Tag: Open innovation

You know you need a social innovation software. A tool that is going to help you stay connected with your team and keep on track with your breakthrough project. You know that ideas can happen anytime and anywhere and that everyone on your team deserves an equal voice. So now that you’re ready to find the right tool, what features should you be looking for in an open innovation software? Our team has run open innovation contests, utilised design thinking for social change, and run projects and campaigns to boost social innovation. So what do we find most useful in a social innovation tool? ##5 Things to Look for in a Social Innovation Software:

1. Flexibility

Every project is different. Whether you have a team of 10 based in a few different cities or a team of hundreds based all...

This post was originally published on crisscrossed.net

It is great to see that our publication is now available as an eBook. For this project, I worked together with the GIZ, namely Jan Schwaab, and Christian Gmelin, to create 10 exciting chapters, which enlighten the abstract concept of innovation. The various chapters provide an overview and practical advice on how to pursue an open innovation approach. Thanks to all the authors. Following are some introductions to the chapters.

1. Creating Space for Change##

Geraldine de Bastion

Africa’s Technology Innovation Hubs

Social Media have by now spread to all corners of the world, including the remotest areas in Africa. They have changed our personal and professional communication, our news and consumption habits and the way we share information. New markets and industries are...

This is where we answer questions from our community (that’s you!). This week’s interview is about what to do when resistance comes up during the open innovation process; from team members or from the participants in your workshop. I chat with the founder of WE THINQ, Christian Kreutz, about his experiences with resistance and the ‘angry citizen’.

Kayla: Hi, I’m Kayla.

Christian: Hi, I’m Christian.

Kayla: We are going to be starting a video series today where we answer questions from our community. If you want ask a question, you can go to the page questions.wethinq.com and ask a question and we will do our best to answer it.

Today’s question is what resistance could come up during the open innovation process? What happens if my team members don’t support me in the process? How do you deal with...

Originally published on the Crisscrossed blog.

After months of work Crisscrossed is now finally released to the public for free. Every line of code and all thoughts behind it. Good ideas and probably also so not so good ones. The philosopy behind it all is simple: An idea needs to prove itself and can only be improved if its “recipe” is as transparent as possible. For us at [Crisscrossed] (http://www.crisscrossed.de), it was our first open source software project and as an outcome ther was the realization that open source innovation is essential for how we collaborate on ideas to make them become reality in a complex world.

Traditionally, collaborative efforts were limited by restrictions such as geographical boundaries. People needed to be in the same physical proximity to work on projects, greatly limiting their scope. Open source...

Originally published on the Crisscrossed blog.

Open source software has become a strong movement and as it gains popularity it leads most software companies to engage with the expanding open source community. All things digital, being it music, photos, etc., have in one way or another become free thanks to some clever licenses. What is not so often noticed is how the vision of open source spreads to other sectors and leads to a fascinating array of tools, thanks for example to 3D printing, and communities, which form a new way of open collaboration. I made a small exploration to search for great projects.

To begin with, there is a nice definition by the University of Hamburg:

Open Source Innovation, according to our definition, refers to an innovation, which is (1) generated through volunteer...

Last Updated December 19,2016

Conferences are a great way to expand your knowledge and build your networks. We’ve compiled this list to help you find the perfect open innovation conference! Please let us know if you have a good one to add!

Open Innovation Conferences:

TechConnect World Innovation - The TechConnect World Innovation Conference is an annual event uniquely designed to accelerate the commercialization of innovations out of the lab and into industry. May 14-17 2017, Washington.

London Technology Week - London Technology Week is a week of face-to-face events celebrating London’s global position as a hotbed of tech innovation, business successes, entrepreneurship and creative talent. 12 - 16th June 2017 , London.

OpenSym - OpenSym is the conference for researchers and practitioners of open collaboration concepts, processes, and technology, as found in open access, open...

The most successful companies in the world today have done thingss differently than their predecessors. They had to. Google and Microsoft both started with 2 employees. So how did these companies, and many startups that came after them, break the molds in their industries and come out ahead of the competition? Mark Zuckerburg’s slogan “Move fast and break things”, now updated to “Move fast with stable infrastructure”, gives some insight into the mentality of these organisations. Instead of wasting time holding meetings and filing paperwork, the smallness of their organisations allowed them to move quickly, experiment, and get direct feedback from their fans and customers. These startups are now some of the biggest companies in the world. Yet they still manage to continually create new products and improve their old ones; growing their revenues and their value to their communities.

