>“I'm very excited about the potential to marry digital tools and approaches to support our therapies. I have seen a lot of great progress, especially in chronic disease, where behavioral aspects such as adhering to lifestyle, diet, and exercise changes are key..."</li> <li>“We have a broad mandate, looking for innovation that optimizes current processes, or re-imagines our industry. Because we’re looking to the future, we emphasize value potential vs immediate ROI. We follow our Company Values: putting patients first, following the science, and doing the right thing. If we get those things right, the business case and competitiveness will follow.”</li> </ul>	<p>My team operates in Silicon Valley with three goals: bring Silicon Valley perspective and knowledge into our company; find and incubate new partners (especially start-ups) to demonstrate the power of new technology and approaches, and build a West Coast presence that leverages technology as well as life science leadership.</p> <p>My team sits in IT, so we serve all therapy areas and functions. Technology is changing the game in many industries – or eating the world, as Marc Andreessen might say. We look for innovation that can bring medicines to market more quickly, or make therapies more effective. This could be re-imagining how we recruit or operate clinical trials, delivering mobile services that complement our medicines, or applying machine intelligence for clinical or patient support.</p> <p>Our industry is complex, so we work closely with internal teams for the necessary scientific, clinical, and business domain expertise. We are a catalyst, empowering innovation rather than trying to own it in our team. This requires new technology skills in areas such as data analytics or IoT, as well as soft skills in communication, influencing and teamwork. We prioritize based on the importance that differentiating new technology plays in the opportunity, whether the potential value is incremental or transformational, and how closely the company matches our current needs and therapy area focus. </p>	<p>Healthcare and drug development are highly regulated environments, with enormous - often literally life-and-death – impact on people’s lives. This makes innovation all the more important, but it has to be done carefully and respectfully.</p> <p>Regulators have a very difficult job to keep up with impending changes, and sometimes lag the “state of the art” in areas like social media, or machine learning. How will a regulator assess a machine learning algorithm that doesn’t offer a clear rationale for a diagnosis, for example?</p> <p>Another challenge is the complexity and deep specialization required across multiple scientific and technological domains. We need people with deep knowledge in both technology and science or clinical areas – or who have exceptional ability to work with together. </p> <p>The healthcare environment is a complex and fragmented system with many regional variants, and even though we are a large multinational, our impact on the overall system can be limited. People like to say it is easy to pilot a healthcare innovation, but hard to scale it.</p> Finally, we have a very successful core business. It can be hard to convince highly accomplished people of the need to change - especially when many aspects of digital health are still generating clinical evidence, or have very different operating models.	<p>One of the hardest parts about embedding innovation is moving from a successful proof-of-concept into widespread adoption. </p> <p>Ideally, at a grass-roots level, we work jointly with highly motivated internal stakeholders at a very early stage, so that if we are successful there is a home for the project to land and grow. This is a balancing act – at times, we need to push the envelope too!</p> <p>However, top down executive visibility and endorsement is critical. When our leaders understand technology trends and potential impact on our business, they provide invaluable recognition and support of projects that might otherwise “fly under the radar” or be seen as optional. Executive support has also helped to embed innovation objectives for employees more broadly – moving everyone from innovation “if and when I have time” to “a core part of my job, which I’m accountable to deliver.”  </p>	<p>There are huge advances in the way we store, transfer, use, and think about data, software and devices. The real change is driven not by a single technology, but by the combination of several: cloud computing, increasing digitization of healthcare, more personal and linked data, connected devices in the hands of patients, and changes in the ways we interact with computers.</p> <p>We are arriving at a new class of data-empowered healthcare tools. Formerly invisible factors involving behavior, diet, environment, genetics, omics, or early cancer risk can now be measured and assist in risk assessment and diagnosis support. The cost of sensors and medical grade devices is decreasing, improving our ability to monitor continuously. Machine intelligence is exceeding human ability to recognize patterns in medical images and data. This opens possibilities to identify patients at risk, understanding disease progression, and analyzing historical and real time data and making appropriate recommendations.   </p> <p>At the same time, issues like cybersecurity, privacy and cost sustainability must be addressed if we’re to realize these benefits without introducing unacceptable risks.  </p>	<p>I am most excited by companies that surprise me and challenge the way I think – bringing fresh approaches to some of our industry’s longstanding challenges. I believe there is huge potential in combining the rigor of science with the power of human-centered design. One company is using sensors and data analytics to quantify the degree of control in asthma patients, which could help predict an attack days before it would otherwise have happened. I’m also fascinated by “doctors on demand” services and the degree to which smart logistics, advanced teleconferencing, conversational UI and machine learning-enabled clinical support could improve the experience of healthcare while dramatically lowering costs. And I am excited about companies who are thinking about the whole ecosystem – for example, one that is looking to create an “app store” for genomics, challenging potential partners to offer value at a very personal level to their customer base. </p> <p>The variety and impact these companies will have is part of what makes my role such an exciting and rewarding one!</p>	Kim Smyth	View Edit Delete

