Unilever, Walmart, P&G Buck the Short-Term Trend†

As Recession Forces Cuts, Leaders Build for Future With Marketing, R&D

Advertising Age, June 29, 2009 — It's been said over and over: There's no time like recession, when competitors are retreating, to ramp up innovation and marketing to grab share.

So far, the competitors have done their part. U.S. trademark applications through mid-June were down 17% from a year ago; patent application growth stalled last year after more than a decade of high single-digit annual growth; and ad spending plunged 14% last quarter, according to TNS Media Research.

The intrepid share-grabbers have been harder to find. Now, however, as the dust settles from the fourth-quarter financial collapse, a growing number of them appear to be sticking their heads out of the bunkers to lay the groundwork for long-term growth in a short-term-obsessed world.

Using Design to Drive Innovation

Designers must deliver the orchestration of the total experience with a brand, product, or service or face irrelevancy

BusinessWeek, June 29, 2009 — In a previous era, all the talk was of strategy, strategy, strategy. More recently, it's been innovation, innovation, innovation. As design thinking seems poised to sweep away some of today's celebrated innovation practices, we must be wondering what new provocation is on the horizon. Relax, I'm not planning to conjure one up.

How to Kick Off an Innovation Project

To build consumer loyalty, Office Max launched a study of what women look for when they buy office supplies

BusinessWeek, June 24, 2009 — "Life is beautiful. Work can be, too." So ends a fantastical commercial for the office supplies company, OfficeMax (OMX), which aired in cinemas earlier this year.

More than just a new marketing campaign, the ad reflects a new direction for a company that had previously based its competitive strategy on price and location

Netflix Boss Plots Life After the DVD†

Wall Street Journal, June 23, 2009 — Netflix Inc. is a standout in the recession. The DVD-rental company added more subscribers than ever during the first three months of the year. Its stock has more than doubled since October.

But Netflix's chief executive officer, Reed Hastings, thinks his core business is doomed. As soon as four years from now, he predicts, the business that generates most of Netflix's revenue today will begin to decline, as DVDs delivered by mail steadily lose ground to movies sent straight over the Internet. So Mr. Hastings, who co-founded the company, is quickly trying to shift Netflix's business — seeking to make more videos available online and cutting deals with electronics makers so consumers can play those movies on television sets.

Can Governments Till the Fields of Innovation?

New York Times, June 21, 2009 — INNOVATION — the tricky, many-step process by which ideas become products and services — has typically been seen, studied and celebrated at the micro level, as a pursuit for entrepreneurs and clever companies.

But governments are increasingly wading into the innovation game, declaring innovation agendas and appointing senior innovation officials. The impetus comes from two fronts: daunting challenges in fields like energy, the environment and health care that require collaboration between the public and private sectors; and shortcomings of traditional economic development and industrial policies.

Google Searches for Ways to Keep Big Ideas at Home†

Wall Street Journal, June 18, 2009 — Google Inc. is revamping how it develops and prioritizes new products, giving employees a pipeline to the company's top brass amid worries about losing its best people and promising ideas to start-ups.

The Mountain View, Calif., company famously lets its engineers spend one day a week on projects that aren't part of their jobs. But Google has lacked a formal process for senior executives to review those efforts, and some ideas have languished. Others have slipped away when employees left the company.

Ten Commandments from Entrepreneurial 'Evangelist' Guy Kawasaki

Knowledge@Wharton, June 10, 2009 — When Guy Kawasaki talks about business innovation, as he did recently at a University of Pennsylvania technology conference, he brings more than 25 years of major-league experience to the conversation — a background that the good-humored investor and entrepreneur calls "my checkered past." After getting a psychology degree at Stanford and an MBA at UCLA, the Hawaii-born Kawasaki became the second software "evangelist" at Apple Computer, where his job from 1983 to 1987 was to convince people to create software for the Macintosh. Kawasaki fondly recalls his colleagues at Apple as visionary, driven and "arguably the greatest collection of egomaniacs in the history of California — though the record has subsequently been broken by Google."

Smart Balance Keeps Tight Focus on Creativity†

Heart-Healthy Food Developer Outsources Manufacturing, Distribution to Target In-House Strength on New Products

Wall Street Journal, June 9, 2009 — The product-development laboratory at Smart Balance Inc., a food marketer keen to grow through innovation, contains chemical analyzers, lab benches and refrigerated cases. But there are rarely people.

"We don't have legions of white coats," explains Robert S. Gluck, Smart Balance's chief operating officer. Six of its staffers are charged with developing products, but they often work in suppliers' facilities nowhere near its headquarters here.

Smart Balance helps people stay lean with "heart healthy" merchandise, including low-cholesterol spreads, peanut butter, popcorn, cooking oil and milk. The company itself is lean as well, with just 67 employees and scant fixed assets. Its "virtual" business model outsources almost everything else, including... continue reading

News Flash From the Future: What Will Journalism Look Like?

Fast Company, June 1, 2009 — We asked the top media minds at global design and innovation firm IDEO (designer of the Apple mouse, consultant to Fortune 500 companies) to imagine: How will we get our news after the traditional model falls apart? Here's their answer.

Six Ways to Avoid Landing in the Product Failur

Fast Company, May 29, 2009 — A decade ago the ability to generate ideas for businesses was a terrific and unique offering, and often a good business. Many companies and consultants were conducting workshops aimed at coming up with ideas, hundreds of ideas, and getting paid handsomely to do it. Today, it seems most of the businesses I deal with have more than enough ideas, it's determining the right ones to invest time and energy into that is the trick.