Vision - January/February 2008 - (Page 5) Innovation: a springboard to becoming a high-performance business Becoming and remaining an innovation leader has not been easy for Consumer Electronics (CE) companies in recent years—especially given the ever-shortening life spans of CE products. But it's getting even more difficult as software and the user experience increasingly form the basis of product differentiation, and as emerging markets demand fully functional products at much lower prices. The innovation challenge is one of the critical topics that Accenture routinely addresses in its work with the world's leading CE companies. And in this work—as well as our ongoing research on the characteristics of high-performance businesses and conversations with influential CE executives—we've identified a number of capabilities that are critical to establishing and sustaining market-leading innovation. Letting go of old ideas while respecting the past. Companies must be willing and able to replace old ideas—even ones that have been successful—with new ones while continuing to learn from past efforts. Motivating employees with the pressure of competition—internal and external. Whether it's showing employees how their products fare against others in the market, or encouraging internal teams to compete in hatching new ideas, leaders see competition as a strong impetus for innovation. Creating an innovation-appropriate organization structure. When a product must be conceived, designed, built, tested and rolled out to the marketplace much more quickly than ever before, having a product team that includes representatives from all relevant functional areas becomes essential. Having leadership that sets the tone and culture for innovation. Top executives can inspire and challenge others more effectively and credibly if they are intimately involved in innovation efforts, understand what drives innovation and know how innovation gets done in their organizations. Building strong innovation execution processes supported by appropriate technology tools. Companies achieve high performance and market leadership only if they can both generate great ideas and quickly and effectively translate those ideas into an offering that customers buy. Using appropriate metrics to gauge success. Leaders use robust and appropriate metrics to identify which innovation efforts should be funded, keep their innovation activities oriented in the right direction, and enhance the chances of creating winning products. Welcoming new ideas regardless of their source. Today's most innovative CE companies have shifted from owning all aspects of the innovation process to a much more open style of innovation in which collaboration with external partners is highly valued. Knowing the right time for a new offering. CE leaders have capabilities that enable them to gather market data from a wide variety of sources and analyze that data to know when the time is right to strike with a particular offering. The Importance of Thinking Differently CE companies today have many options for growth. But to achieve their growth goals, they need to think differently. They must break old paradigms and thinking about what they can do and can't do—and how long things will take. Accenture believes that the winning CE companies today and beyond will be those that can truly leave old ideas and approaches behind, establish and sustain visionary leadership that fosters a culture of innovation, and build the robust execution capabilities necessary for translating great ideas into high performance. For a more detailed look at Accenture's insights on critical capabilities for achieving sustained innovation and high performance, download our report "CEO Perspectives on High Performance: Innovation Challenge" at accenture.com/CEAvision4 http://www.accenture.com/CEAvision4 http://www.accenture.com/CEAvision4
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