Berlin is now known as the hippest city in Europe according to the people around me. I guess they compare Berlin to New York City in the 1980s due to its cheap rents and prices, ubiquitous graffiti, and outpouring of creativity. They convert a lot of the older buildings on the former East Berlin into clubs. Since the Berlin Wall came down, Berliners have gone through massive reconstruction, mostly in what was formerly East Berlin. The heart of the city, the Mitte district, has been totally rebuilt, though remnants of the communist regime still remain. On the Museuminsel (Museum Island), the glories of Berlin's neoclassical past have been restored, including the Pergamon Museum, which houses reconstructions of structures from Ancient Greece and the Middle East. The 19th-century Reichstag building, which is the new seat of the German parliament, gained a modern glass cupola to replace the original dome destroyed by fire when the Nazis came into power. The area undergoing the greatest change is the Potsdamer Platz, where the largest of its high-density urban developments inaugurated in 1998 added 19 buildings on over 730,000 square feet of land. At the 1998 opening, the Mercedes-Benz marketing headquarters and the Berliner Volksbank in Potsdamer Platz resided alongside hundreds of shops and restaurants. I am happy to be back here this week to present a keynote topic on innovation. What a great crowd from all over the world. Been doing this for a long time and I can’t imagine I keep still having new stories to tell. But it is a hot week, hey it’s only June.
Innovation faces a different challenge particularly in continental Europe The current emphasis on innovation as a source of industrial competitiveness was put in Europe in early 90’s. An Integrated Approach to European Innovation and technology Diffusion Policy’’ in 1993, which stated that ‘’ Innovation and technology policy has an important role to play in developing the competitiveness of industry in the face of global competition and in improving the quality of life. They will face serious challenge when India and China continue to push forward with innovation in the bottom of the pyramid. Even for highly developed countries in Europe like Germany and France struggle with real bottle-neck in the research-development-innovation system is the transfer of research results to market exploitation. There are simply lack of market orientation with how they do it. Innovation is the only way if the EU intends to respond to the economic and social challenges in the next century - the Century for Innovation.
I am staying at the Q Hotel instead of staying with the event organizer. I’m not liking five stars hotel because they look and smell like a hotel. I am boutique hotel fan. This hotel was designed by GRAFT (best known for their work on Brad Pitt's Hollywood Hills studio) and they called this a new super lifestyle hotel, not sure what it means. This 5-star hotel earns a spot on Conde Nast Traveller's roundup of best cool hotels for its inventive and striking design. Several cab drivers told me Brad and Angelina stay here when they are in Berlin.
There’s lots of innovative thinking in the design of this hotel. First idea, for the first time in a hotel, walls are no longer just the boundaries of a room but actual pieces of furniture. Therefore, guests change their interaction with furniture and architecture and become the actors on the lifestyle stage. It is as if the room has been formed by movement, and it convey energy, tranquillity and inspiration and remind you of futuristic cocoons. Suggest you stay here next time you’re in Berlin. Staff are friendly and it is in a nice area too. The large hotel chains really need to rethink their business. When was the last innovation coming from the big chains? W Hotel I guess, it was a long time ago. Honestly most of these hotel sucks, even if they are 5 stars.
Back to the topic of innovation, I was working on my keynote over lunch. innovation is about doing things differently, doing odd things and doing different things and sometimes crazy things with an intent to change a business, an industry or even the world. Innovation has no best practices and doesn’t need them. It needs aspiration, imagination, new tools and open mind. As a starting point, start thinking different. I used this analogy often in my keynotes, if you are a fish in the ocean, you will be the last one to know what’s water like. It is important to go and get outside help and start to look at your industry to understand where others are focusing their efforts. Industry executives frequently read the same magazine, think the same problem (the idea of an industry is everyone in the same business, solving similar customer problems and often making the same return on capital deployed), and this leads to parallel agendas. Then comes the best practices (tier-four) consultant to help you to benchmark your operations and become even more like everyone. This is a proven formula to mediocrity and a path this is familiar to many.
First thing to start for innovation is to look beyond your industry not only the immediate threats but also for opportunities to borrow ideas emerging in other industries and adaptable to yours. At Idea Couture, we call it “Comparative and Competitive” analysis.
Second thing is to go deep into the lives of your customer and understand their needs, desires and jobs-to-be-done as well the rituals of getting those jobs done. Our anthropologists spend weeks in the life of customers to capture those moments where they need help and often those unarticulated and unmet needs are a great source of innovation ideas. Setting the right climate is another key factor.
You need a structured approach to play and these sessions need to involve outside people beyond the company’s team. Idea Couture’s NoodelPlay uses a mulit-workshop setting with a structures play approach to bring these ideas to life in a story telling fashion. This is where we apply ‘design thinking’ concepts to strategizing. As needs are uncovered and business concepts emerge to address them, the discovery effort shifts to economics of delivery and industry competitive dynamics. To be continue next week.