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8	SELECT `Leader`.`id`, `Leader`.`name`, `Leader`.`job_title`, `Leader`.`company`, `Leader`.`headshot`, `Leader`.`company_logo`, `Leader`.`bio_full`, `Leader`.`summary`, `Leader`.`category`, `Leader`.`featured`, `Leader`.`program_only`, `Leader`.`game_changer_only`, `Leader`.`enable`, `Leader`.`created`, `Leader`.`modified`, `Leader`.`modifier`, `ArticlesLeader`.`id`, `ArticlesLeader`.`article_id`, `ArticlesLeader`.`leader_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`leaders` AS `Leader` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`articles_leaders` AS `ArticlesLeader` ON (`ArticlesLeader`.`article_id` IN (1247, 1245, 1244, 1217) AND `ArticlesLeader`.`leader_id` = `Leader`.`id`)	0	0	0
9	SELECT `Tag`.`id`, `Tag`.`tag`, `Tag`.`created`, `Tag`.`modified`, `ArticlesTag`.`id`, `ArticlesTag`.`article_id`, `ArticlesTag`.`tag_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`tags` AS `Tag` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`articles_tags` AS `ArticlesTag` ON (`ArticlesTag`.`article_id` IN (1247, 1245, 1244, 1217) AND `ArticlesTag`.`tag_id` = `Tag`.`id`)	0	0	0
10	SELECT `Event`.`id`, `Event`.`name`, `Event`.`date_start`, `Event`.`date_end`, `Event`.`date`, `Event`.`not_exact_date`, `Event`.`location`, `Event`.`description`, `Event`.`url`, `Event`.`image`, `Event`.`category`, `Event`.`event_type`, `Event`.`created`, `Event`.`modified`, `Event`.`modifier` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`events` AS `Event` WHERE `Event`.`category` = 1 ORDER BY `Event`.`date_start` DESC LIMIT 3	3	3	0
11	SELECT `Brainwafe`.`id`, `Brainwafe`.`issue`, `Brainwafe`.`ednote_title`, `Brainwafe`.`ednote_content`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_headshot`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_logo`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_logo_url`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_title`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_subtitle`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_content`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_headshot`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_logo`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_logo_url`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_title`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_subtitle`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_content`, `Brainwafe`.`contributed_title`, `Brainwafe`.`contributed_subtitle`, `Brainwafe`.`contributed_content`, `Brainwafe`.`enable`, `Brainwafe`.`current`, `Brainwafe`.`url_hash`, `Brainwafe`.`modifier`, `BrainwavesEvent`.`id`, `BrainwavesEvent`.`event_id`, `BrainwavesEvent`.`brainwafe_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`brainwaves` AS `Brainwafe` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`brainwaves_events` AS `BrainwavesEvent` ON (`BrainwavesEvent`.`event_id` IN (129, 127, 53) AND `BrainwavesEvent`.`brainwafe_id` = `Brainwafe`.`id`)	0	0	0
12	SELECT `Program`.`id`, `Program`.`title`, `Program`.`subtitle`, `Program`.`summary`, `Program`.`description`, `Program`.`image`, `Program`.`thumbnail`, `Program`.`date`, `Program`.`feature`, `Program`.`enable`, `Program`.`created`, `Program`.`modified`, `Program`.`modifier`, `EventsProgram`.`id`, `EventsProgram`.`event_id`, `EventsProgram`.`program_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`programs` AS `Program` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`events_programs` AS `EventsProgram` ON (`EventsProgram`.`event_id` IN (129, 127, 53) AND `EventsProgram`.`program_id` = `Program`.`id`)	1	1	0
13	SELECT `Event`.`id`, `Event`.`name`, `Event`.`date_start`, `Event`.`date_end`, `Event`.`date`, `Event`.`not_exact_date`, `Event`.`location`, `Event`.`description`, `Event`.`url`, `Event`.`image`, `Event`.`category`, `Event`.`event_type`, `Event`.`created`, `Event`.`modified`, `Event`.`modifier` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`events` AS `Event` WHERE `Event`.`category` = 0 AND `Event`.`date_end` >= '2025-04-28' ORDER BY `Event`.`date_start` asc LIMIT 3	0	0	0
14	SELECT `Report`.`id`, `Report`.`date`, `Report`.`title`, `Report`.`subtitle`, `Report`.`summary`, `Report`.`author`, `Report`.`body`, `Report`.`upload`, `Report`.`image`, `Report`.`internal`, `Report`.`url`, `Report`.`featured`, `Report`.`program_only`, `Report`.`related`, `Report`.`enable`, `Report`.`created`, `Report`.`modified`, `Report`.`modifier` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`reports` AS `Report` WHERE `Report`.`id` IN (3, 5)	2	2	0
