Five Ways to Commit Innovation Suicide | Gijs van Wulfen, Innovation Excellence

In one of his earlier blogs, van Wulfen identified "40 reasons why people are struggling with innovation." He writes (emphasis added):

And a lot of mistakes are made over and over again. That’s why I like to share with you five ways to commit innovation suicide. So you can avoid them in practice.

Summarized, here they are:

1. Start without business need ...
Remember: necessity is the mother of invention. So don’t try to convince others to innovate when there is no business need, because they will turn you down. ...

2. Start appointing an innovator ...
[T]here’s a huge risk that as soon as you appoint an innovator the rest of your organisation will lean back waiting. Because it is not seen as their responsibility anymore.

3. Start with an idea ...
Once you get your idea you will probably fall in love with it. That’s a great feeling. But love makes blind, unfortunately. The psychological phenomenon of selective perception will make you see only the positive points of the idea and only listen to people who are supporting you. ...

4. Start with a brainstorm ...
[W]hen you brainstorm unprepared with the usual colleagues hardly anything new appears. And you think the problem is not getting new ideas. But you are wrong. The problem is to get rid of the old ones! ...

5. Start neglecting customers ...
[E[ffective innovation is all about getting new ideas for simple solutions to solve relevant customer problems or needs. Meeting potential customers in person and finding out the customer’s frictions belong to the most effective techniques when you want to create new product ideas. ...

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