Anyone can do it – how much courage do you need for innovation?

by Bernd Huth

21 April is the official World Creativity and Innovation Day. The idea originated in Canada in 2001 as World Creativity and Innovation Day (WCID). However, it took another 17 years until the UN General Assembly approved it by resolution. The WCID aims to raise people’s awareness of the potential of creativity and innovation. As a product designer, the tension between creativity and innovation is an integral part of my daily work.

Mutiger Flugversuch im Sommer 1893

Not every project is suitable for creating innovations, but innovations often emerge “quasi incidentally” in design projects, for example through design thinking and other creativity techniques. One would assume that this is always cause for great happiness. But often enough, SMEs in particular are overextended with innovations and prefer to follow established trends. New, innovative products usually also require new technologies in production. In addition, they also need to be accompanied by different communication to explain the novelty. In general, innovations require not only a willingness to take risks, but also a strategy to be able to use the entire innovation potential economically in the long term.

Too many companies stumble into the future instead of moving forward with an open culture of innovation.

Armando Garcia Schmidt, Economist and Director of Studies at Bertelsmann Stiftung.

Innovation strategies should be concrete, implementation-oriented, free of contradictions, clear and understandable. With a good strategy and the appropriate partners, the new loses its “fear” and all potentials can be used. Innovations promise long-term economic success if they are properly implemented and launched on the market, and if they are accompanied by good communication. Innovations do not necessarily have to be completely new product or process launches, but can also be optimizations and improvements of existing products.

Contact me without any obligation to discover the innovation potential in your company together.

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