15	SELECT `Tracking`.`id`, `Tracking`.`referrer`, `Tracking`.`user_id`, `Tracking`.`non_member_id`, `Tracking`.`report_id`, `Tracking`.`report_download`, `Tracking`.`other`, `Tracking`.`date` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`tracking` AS `Tracking` WHERE `Tracking`.`report_id` IN (3, 5)	0	0	0
16	SELECT `Download`.`id`, `Download`.`user_id`, `Download`.`non_member_id`, `Download`.`report_id`, `Download`.`tracking_id`, `Download`.`date` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`reports_download` AS `Download` WHERE `Download`.`report_id` IN (3, 5)	32	32	0
17	SELECT `Program`.`id`, `Program`.`title`, `Program`.`subtitle`, `Program`.`summary`, `Program`.`description`, `Program`.`image`, `Program`.`thumbnail`, `Program`.`date`, `Program`.`feature`, `Program`.`enable`, `Program`.`created`, `Program`.`modified`, `Program`.`modifier`, `ProgramsReport`.`id`, `ProgramsReport`.`report_id`, `ProgramsReport`.`program_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`programs` AS `Program` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`programs_reports` AS `ProgramsReport` ON (`ProgramsReport`.`report_id` IN (3, 5) AND `ProgramsReport`.`program_id` = `Program`.`id`)	1	1	0
18	SELECT `Tag`.`id`, `Tag`.`tag`, `Tag`.`created`, `Tag`.`modified`, `ReportsTag`.`id`, `ReportsTag`.`report_id`, `ReportsTag`.`tag_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`tags` AS `Tag` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`reports_tags` AS `ReportsTag` ON (`ReportsTag`.`report_id` IN (3, 5) AND `ReportsTag`.`tag_id` = `Tag`.`id`)	0	0	0
19	SELECT `MediaCoverage`.`id`, `MediaCoverage`.`date`, `MediaCoverage`.`title`, `MediaCoverage`.`author`, `MediaCoverage`.`summary`, `MediaCoverage`.`publisher`, `MediaCoverage`.`url`, `MediaCoverage`.`created`, `MediaCoverage`.`modified`, `MediaCoverage`.`modifier`, `MediaCoverageReport`.`id`, `MediaCoverageReport`.`media_coverage_id`, `MediaCoverageReport`.`report_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`media_coverage` AS `MediaCoverage` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`media_coverage_reports` AS `MediaCoverageReport` ON (`MediaCoverageReport`.`report_id` IN (3, 5) AND `MediaCoverageReport`.`media_coverage_id` = `MediaCoverage`.`id`)	0	0	0
20	SELECT `Brainwafe`.`id`, `Brainwafe`.`issue`, `Brainwafe`.`ednote_title`, `Brainwafe`.`ednote_content`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_headshot`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_logo`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_logo_url`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_title`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_subtitle`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_content`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_headshot`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_logo`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_logo_url`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_title`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_subtitle`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_content`, `Brainwafe`.`contributed_title`, `Brainwafe`.`contributed_subtitle`, `Brainwafe`.`contributed_content`, `Brainwafe`.`enable`, `Brainwafe`.`current`, `Brainwafe`.`url_hash`, `Brainwafe`.`modifier`, `BrainwavesReport`.`id`, `BrainwavesReport`.`brainwafe_id`, `BrainwavesReport`.`report_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`brainwaves` AS `Brainwafe` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`brainwaves_reports` AS `BrainwavesReport` ON (`BrainwavesReport`.`report_id` IN (3, 5) AND `BrainwavesReport`.`brainwafe_id` = `Brainwafe`.`id`)	0	0	0
21	SELECT `InnovatorProfile`.`id`, `InnovatorProfile`.`linkedin_url`, `InnovatorProfile`.`summary_bio`, `InnovatorProfile`.`answer_1`, `InnovatorProfile`.`answer_2`, `InnovatorProfile`.`answer_3`, `InnovatorProfile`.`answer_4`, `InnovatorProfile`.`answer_5`, `InnovatorProfile`.`leader_id`, `InnovatorProfile`.`modifier`, `Leader`.`id`, `Leader`.`name`, `Leader`.`job_title`, `Leader`.`company`, `Leader`.`headshot`, `Leader`.`company_logo`, `Leader`.`bio_full`, `Leader`.`summary`, `Leader`.`category`, `Leader`.`featured`, `Leader`.`program_only`, `Leader`.`game_changer_only`, `Leader`.`enable`, `Leader`.`created`, `Leader`.`modified`, `Leader`.`modifier` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`innovator_profiles` AS `InnovatorProfile` LEFT JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`leaders` AS `Leader` ON (`InnovatorProfile`.`leader_id` = `Leader`.`id`) WHERE 1 = 1 LIMIT 20, 20	20	20	1
22	SELECT COUNT(*) AS `count` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`innovator_profiles` AS `InnovatorProfile` LEFT JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`leaders` AS `Leader` ON (`InnovatorProfile`.`leader_id` = `Leader`.`id`) WHERE 1 = 1	1	1	0