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The ultimate resource list for change makers and innovators. If you are looking for open innovation toolkits, open innovation whitepapers, and open innovation best practices, you have come to the right place. We have compiled this list of toolkits, whitepapers, and best practices to help you find in depth information about open innovation. If you have a great whitepaper, toolkit, or article to add to the list- let us know in the comments!

Toolkits

100 Open Innovation Toolkit - A variety of different open innovation tools to help you in every stage of the innovation process!

100% Open Innovation Toolkit For Charities - All the great tools in the open innovation toolkit, specifically geared towards charities. In the form of a handy slideshare presentation.

Accelerate Open Innovation Toolkit - A comprehensive guide through the open innovation...

When you’re planning an open innovation initative, there can be a lot to keep up with. We’ve boiled down the key steps of open innovation into this infographic. Feel free to print out this infograph or the accompanying checklist as a quick tool to use for your next innovation project!

□ What challenge are you trying to solve? Tip: Start small and add more depth as you go. The more concrete your challenge is the better feedback you get.

□ Can you boil down this challenge down to one key question? Tip: Ask your question like you’re telling a story. Setting a frame around the whole process is very important to keep the focus.

□ How do you get stakeholders to participate? Tip: Involve from the beginning critical stakeholders such as the management.

□ What kind...

We’ve written a lot about finding participants for your idea contests. Often, you want to find as many participants from different backgrounds for your competitions. After all, the benefit of going on-line is being able to include anyone from anywhere with an internet connection.

But what if your idea competition fits in a niche?

What if you are holding an idea competition for a specific group of people. For example, a search for ways to get young people more involved in your local government. You may not want to reach out to communities around the world because, the group that will be affected by this initiative, are the youth living in your city. As much as Lucy from Canada might have some great ideas, you are looking for things that resonate with the young people in Islington, not young people...

Should you structure collaboration? If you’re reading this blog, I’m guessing you’re already a big fan of open innovation and collaboration. You know how it can build ownership over a project and lead to a creative solution to a challenge. But how can you harness this collaboration? You don’t want to stifle creativity by putting rules on the process, yet a free-flow approach may lack focus. So how do you choose, or find a balance between, the two approaches? Let’s first take a look at what each kind of collaboration looks like:

Unstructured Collaboration:

Unstructured collaboration is what we think of when we envision creativity and open innovation. There can be guidelines in an unstructured collaboration session, but there are no strict rules. Participants are left to their own devices to come up with ideas. A ‘blue sky’ session,...

There’s an app for that. More specifically, there is an app that detects malaria in children; helping them get treatment before the disease becomes fatal. Technology exists to help the visually impaired interact with their surroundings, and to convert sign language into speech. But how do these ideas become reality? It takes more than just one person and one idea to make great innovations like this happen.

How do these new technologies go from being an inkling of an idea to a product that is helping improve lives and communities?

The people behind these social innovations accessed the right opportunities. They were able to pitch their products to the right people by participating in idea contests and prize challenges. But before the pitch they were able to get feedback from an array of different people to fine...

We love writing about innovations that are making the world a better place. It’s exciting to watch creative minds tackle social challenges. With the growing costs of healthcare and rising rates of obesity, it’s fair to say that improving health is one of the biggest challenges our communities are facing today. Thanks to policy changes, innovative organisations, and wearable technology, getting healthier is becoming more accessible than ever. New technologies and programs are increasing our access to health education, healthy food, exercise, and healthy environments. Here are our 5 favourite innovations that are making us healthier:

1. Fresh! Healthy Vending

Healthy snacking is an important part of maintaining a healthy weight. But it can be hard to get the nutrients we need if we are faced with potato crisps and chocolate bars as our only snacking options. Fresh...

