Last week I was in Orlando for the Open Innovation Summit. I, along with several other speakers, talked about how innovation is often sparked by a burning platform. In other words, a crisis! The conference chair Michael Arndt wrote an article about it in his Businessweek blog titled Next Innovation Tools & Trends. I highly recommend reading not only this article, but others in his blog.
Companies like Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble, Whirlpool and others have done some remarkable innovating via strategic alliances in economic downturns, and those case studies are fascinating.
If you missed this year’s inaugural Open Innovation Summit, I encourage you to attend next year! It’s a conference that delivers practical strategies on how to manage Open Innovation initiatives and get the absolute maximum return on your R&D investments.