(default) 22 queries took 1 ms

Query

Error

Affected

Num. rows

Took (ms)

SELECT `Menu`.`id`, `Menu`.`slug`, `Menu`.`referrer`, `Menu`.`url`, `Menu`.`report_id`, `Menu`.`other`, `Menu`.`created`, `Menu`.`modified` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`tracking_routes` AS `Menu` WHERE 1 = 1

SELECT `Article`.`id`, `Article`.`date`, `Article`.`title`, `Article`.`author`, `Article`.`publisher`, `Article`.`description`, `Article`.`url`, `Article`.`program_only`, `Article`.`innovator_news`, `Article`.`created`, `Article`.`modified`, `Article`.`modifier` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`articles` AS `Article` WHERE `Article`.`program_only` = '0' ORDER BY `Article`.`date` DESC LIMIT 8

SELECT `Program`.`id`, `Program`.`title`, `Program`.`subtitle`, `Program`.`summary`, `Program`.`description`, `Program`.`image`, `Program`.`thumbnail`, `Program`.`date`, `Program`.`feature`, `Program`.`enable`, `Program`.`created`, `Program`.`modified`, `Program`.`modifier`, `ArticlesProgram`.`id`, `ArticlesProgram`.`program_id`, `ArticlesProgram`.`article_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`programs` AS `Program` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`articles_programs` AS `ArticlesProgram` ON (`ArticlesProgram`.`article_id` IN (1365, 1361, 1359, 1360, 1358, 1363, 1354, 1355) AND `ArticlesProgram`.`program_id` = `Program`.`id`)

SELECT `Leader`.`id`, `Leader`.`name`, `Leader`.`job_title`, `Leader`.`company`, `Leader`.`headshot`, `Leader`.`company_logo`, `Leader`.`bio_full`, `Leader`.`summary`, `Leader`.`category`, `Leader`.`featured`, `Leader`.`program_only`, `Leader`.`game_changer_only`, `Leader`.`enable`, `Leader`.`created`, `Leader`.`modified`, `Leader`.`modifier`, `ArticlesLeader`.`id`, `ArticlesLeader`.`article_id`, `ArticlesLeader`.`leader_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`leaders` AS `Leader` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`articles_leaders` AS `ArticlesLeader` ON (`ArticlesLeader`.`article_id` IN (1365, 1361, 1359, 1360, 1358, 1363, 1354, 1355) AND `ArticlesLeader`.`leader_id` = `Leader`.`id`)