“After years of telling corporate citizens to ‘trust the system,’ many companies must relearn instead to trust their people - and encourage their people to use neglected creative capacities in order to tap the most potent economic stimulus of all: idea power.” - Rosabeth Moss Kanter

It’s no secret: our world is rapidly changing. The system is broken, and those that aren’t creating a better world, are getting left behind. Open innovation is a system that gives ideas power, not people. Many organisations use open innovation to find the best ideas and work with their communities to improve their services. So how can you also get these ideas from your community? How can you create a culture of innovation in your workplace? The best ideas probably already exist- in the minds of your community and co-workers. If you follow these...

Getting started with open innovation can feel overwhelming. The opportunities with open innovation are so vast that knowing where to begin can be daunting. We’ve compiled this list of our favourite open innovation examples and resources to help you get clarity around your initiative. Whether you are wondering if open innovation is right for your organisation or you are an open innovation pro, our resource list will point you in the right direction! If you have anything to add please leave it in the comments!

This page is updated regularly. Last Updated: June 23, 2017

Prize Challenges

• Eyeka- Limited number of competitions right now but we are hoping to see this one grow!
• My Starbucks Idea - Submit ideas for Starbucks products or community initiatives.
• GE Ecomagination - Submit ideas for environmentally friendly products.
• <a...

And the winner is… eMio sharing!

Climate KIC was looking for solutions that reduce carbon emissions in urban transport systems. After 10 finalist teams attended venture weekend workshops, a winner and two runner ups were announced. eMio sharing is a scooter sharing program that will be implemented in Berlin in 2015.

This challenge is a great example of how online and offline platforms can be utilised to get the most out of your idea competition. Let’s review the process climate KIC took to get their sustainable transport initiative:

1. Definition of Challenge and Call For Proposals

Climate KIC was clear about what problem they wanted to solve:

THE CHALLENGE

Urban transport is a significant contributor to climate change. About 28% of greenhouse gas emissions in the EU presently come from transport, with 84% of that...

At WE THINQ, We work with a lot of change makers who are always looking for new and better ways to achieve results. Open innovation is our go-to process to see change, but there are other methods used to inspire creative problem solving. Design thinking is a widely used process based on the premise that everyone can be part of creating a more desirable future. Both design thinking and open innovation are used to create positive changes in organisations and communities. So what is the difference between these two methods and how can you choose which is right for your project or organisation?

Design Thinking: The People Focused Approach

Design thinking outlines a 5 step strategy to innovation:

1. Empathy: Get to know your audience. The core of design thinking involves focusing on the customer. Many ideas fail because...

I’ve collected 28 of my favourite quotes on innovation and creativity. Enjoy these quick nuggets of wisdom. I hope they will inspire you in your work and give you a new perspective on your day!

1. “You can’t solve a problem on the same level that it was created. You have to rise above it to the next level.” - Albert Einstein

2. “The creation of something new is not accomplished by the intellect, but by the play instinct arising from inner necessity. The creative mind plays with the object it loves.” - Carl Jung

3. “There is only one thing stronger than all the armies of the world: and that is an idea whose time has come.” - Victor Hugo

4. “I will act as if what I do will make a difference.” - William...

One of the most exciting things about working with the WE THINQ software, is getting to see what our amazing clients are working on. There’s nothing like seeing an Open Innovation Slam go down first hand, with a software that you are a part of. Which leads me to one of the most exciting initiatives coming out of Europe right now:

The Climate-KIC Open Innovation Slam

It is a pivotal time in Europe right now for climate change. The UN climate summit accompanied by various climate marches took place this past week, and Europeans seem to be ripe with ideas on how to curb climate change. Climate- KIC, partnering with Berliner Verkehrsbetriebe (BVG), The Berlin Centre for Entrepreneurship, EUREF, and centre for innovation and business creation at TUM are teaming up to host an open innovation slam. The goal...

Are you interested in the social innovation projects that are helping businesses to increase revenue while positively impacting society? In a business setting, this sort of innovation is crucial and if you can implement them in your own business, you’ll not only benefit those who you do business with, you’ll also improve your profits. Here are some of the projects we really respect from the world of business.

