Orient - The Official Magazine of the British Chamber of Commerce Singapore - Issue 71 April 2019
Anyone who talks about really big innovations today immediately thinks of start-ups. Young, unconventional companies that are putting the established market players to the test: From Airbnb to Grab to Tesla - the examples are always the same.
Even if the perception is misleading and still an essential part of the innovative products and services is generated in "big companies", it shows that established companies find it difficult to completely question their services and products and thus ensure that new developments are made. When it comes to innovation, start-ups have a decisive advantage. They have no past. They don't have to stick to complex processes, and they don't have to pay attention to existing customers. They are simply flexible and mobile per se. But this plus in agility goes hand in hand with a minus in experience, capital and awareness in the market.
The question therefore arises: Why can't established companies make better use of their strong starting position? What do they have to do to ensure successful innovations with the same agility as a start-up? Agility in a company means that while it has a vision and a clear goal, it remains flexible on the way there, moves forward in stages, tries out and learns. This step-by-step approach is not planned down to the last detail. In this way, it contradicts roughly everything that can be done in large companies. From the budgeting processes to the official purchasing to the target agreements of the employees, very little is geared towards agility. The culture and rhythm of a large company have grown historically and have been optimised for specific processes and are not flexible. This cannot be changed overnight and hampers innovation - especially in the area of digital transformation. Being innovative means consistently questioning what already exists. Companies must observe the environment and learn from other industries. And it needs speed - at a horrendous pace. And thus, the well-known waterfall thinking of many companies being doomed to failure. Companies should not waste valuable time judging hypotheses. Today, direct feedback from the market is in demand, a market that is changing more and more rapidly. It therefore needs the first prototypes quickly, with which the idea can be tested by the customer and immediately improved or even discarded.
Buying Start-up DNA
Implementing all this in an existing organisation is extremely challenging. But there are numerous ways to increase agility in your own company. For example, some companies are setting up "Innovation Labs" internally or are setting up a new organisation at the same time. However, this does not really protect against industry and company blindness. External innovation partners can help. You buy the DNA of a young company on the market. Zuhlke has launched "Rent a Startup" for this purpose: Companies can rent a complete start-up team for a certain period of time, detached from day-to-day business and outside their own organisation. Together with selected customer experts, Zuhlke experts from a wide range of disciplines work on future products and services. The innovation services provider also offers the appropriate infrastructure and an inspiring environment. The Goal: After a short time, the first prototype is ready for testing by the user. The company took inspiration for this offer from its Ventures team and from existing start-up customers who have successfully established such environments in the Zuhlke buildings. Being innovative means staying on the ball. An innovation can still be the ultimate today and be outdated tomorrow. Companies must learn to learn continuously. All innovation projects - especially in the digital field - should be designed in such a way that they can be further developed and expanded as flexibly as possible.