SELECT `Tag`.`id`, `Tag`.`tag`, `Tag`.`created`, `Tag`.`modified`, `ArticlesTag`.`id`, `ArticlesTag`.`article_id`, `ArticlesTag`.`tag_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`tags` AS `Tag` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`articles_tags` AS `ArticlesTag` ON (`ArticlesTag`.`article_id` IN (1365, 1361, 1359, 1360, 1358, 1363, 1354, 1355) AND `ArticlesTag`.`tag_id` = `Tag`.`id`)

SELECT `Article`.`id`, `Article`.`date`, `Article`.`title`, `Article`.`author`, `Article`.`publisher`, `Article`.`description`, `Article`.`url`, `Article`.`program_only`, `Article`.`innovator_news`, `Article`.`created`, `Article`.`modified`, `Article`.`modifier` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`articles` AS `Article` WHERE `Article`.`innovator_news` = '1' AND `Article`.`program_only` = '0' ORDER BY `Article`.`date` DESC LIMIT 4

SELECT `Program`.`id`, `Program`.`title`, `Program`.`subtitle`, `Program`.`summary`, `Program`.`description`, `Program`.`image`, `Program`.`thumbnail`, `Program`.`date`, `Program`.`feature`, `Program`.`enable`, `Program`.`created`, `Program`.`modified`, `Program`.`modifier`, `ArticlesProgram`.`id`, `ArticlesProgram`.`program_id`, `ArticlesProgram`.`article_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`programs` AS `Program` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`articles_programs` AS `ArticlesProgram` ON (`ArticlesProgram`.`article_id` IN (1247, 1245, 1244, 1217) AND `ArticlesProgram`.`program_id` = `Program`.`id`)

SELECT `Leader`.`id`, `Leader`.`name`, `Leader`.`job_title`, `Leader`.`company`, `Leader`.`headshot`, `Leader`.`company_logo`, `Leader`.`bio_full`, `Leader`.`summary`, `Leader`.`category`, `Leader`.`featured`, `Leader`.`program_only`, `Leader`.`game_changer_only`, `Leader`.`enable`, `Leader`.`created`, `Leader`.`modified`, `Leader`.`modifier`, `ArticlesLeader`.`id`, `ArticlesLeader`.`article_id`, `ArticlesLeader`.`leader_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`leaders` AS `Leader` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`articles_leaders` AS `ArticlesLeader` ON (`ArticlesLeader`.`article_id` IN (1247, 1245, 1244, 1217) AND `ArticlesLeader`.`leader_id` = `Leader`.`id`)

SELECT `Tag`.`id`, `Tag`.`tag`, `Tag`.`created`, `Tag`.`modified`, `ArticlesTag`.`id`, `ArticlesTag`.`article_id`, `ArticlesTag`.`tag_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`tags` AS `Tag` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`articles_tags` AS `ArticlesTag` ON (`ArticlesTag`.`article_id` IN (1247, 1245, 1244, 1217) AND `ArticlesTag`.`tag_id` = `Tag`.`id`)

SELECT `Event`.`id`, `Event`.`name`, `Event`.`date_start`, `Event`.`date_end`, `Event`.`date`, `Event`.`not_exact_date`, `Event`.`location`, `Event`.`description`, `Event`.`url`, `Event`.`image`, `Event`.`category`, `Event`.`event_type`, `Event`.`created`, `Event`.`modified`, `Event`.`modifier` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`events` AS `Event` WHERE `Event`.`category` = 1 ORDER BY `Event`.`date_start` DESC LIMIT 3