Digital Hub Workspaces Breed Creativity

Firstly, in cities across the world, digital hub workspaces – sometimes referred to as cooperatives – have been sprouting up waiting to be filled by eager creative and technical people looking to share ideas, collaborate and make cool stuff. A good example is Duke Studio opening in Leeds where young digital creative freelancers can share a single space and collaborate. If your business can make...

Many large companies have embraced open innovation as a viable mechanism for realizing their research and development needs. However, fortunes vary greatly owing to the nature of some projects and the caliber of innovators involved. Whether a project is science or market oriented, success is evaluated based on financial impact, transfer volume, as well as the time it takes to reach the desired goals. Tapping into external sources for collaboration ideas through innovation challenges is not a new concept.

Open Innovation Success Examples

A number of companies have tasted success through the implementation of well-designed open innovation projects. Crowdsourcing product innovations can reap huge rewards that outstrip rewards paid out to participants. Strong innovation management policies enable companies to continually reinvent their operations by injecting fresh ideas that shape the future. Here are a few product innovation examples.

General...

In the new age of entrepreneurship, innovation has taken on many faces. Primarily, innovation is shifting how we approach developing ideas that truly problem-solve and disrupt in new ways. The truth is, while we are all “brilliant” entrepreneurs and thinkers, we often don’t have all the answers. Sure, we can go on retreats and build mind maps that can lead to some brilliant answers to some of the modern world’s complex (or mundane) problems, but sometimes we need a little help from our friends. This is where the crowdsourcing model really shines. It takes the pressure off a little bit and gives you a lifeline when you need it the most—from your friends and colleagues who inspire you the most.

Five Ways to Crowdsource Innovation

1. Ideation & Inspiration: If you’re like the rest of us, there are moments...

Hackathons are collaborative innovation events, which offer a great opportunity for highly motivated individuals with any professional background to come together to exchange ideas. These open spaces are a great contradiction to traditional setups. One key driver here is open source thinking – people sharing methods, data and ideas without obstacles, which works fine as long as it involves open source licensed material, but if intellectual property rights come to play, it can get critical.

It is important for those organizing hackathons to beware of the licenses of the data being used. A key point is to decided whether the data would be available only once or shared through an API in the future. This is decisive for the development of sustainable product solutions. Agreements on intellectual property rights among participants should be stipulated at the very start, or at...

Online participation is used to describe the interaction between users and online communities on the web. The aim of an online community is to encourage members to contribute to the community in some way. Some common online communities are wikis, blogs and social platforms where people actively voice their opinion and give feedback. Online participation is currently a heavily researched field constantly under the microscope, while experts try to assess why people become part of such communities and what they gain from it.

For a business, an online community would translate into idea management software, such as WE THINQ. The innovative software has enabled businesses to reach out to the bright minds all over the world and invite them to contribute their ideas to drive a project. But the question still remains – why would people in some...

Are you ready to learn more about open innovation? We love sharing these blog posts with you, but sometimes you need more information than can fit on one web page. If you want to be more prepared to take the next step with your innovation initiative, these books on open innovation will help you get started. We’ve contacted some of the best thought leaders in open innovation on the web, and have come back with these recommendations for books on open innovation:

1.Making Open Innovation Work

This is a solid book on open innovation by Stefan Lindegaard. The book is a good starting point of small and medium sized businesses that want to find out how to use social technologies to collaborate with the larger ecosystem in their industry as well as outside of it. Each chapter ends with...

What does online engagement mean for your business? Do you define it in terms of a purchase made on your online store? Or when a visitor subscribes for your online service? Online engagement could mean different things for different businesses. Apart from the above mentioned examples, a broader perspective of online engagement is to give the online community, whether your employees, customers, vendors, partners or anybody else, a chance to contribute their ideas and share their perspectives for the aim of business growth.

Online engagement provides businesses, particularly small-to-medium sized, with various opportunities for growth and innovation. Among other resources, one tool gaining rapid popularity to promote online engagement is idea management software. Innovation software provides a platform to millions of people to submit their ideas, manage these ideas through feedback, shape them into a project and implement the best...

