Forscher.consultancy
3

Dear Rahul,

I appreciate you spend time to explore more about Research & Innovation. I understand Innovation & R&D are close terms & my biggest concern is that only Indian company has gel them so much that it sounds same. But if companies can able to differentiate them in terms of not limiting Innovation till R&D only then it would benefit our companies lot like companies in western countries.

Well in case of dell, it was study of circuit how it works so study & R&D is different. Its like we study "how engine works" in thermodynamics that doesn't mean we have done R&D in engine. R&D already done & we are studying its working. same thing with dell, he studied how circuit works. (I hope this is not going to initiate new debate on study & Research). Also, market research I don't think its a part of R&D department. So, i can surely separate market research from R&D. As, you mentioned "it was not systematic & scientific research" then its no way related R&D as R&D is all about systematic & scientific research.

Yes, market study / market research is the part of Innovation but again I dont think u need R&D lab to carry out market research. Innovation is more about improving ways of doing same thing/ new ways of doing same thing in any area not just R&D thats why Topic of discussion is "Business Innovation, A Success path of Dell, Micromax. Is your company on same path ?" & my point is Innovation in business model can be done for achieving success in the market dont just relay on R&D for producing Innovative product. Consider case of Malls "all shops under one roof" is the Innovative Business model now I would be happy to know which companies R&D has generated this concept, if only R&D can bring Innovation. We can have Innovation in Business process, Innovation in HR, Innovation in marketing, Innovation in everything we do only if we understand difference between R&D & Innovation. Else believe me u will land up spending all Innovation Initiative money in R&D & come out with hi tech product like IBM laptop whose market will be soon eaten up by Dells Innovative Business model. So, are we ready to broaden Innovation out of R&D ?

Regards

Sarang

Forscher Consultancy

From India, Mumbai
thapar.rahul@gmail.com
2

Dear Sarang,

Thanks.

Of course if we will go in nitti gritty of words like study and research, discussion will be longer...(i don't mind that but right now I am not intended to because of some contraints). Still I will think upon this and may reply lately or seperately..

I undersand from you reply that for you "R&D" means systematic and scientific ones (as per what you have explained)...but what I said was any "research", it may not be defined by systemetic boundaries. (please refer all the three examples I gave in my previous post). So, our differences of understaing of same word seems different based on our definitions!!!! This is normal human process.

As you said "Yes, market study / market research is the part of Innovation but again I dont think u need R&D lab to carry out market research", I feel there is difference in notions of R&D - here in this topic I considered all R&Ds and you seems to be fixed only to the labs (like scientific and technology labs (science based). (though there are market research labs as well).

Anyway, I feel as per your definition of R&D, as it seems to me, all innovations not require to go along with R&D. As per my thoughts as of now, "Research" is "research" and innovations eventually are tend to go through the research process. For this you can consider my example about innovating HR processes (according to your definition of research - no research is done there and as per me human brain will do some or other research which may not be articulated).

Please check your last para - there you came back again with definition of Research. Mall concepts might have come from consumer buying behavior where behavior scientists have done lot of researches. You may say that innovator has not done any research. I agree, based on your definition. As per me: My assumtion is that our brain does the researches at neurotic level which we may not be aware of consciously - one tends to do the research.

I am not being rigid, and I think discussion should flow further with examples and there we can also explore research related concepts.

Going ahead...

Further examples:

(1) White revolution - Anand: Vaghese kurian: No research as per you, as per me there was huge understanding of socio-economic-polictical-cultural understanding....

(2) Gram panchayat system: no R&D expenses, came from experience and understanding of society - Mr. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi played major role. (but they all had non scientifc research info based on their experience)

(3) Online purchasing (e-bay, Amazon etc) : Cutting supply chain cost for forward integrating businesses and providing goods at cheaper rate.

Regards,

Rahul

From India, Mumbai
Forscher.consultancy
3

Dear Rahul,

Thanks for adding your notes on Research. Well, yes if you go through quickly from start of this thread you will find I mentioned R&D as scientific research. I agree on your point behavioral research , market research is the part of Innovation in fact focus group labs & psychological product testing labs are also there. There primary goal is to see how customer react to Innovative product & how old products can be made better in terms of product experience. Like TV to LCD n LCD to plasma TV u get better n better experience.

Ok lets Include Research in the Innovation & proceed with the topic "How to carry out Innovation for small companies in small budget ? " I hope that will make everyone comfortable with the discussion; will be helpful to readers also & will serve the primary objective of discussion "how to carry out Innovation". I feel small companies should take following steps;

1) Innovation group: Form group of 5-7 people who will be responsible for carrying out Innovation in the company in all departments. Here, team should be very diverse in terms of ages, experience & background. So, team will have employee of age 40 to 24, from accounts, engineering, marketing etc. For only reason to have free flowing Ideas which will not only stick to the frame of engineering or marketing etc.

2) Study system: Study the existing structure of business model & customer pains with the service or product they are providing. You can do market & Behavior research to identify problem areas.

3) Generating Ideas: Once problem areas are Identified use different thinking methods like critical thinking, Reverse thinking, random idea generation, parallel thinking, 6-Hats thinking, & various Idea generation method to come out with Innovative Idea to address the problems of customer pain & existing business model.

4) Innovation payback: Plot Innovation payback curve total time vs budget curve for concept to market.

5) Report Making : Present report to higher management & pass the budget.

6) Work on Idea: Carry out concept to improvement in product / service task.

7) Testing: Carry out testing with focus groups & other methods. Update the concept with feedback & again make improvements in product / service.

I feel dedicated person should be there to monitor whole Innovation process, for Identifying barriers, controlling cost for smooth execution of Innovation.

This is roughly based on my readings on Innovation. Please add your opinion if you think Innovation can be done differently or few more steps are required in above procedure. Looking forward for more knowledge exchange.

Regards

Sarang

Forscher Consultancy

From India, Mumbai
thapar.rahul@gmail.com
2

Dear Sarang,

Going ahead..I read the steps mentioned by you. It is appreciable.

My points:

- When you say group of 5-7 people from diverse functions, idea is good. I think there should be some mechanism to understand dynamics of that group. I am coming from behavior science point of view. If group energy is constructive and ready to confront the problem them it can do wonders else it can come up with no good results.

- Secondly, idea generation shouldn't be limited to this group only. innovative ideas can be there in any corner of the organization - how to tap? For example,what I can think is that this group has one or two representative of each department. So once pain area is identified, they can go back to there department and then there small groups can be formed to work and generate more ideas for that issue. These ideas can be brought back to the primary group (which you said contains 5 - 7 members), say account department takes up these ideas and go back to their department and work on the costing of different ideas/designs. Which means each representative goes back to their department for further idea generation. Here the process will become little lengthy, so technology can be useful.

Regards,
Rahul

From India, Mumbai
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