SELECT `Brainwafe`.`id`, `Brainwafe`.`issue`, `Brainwafe`.`ednote_title`, `Brainwafe`.`ednote_content`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_headshot`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_logo`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_logo_url`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_title`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_subtitle`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_content`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_headshot`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_logo`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_logo_url`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_title`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_subtitle`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_content`, `Brainwafe`.`contributed_title`, `Brainwafe`.`contributed_subtitle`, `Brainwafe`.`contributed_content`, `Brainwafe`.`enable`, `Brainwafe`.`current`, `Brainwafe`.`url_hash`, `Brainwafe`.`modifier`, `BrainwavesEvent`.`id`, `BrainwavesEvent`.`event_id`, `BrainwavesEvent`.`brainwafe_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`brainwaves` AS `Brainwafe` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`brainwaves_events` AS `BrainwavesEvent` ON (`BrainwavesEvent`.`event_id` IN (129, 127, 53) AND `BrainwavesEvent`.`brainwafe_id` = `Brainwafe`.`id`)

SELECT `Program`.`id`, `Program`.`title`, `Program`.`subtitle`, `Program`.`summary`, `Program`.`description`, `Program`.`image`, `Program`.`thumbnail`, `Program`.`date`, `Program`.`feature`, `Program`.`enable`, `Program`.`created`, `Program`.`modified`, `Program`.`modifier`, `EventsProgram`.`id`, `EventsProgram`.`event_id`, `EventsProgram`.`program_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`programs` AS `Program` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`events_programs` AS `EventsProgram` ON (`EventsProgram`.`event_id` IN (129, 127, 53) AND `EventsProgram`.`program_id` = `Program`.`id`)

SELECT `Report`.`id`, `Report`.`date`, `Report`.`title`, `Report`.`subtitle`, `Report`.`summary`, `Report`.`author`, `Report`.`body`, `Report`.`upload`, `Report`.`image`, `Report`.`internal`, `Report`.`url`, `Report`.`featured`, `Report`.`program_only`, `Report`.`related`, `Report`.`enable`, `Report`.`created`, `Report`.`modified`, `Report`.`modifier` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`reports` AS `Report` WHERE `Report`.`id` IN (3, 5)

SELECT `Tracking`.`id`, `Tracking`.`referrer`, `Tracking`.`user_id`, `Tracking`.`non_member_id`, `Tracking`.`report_id`, `Tracking`.`report_download`, `Tracking`.`other`, `Tracking`.`date` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`tracking` AS `Tracking` WHERE `Tracking`.`report_id` IN (3, 5)

SELECT `Download`.`id`, `Download`.`user_id`, `Download`.`non_member_id`, `Download`.`report_id`, `Download`.`tracking_id`, `Download`.`date` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`reports_download` AS `Download` WHERE `Download`.`report_id` IN (3, 5)

SELECT `Program`.`id`, `Program`.`title`, `Program`.`subtitle`, `Program`.`summary`, `Program`.`description`, `Program`.`image`, `Program`.`thumbnail`, `Program`.`date`, `Program`.`feature`, `Program`.`enable`, `Program`.`created`, `Program`.`modified`, `Program`.`modifier`, `ProgramsReport`.`id`, `ProgramsReport`.`report_id`, `ProgramsReport`.`program_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`programs` AS `Program` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`programs_reports` AS `ProgramsReport` ON (`ProgramsReport`.`report_id` IN (3, 5) AND `ProgramsReport`.`program_id` = `Program`.`id`)

SELECT `Tag`.`id`, `Tag`.`tag`, `Tag`.`created`, `Tag`.`modified`, `ReportsTag`.`id`, `ReportsTag`.`report_id`, `ReportsTag`.`tag_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`tags` AS `Tag` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`reports_tags` AS `ReportsTag` ON (`ReportsTag`.`report_id` IN (3, 5) AND `ReportsTag`.`tag_id` = `Tag`.`id`)

SELECT `MediaCoverage`.`id`, `MediaCoverage`.`date`, `MediaCoverage`.`title`, `MediaCoverage`.`author`, `MediaCoverage`.`summary`, `MediaCoverage`.`publisher`, `MediaCoverage`.`url`, `MediaCoverage`.`created`, `MediaCoverage`.`modified`, `MediaCoverage`.`modifier`, `MediaCoverageReport`.`id`, `MediaCoverageReport`.`media_coverage_id`, `MediaCoverageReport`.`report_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`media_coverage` AS `MediaCoverage` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`media_coverage_reports` AS `MediaCoverageReport` ON (`MediaCoverageReport`.`report_id` IN (3, 5) AND `MediaCoverageReport`.`media_coverage_id` = `MediaCoverage`.`id`)