Last Updated March 15, 2017

It’s a brave new world, indeed! Data flies around the world at the speed of light and exchanging information and ideas is wise for any enterprise that wants to remain competitive. Crowdsourcing allows businesses to use the input of multiple sources, both within the corporation and externally, to develop solutions for strategic issues or to find better ways to complete tasks. This new culture of innovation, supported by crowdfunding for worthwhile projects, allows for idea collaboration and technological innovation for the greater good. Further, our increasingly mobile world population allows for people from anywhere, and with any background, to give their input on a project. We’ve compiled a list of some great examples of crowdsourcing. If you’re looking to get started with a crowdsourcing project, check out these resources:

Dell Social Innovation Challenge

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With the increase in globalization, the need for a culturally diverse workforce has also increased. Cultural diversity offers the creativity and flexibility that are needed for innovation. If a business does not leverage the effective weapon of diversity, it creates barriers to the growth of its creative potential, which ultimately costs the business its competitive edge.

Bringing together people with different backgrounds, qualifications, and experiences are all significant to effective problem-solving for the business. When more bright minds, each with his or her diverse set of experiences, brainstorm to solve a given problem, the resulting solution is more effective, certain and feasible. Similarly, diversity fosters creativity and innovation. Diversity enables to obtain a broader range of perspectives and better ideas for driving the best business solutions. A diverse workforce mirrors today’s marketplace through increased consumer insight. When people from diverse backgrounds and...

Almost every business realizes the importance of innovation, but few take active steps to incorporate it in their business strategy. They might think that having a few employees in the R&D department is enough to stir up new ideas and give something new to the target market on a regular basis. Let us break the news to you; they are not enough. That handful of employees can only come up with a handful of ideas, and a point will come when they will be saturated.

In a world of such widely distributed knowledge and expertise, businesses cannot afford to rely entirely on their own research. Employing tools and resources to extract ideas from external sources such as other employees, customers, vendors, partners, and industry experts spread out around the world is nowadays a more reliable alternative.

Have you ever...

What is it that you want to change about your business? Do you want to introduce breakthrough products or services? Game changing revenue growth? Dramatic reduction in overheads? Every business wants the same. Then what is stopping you or others in the industry from achieving this? It is the scarcity of new ideas!

A small to medium sized organization can have only a limited number of employees – say 50. Out of those 50 employees, only a handful works in R&D where new ideas and concepts originate. The rest work in several different departments, and even though they might have interesting ideas for business growth, they don’t have a platform to suggest those ideas. Enter idea management software.

In simplest terms, idea management is the management of ideas. Although the common notion is that idea management software helps gather,...

When people collaborate to develop ideas together, they are capable of more than the sum of their parts. These ideas evolve because a collective group put energy into them. In creative endeavours, teams collaborating often achieve a much better result than individuals.

As ideas evolve, the key to success is not superiority, but diversity. When teams bring different perspectives to idea processes, the end result is a stronger idea. Individual ideas are not complete. They need to be vocalised, discussed , and re-adjusted before one puts them into practice.

If these ideas are not exposed to a larger audience, as so many ideas were in the pre-Internet era, they will never become fully formed.

Nowadays, there are many ways to share our ideas on the Internet. Minds from all over the world are able to collaborate in a focused manner...

In today’s world of social media, marketing is no longer a one-way monologue. Several organisations have run successful marketing campaigns that follow the crowdsourcing model. These campaigns have the advantage of making consumers feel involved and engaged. This is valuable in an era when the public is becoming desensitized to the many marketing messages they face every day.

Let’s take a look at a few companies that have successfully used crowdsourcing for marketing.

Lego Ideas

Lego Ideas, which was originally known as Lego Cuusoo, invites Lego fans from around the world to share ideas for new Lego products. Any idea that wins the support of 10,000 site members will be considered for production, and the person who suggested it will get 1 percent of the royalties.

Not only has the Lego Ideas program led to the creation of six...

From the suggestion box to complex online structures and tools, open innovation has come a long way. Henry Chesbrough coined the term open innovation back in 2003 in his book by the same name. Since then, many organisations have found success with open innovation. And with success comes the desire to analyse and define that success. So, what is the definition of open innovation?

Chesbrough originally defined open innovation as: “a paradigm that assumes that firms can and should use external ideas as well as internal ideas, and internal and external paths to market, as the firms look to advance their technology”.

