Blog 6- THE ERA OF OPEN INNOVATION BY CHARLES LEADBEATER

 

THE ERA OF OPEN INNOVATION BY CHARLES LEADBEATER

Why Open Innovation is unstoppable?

Charles Leadbeater argues that innovation isn’t just for professionals anymore. He wonderfully articulates that amateurs with passion and new tools are capable of creating products and paradigms.

Charles Leadbeater is the author of We-Think: Mass innovation, not mass production: The Power of Mass. In the video, he explains why open innovation is the future. Users and community’s innovation is unstoppable despite all the obstacles that it finds.

Firstly, he uses the example of mountain bikes to explain how users create a product they wanted 15 years before the big bike companies realized that there was a market for it. That happened, according to Leadbeater, because users had an incentive that big corporations hadn’t.  They were tired of the traditional products they were offered so they decided to create a new one. We have the ability to harness technology, to make it work for us, to enhance are capabilities and unleash our ideas.  Technology is no longer an adjunct to our lives but an integral part of it. We use it, we wear it, and it has become woven into the fabric of our daily lives. This fusing together of our physical and digital worlds, which we call Blended Reality, will enable a wave of new experiences and innovations. I believe there are five key emerging technologies – Hyper Mobility, 3D Transformation, the Internet of All Things, Immersive Experiences and Smart Machines – which will have the biggest impact on Blended Reality and empower a new generation of creators, makers, designers, entrepreneurs and industries.

 

This practical case shows that creativity and innovation are not something driven by special people in special places thinking about special ideas, while consumers are passive and just can say yes or no to the invention. According to Leadbeater, innovation doesn’t occur only in the laboratories of large companies or garages. And neither does it arise spontaneously from people whom we consider geniuses. Innovation comes from collaboration and it is the result of a cumulative process.

 

Traditional labs vs open innovation spaces

He thinks that the traditional vision of big companies, creating places like R&D parks and looking for more special people, has always been wrong. Creativity is highly collaborative and interactive. In addition, he thinks that big corporate structures aren’t taught to foster innovation. Innovation means uncertainty, not direct profits. He explains that the more radical the innovation, the higher the degree of uncertainty.

Passionate amateurs don’t think in terms of direct profits. Passion moves them. They have the skills, they invest time and they get results. And this is the potential of Open Innovation: consumption expresses production potential.

These user-innovators don’t think they are doing important stuff or something that matters. But, as consumers, they are creating something they won’t. Leadbeater argues that the best competitor against monopolies is consumer driven innovation.  He believes that people are interested in participating and that it will be a huge movement. Global demographic shifts and technology trends are informing a new generation of thinkers and makers. Soon there will be 8 billion people in the world, including enormous waves of digital natives and graying populations, along with the technology and energy resources required for their support and success. Massive shifts of wealth are occurring between established and emerging countries, and technology advancements are leapfrogging generations of infrastructure. These shifts fuel the imagination of everyone from engineers to entrepreneurs as they develop new products and services. For established enterprises in this emerging environment, he believes that change, disruption, and reinvention are not challenges to be navigated, but behaviors to embrace and drive.

Reference:

https://www.ted.com/talks/charles_leadbeater_the_era_of_open_innovation?language=en

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