SELECT `Brainwafe`.`id`, `Brainwafe`.`issue`, `Brainwafe`.`ednote_title`, `Brainwafe`.`ednote_content`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_headshot`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_logo`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_logo_url`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_title`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_subtitle`, `Brainwafe`.`feature_content`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_headshot`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_logo`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_logo_url`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_title`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_subtitle`, `Brainwafe`.`interview_content`, `Brainwafe`.`contributed_title`, `Brainwafe`.`contributed_subtitle`, `Brainwafe`.`contributed_content`, `Brainwafe`.`enable`, `Brainwafe`.`current`, `Brainwafe`.`url_hash`, `Brainwafe`.`modifier`, `BrainwavesReport`.`id`, `BrainwavesReport`.`brainwafe_id`, `BrainwavesReport`.`report_id` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`brainwaves` AS `Brainwafe` JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`brainwaves_reports` AS `BrainwavesReport` ON (`BrainwavesReport`.`report_id` IN (3, 5) AND `BrainwavesReport`.`brainwafe_id` = `Brainwafe`.`id`)

SELECT `InnovatorProfile`.`id`, `InnovatorProfile`.`linkedin_url`, `InnovatorProfile`.`summary_bio`, `InnovatorProfile`.`answer_1`, `InnovatorProfile`.`answer_2`, `InnovatorProfile`.`answer_3`, `InnovatorProfile`.`answer_4`, `InnovatorProfile`.`answer_5`, `InnovatorProfile`.`leader_id`, `InnovatorProfile`.`modifier`, `Leader`.`id`, `Leader`.`name`, `Leader`.`job_title`, `Leader`.`company`, `Leader`.`headshot`, `Leader`.`company_logo`, `Leader`.`bio_full`, `Leader`.`summary`, `Leader`.`category`, `Leader`.`featured`, `Leader`.`program_only`, `Leader`.`game_changer_only`, `Leader`.`enable`, `Leader`.`created`, `Leader`.`modified`, `Leader`.`modifier` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`innovator_profiles` AS `InnovatorProfile` LEFT JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`leaders` AS `Leader` ON (`InnovatorProfile`.`leader_id` = `Leader`.`id`) WHERE 1 = 1 LIMIT 20, 20

SELECT COUNT(*) AS `count` FROM `bpinorg_dev`.`innovator_profiles` AS `InnovatorProfile` LEFT JOIN `bpinorg_dev`.`leaders` AS `Leader` ON (`InnovatorProfile`.`leader_id` = `Leader`.`id`) WHERE 1 = 1

Message	Memory use
Component initialization	2.19 MB
Controller action start	4.01 MB
Controller render start	4.55 MB
View render complete	5.39 MB

Message	Time in ms	Graph
Core Processing (Derived from $_SERVER["REQUEST_TIME"])	15.12
Event: Controller.initialize	26.59
Event: Controller.startup	0.29
Controller action	3.29
Event: Controller.beforeRender	19.93
» Processing toolbar data	1.89
Rendering View	59.15
» Event: View.beforeRender	0.02
» Rendering APP/View/InnovatorProfiles/index.ctp	57.06
» Event: View.afterRender	0.03
» Event: View.beforeLayout	0.03
» Rendering APP/View/Layouts/default.ctp	1.47
» » Rendering CORE/Cake/View/Elements/sql_dump.ctp	0.50
Event: View.afterLayout	0.00

Constant	Value
APP	/home/bpinorg/public_html/app/
APP_DIR	app
APPLIBS	/home/bpinorg/public_html/app/Lib/
CACHE	/home/bpinorg/public_html/app/tmp/cache/
CAKE	/home/bpinorg/public_html/lib/Cake/
CAKE_CORE_INCLUDE_PATH	/home/bpinorg/public_html/lib
CORE_PATH	/home/bpinorg/public_html/lib/
CAKE_VERSION	2.3.8
CSS	/home/bpinorg/public_html/app/webroot/css/
CSS_URL	css/
DS	/
FULL_BASE_URL	https://bpinetwork.org
IMAGES	/home/bpinorg/public_html/app/webroot/img/
IMAGES_URL	img/
JS	/home/bpinorg/public_html/app/webroot/js/
JS_URL	js/
LOGS	/home/bpinorg/public_html/app/tmp/logs/
ROOT	/home/bpinorg/public_html
TESTS	/home/bpinorg/public_html/app/Test/
TMP	/home/bpinorg/public_html/app/tmp/
VENDORS	/home/bpinorg/public_html/vendors/
WEBROOT_DIR	webroot
WWW_ROOT	/home/bpinorg/public_html/app/webroot/