Quite the opposite to ‘closed innovation’, which assumed that the best route to innovation was to have control over the process (ie. hiring the best employees, keeping data internally, etc.)

For us and open innovation definition...

Small software companies are amongst the most innovative firms in the world. But how do they achieve, what every company longs for?

One element certainly is their cultural DNA that places individual freedoms over corporate hierarchies. At some companies like Github, the developer of the software repository platform, there are no reporting lines at all. There’s no better shot in the arm for the motivation and productivity of your employees.

But the main driver might be open innovation. These companies publish their core product, the software code their developers have put together. This is a tremendous departure from the mainstream business model that proposes to develop a product, keep its secrets secret and then lock in customers by building strong barriers to switching to the competition, such as making the device technically incompatible with other firms’ products. Then push...

One of the most effective ways to solve a problem or create a business plan is to brainstorm. Brainstorming, according to Dictionary.com, is defined as: “A conference technique of solving problems, amassing information, stimulating creative thinking, developing new ideas, etc., but unrestrained and spontaneous participation in discussion.”

In other words, a bunch of people sitting around a conference room table writing stuff down on flip charts and whiteboards, right? Wrong. As the song says, “That was yesterday, and yesterday’s gone.”

Today, thanks to technology, we are living in a world virtually (no pun intended) without limits, and that applies to brainstorming as well. With brainstorming software, participants can be anywhere in the world with an unlimited number of people participating.

Unlike a conference call where people may have difficulty hearing each other or are constantly cutting in on...

“It takes two flints to make a fire.” ― Louisa May Alcott

We talk a lot about collaboration when we talk about innovation. We can get better ideas, valuable feedback, and meaningful conversation when we are open to collaboration. But this conversation remains at the participant level. What about creating innovative partnerships to expand the reach and effectiveness of your initiative? In the groundbreaking book: “CrowdStorm” the authors outline the various partnerships for innovation to pursue to ensure success in your project. If you have got a great idea for an innovation initiative that you want to take to the next level, consider partnering with these types of organisations and individuals:

Media Partners

Finding a media partnership for innovation is a great way to boost your publicity and tap into your target markets on a low budget. Search...

There is no doubt that crowdsourcing has great potential; particularly in the case of the United Nations. One clear advantage of Open Innovation for the UN is that it allows it to test its performance and engage with each target group to learn what it is actually needed and achieved. The UN has an unlimited audience and deals with immense challenges, which require creative, collective solutions. Using the Internet to gather ideas, discuss and collaborate on finding solutions should be the daily norm; and that is why at least some UN organizations have already started experimenting with crowdsourcing. Here are 5 interesting crowdsourcing examples.

UNICEF Innovation

UNICEF is not only one of the pioneers in Open Innovation, but it has also been experimenting with crowdsourcing. They have an Innovation Guide and are also working on setting up innovation...

“Creating a better future Requires creativity in the present.” ― Matthew Goldfinger

##What is Open Innovation? Open Innovation enables organizations to function in a new way. A way that empowers co-workers, community members, stakeholders, and fans to tackle challenges and improve the organisation. So how can you use an Open Innovation strategy to make a difference in your workplace?

One of our favourite examples of the power of Open Innovation is the GIZ. The GIZ is an organisation that helps solve developmental challenges in many countries. This means that they work with various employees, governments and stakeholders around the world. When the GIZ needed to write a new policy they turned to us to use crowd sourcing to write the document. It started with a basic draft, and three weeks later hundreds of colleagues from around the world had...

We have created something special for our readers and clients who really want to master the art of Open Innovation. We love writing these blog posts with quick tips and best practices, but we wanted to make something for our readers who want to delve deeper into using Open Innovation in their organisations. The 7 day course will be delivered straight to your inbox, and will help you get the most out of Open Innovation. You may be interested in the course if:

• You are looking to get the most out of innovation challenges and events
• You would like to learn about the different strategies of idea sharing and crowdsourcing
• You want to create a strong community around your project
• You want to become an Open Innovation expert.

How can you get the best ideas for your...