Environment Variable	Value
Php Version	5.6.40
User	bpinorg
Home	/home/bpinorg
Fcgi Role	RESPONDER
Redirect Redirect Unique Id	aA_8go9e4bJcIMDRqfNa8gAAkxM
Redirect Redirect Script Url	/innovator_profiles/index/page:2
Redirect Redirect Script Uri	https://bpinetwork.org/innovator_profiles/index/page:2
Redirect Redirect Https	on
Redirect Redirect Ssl Tls Sni	bpinetwork.org
Redirect Redirect Http2	on
Redirect Redirect H2push	off
Redirect Redirect H2 Push	off
Redirect Redirect H2 Pushed
Redirect Redirect H2 Pushed On
Redirect Redirect H2 Stream Id	3
Redirect Redirect H2 Stream Tag	20153-23-3
Redirect Redirect Status	200
Redirect Unique Id	aA_8go9e4bJcIMDRqfNa8gAAkxM
Redirect Script Url	/innovator_profiles/index/page:2
Redirect Script Uri	https://bpinetwork.org/innovator_profiles/index/page:2
Redirect Https	on
Redirect Ssl Tls Sni	bpinetwork.org
Redirect Http2	on
Redirect H2push	off
Redirect H2 Push	off
Redirect H2 Pushed
Redirect H2 Pushed On
Redirect H2 Stream Id	3
Redirect H2 Stream Tag	20153-23-3
Redirect Status	200
Unique Id	aA_8go9e4bJcIMDRqfNa8gAAkxM
Script Url	/innovator_profiles/index/page:2
Script Uri	https://bpinetwork.org/innovator_profiles/index/page:2
Https	on
Ssl Tls Sni	bpinetwork.org
Http2	on
H2push	off
H2 Push	off
H2 Pushed
H2 Pushed On
H2 Stream Id	3
H2 Stream Tag	20153-23-3
Proxy-nokeepalive	1
Http Accept	/
Http User Agent	Mozilla/5.0 AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko; compatible; ClaudeBot/1.0; +claudebot@anthropic.com)
Http Accept Encoding	gzip, br, zstd, deflate
Http Host	bpinetwork.org
Http X Https	1
Path	/usr/local/jdk/bin:/usr/kerberos/sbin:/usr/kerberos/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/X11R6/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/X11R6/bin:/root/bin:/opt/bin
Server Signature
Server Software	Apache
Server Name	bpinetwork.org
Server Addr	173.231.198.134
Server Port	443
Remote Addr	18.191.222.230
Document Root	/home/bpinorg/public_html
Request Scheme	https
Context Prefix
Context Document Root	/home/bpinorg/public_html
Server Admin	webmaster@bpinetwork.org
Script Filename	/home/bpinorg/public_html/app/webroot/index.php
Remote Port	15051
Redirect Url	/app/webroot/innovator_profiles/index/page:2
Gateway Interface	CGI/1.1
Server Protocol	HTTP/2.0
Request Method	GET
Query String
Request Uri	/innovator_profiles/index/page:2
Script Name	/app/webroot/index.php
Php Self	/app/webroot/index.php
Request Time Float	1745878146.7577
Request Time	1745878146
Argc	0

Business Performance (BPI) Network

Innovator Profiles

Actions

default

Total Time: 1 ms
Total Queries: 22 queries

Query Explain:

Memory

Timers

Business Performance (BPI) Network

Innovator Profiles

Actions

Request History

Session

Request

Cake Params

Post data

Query string

Cookie

Current Route

Sql Logs

default

Total Time: 1 ms Total Queries: 22 queries

Query Explain:

Memory

Timers

Logs

View Variables

App Constants

CakePHP Constants

PHP Environment

Included Files

Include Paths

Included Files

Total Time: 1 ms
Total Queries: 22 queries