At WE THINQ, we think that innovation management software is pretty great - it’s a given. Yet we often run in to people who love innovation but are wary of using innovation management software. They think that giving too much sway to the innovation process will stifle the creative process, that implementing a software will take too much time, or that the only tool one needs for Open Innovation to work is a good idea. As our clients can attest to these objections are misguided. The right innovation management tool adds a great value to the innovation process. Below we have explained what we think are the top 5 benefits to using innovation management software:

1. Improves visibility.

One of the benefits of Open Innovation is the amount of people you can include in your innovation process. If...

In this post we have collected some of our favourite Open Innovation resources. No more need to scour the internet trying to learn how on earth this ‘Open Innovation’ thing works – everything you need is right here! These Open Innovation resources will help you run great Open Innovation events and initiatives.

This post is updated regularly. Last update: July 15.

Idea generation

• Great guide on gathering top notch ideas - How to Run Idea Generation Events by Nesta UK
• A creative approach to idea generation - Generating Unexpected Ideas: reframing your challenge
• Unconventional guide to social innovation - Social Innovation Camps: a toolkit for troublemakers
• Our Open Innovation Crash Course. A quick and exciting introduction to the topic.

Challenge prizes and hack-a-thons

• Everything you need to know about hack-a-thons -...

What if your organisation is not innovative? And on top of it even has innovation barriers. We have talked a lot about how to innovate, but let’s face it, some organisations have a harder time than others. Maybe you work at a bigger company with a lot of bureaucracy to sort through. Or maybe there is a culture of safety and routine rather than experimentation and innovation. Even for those cases, there are small steps that help organisations be more innovative; for example, getting the chance to host an innovation challenge. But how can you guarantee a successful event with the pressure to prove the merits of innovation? Context Partners, a social innovation design firm, has written a useful guide in making your organisation innovative. Read the guide here or keep reading this article for a short summary!

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So, you have decided to run an idea competition. You have booked a space and started to reach out to potential participants, but there is one thing left to be sorted: What will you offer as the prize? Even if the challenge is going to better the world, having the right prize is essential. A good prize helps attract participants and raise the quality of ideas submitted. To start off we should explore the two different types of prizes for an idea competition:

1. A grand prize
2. A grant scheme

In the first category, a prize is selected, ideas are submitted, a panel of judges selects the winner and they receive the prize. It is then up to the prize giver if they would like to include the group in the implementation of the project.

In the second...

It was only a few years ago when ‘unconferences’ were a new and different type of event, where people planned online to meet somewhere to exchange about crazy ideas. The web-based model of open innovation developed into face-to-face events. Now, a few years later, we are witnessing how innovation hubs are popping up across the world. Spaces are being opened for anyone to exchange ideas and find help and solutions to seriously implement these. The Internet, as platform for open innovation, has been transforming the way we collaborate; which makes companies, for instance, experiment with incubators, accelerators or open innovation contests.

Luckily, these innovation hubs are not reserved to capitals from the Northern hemisphere; in contrary, the most vibrant communities are located in the Southern hemisphere. I wonder if the dynamic and energy in African or transition countries...

So, you are ready to innovate. You have an open idea contest planned and are ready to measure the positive effects of your campaign to your organisation. It is a couple months before the contest date and you get a short email from one of your participants asking where to show up on the day of. You realise you have not yet thought about where you will be hosting your challenge. You do not want to host it in any old school gym or church basement, you want a space that is going to encourage creative thinking and debate. But what are the sort of things you should look for in choosing an innovation hub? Design? Utility? Size?

We have watched many idea contests succeed and fail - some of our observations can be seen here. But today we...

Open Innovation is an essential part of who we are, and we look for opportunities to be innovative in every job we do. Yet, for many organisations, the benefits of open innovation are not so clear. Sure, innovation sounds great, but what does it do for me and for my organisation?

Measuring Open Innovation

Innovation is both organic and messy, making it counterintuitive to measure. But, organisations need to be able to assess the value in innovation to justify contributing time and money to a new project. This poses a tough question: How can we measure the immeasurable? How can we measure open innovation? We have scoured the internet to find the best measurements out there for your Open Innovation initiatives:

Methods for measuring Open Innovation

Qualitative

• Quality of ideas. Is there a good amount of competition...

Environmental issues tend to be constantly changing and evolving, requiring adaptive and dynamic approaches that are provided by social innovation.

The European Commission (EC) recently released a report on Social Innovation and the Environment. The study outlines samples of community projects that use Social Innovation techniques and strategys to creat eco-friendly services in various locations in the EU. Which brings us to the following questions:

1.What is so unique about Social Innovation that it gives us the tools we need to build more sustainable communities?

**2. How can you use this information to improve the eco-friendliness of services and products that you provide to your customers and communities? **

The processes of Social Innovation are structured to utilize the creativity of the croud by using;

collaboration, participation, co-production, grassroots approaches and cross-sectoral working. As such, social...

At We Thinq, we talk a lot about how to innovate but we don’t always talk about why we innovate. Instead of telling you what we think the reasons are, we are going to let the examples speak for themselves. Below is a list of organisations that are innovating for social and environmental good. We’ve also included some organisations that will help you get your project started, or help your company get started with social innovation. We love working with companies that are interested in innovating not just for profit, but to better the world. Let us know what you think!

This list is updated regularly. Last update: November 30, 2016

What is Social Innovation

• Open Innovation Blog - Innovation blog with focus on social innovation across a variety of sectors
• Young Foundation - Examples and...

Nesta is an innovation charity that helps bring great ideas to life. Back in April 2012 Nesta launched the Centre for Challenge Prizes and since then has run a number of open innovation and idea contests including the European Social Innovation Competition and the Waste Reduction Challenge Prize. We interviewed Jennifer Clayton, the coordinator of the Centre for Innovation Prizes, about her experience using the WE THINQ software to run innovation contests:

Q:What was the background and goal of your idea contest?

Nesta’s Centre for Challenge Prizes wanted to find people or groups that could: Create a new product, technology or service that utilises data to significantly improve the ability of households or small businesses to demonstrate measurable reduction in carbon emissions by shifting energy demand to off peak times or towards excess renewable generation.

Q:Are...

Open innovation can be a powerful force. When hundreds of people collaborate openly things can evolve in all kinds of creative ways. That kind of energy is fantastic to see and I am always excited to follow real-time open innovation events implemented through our application. Ideas spread like wild fire and comments come in by the minute as lately seen in an exciting project with the Deutsche Welle.

Hack-a-thon, idea contest, innovation lab – there are so many forms of open innovation nowadays, but there are also many times when open innovation fails to solve problems or attract participation. Here are 10 things NOT to do if you want your open innovation challenge to succeed:

1. Offer big, monetary prizes to participants. This a great incentive to attract a large number of participants, but does not usually motivate participants...

Open challenges are becoming an essential part of open innovation processes. Companies and non-profit institutions like universities publicly describe a problem and whoever has an idea can propose solutions.

Online open challenges can easily be set up, it only takes a few key strokes to customize specialized web offers. But open challenges are valuable not only for their pure results, but for the discussions between contestants. The solution to a problem might not be one proposal, but may lie in the combination of two or more. Pure online challenges are easily scalable and can attract large crowds. On the flip side, it can be challenging to spur productive debates between contestants.

To recognize the potential of combining their ideas and to stay in touch as part of a new innovative community, participants need to know and trust each other. Trust...

Few industries are as much in need of innovation as the energy sector. For decades, a few large utilities generated power and fed it through to consumers using their own power grids. Companies did not have to cope with the constant change that producers of consumer goods or technology firms need to adapt to. But in recent years, the industry setting has increasingly been challenged by the rise of renewable energies (and in Germany by the end to nuclear energy as well). Power generation has become less predictable and less centralized, which means power grids need to become more flexible and intelligent. Consumers are increasingly generating power by themselves through solar panels and wind turbines. They are becoming more and more aware of their consumption patterns and are seeking to consciously manage their consumption.

A growing trend in business innovation...

How can we define open innovation? In simple words, open innovation integrates external resources from outside the boundaries of a company into the innovation process. This can be user communities, customers, independent experts, suppliers or whoever can provide input. The internet and social media in particular increasingly allow institutions to create a flow of ideas and information through formal institutional borders between its employees, suppliers and customers.

In the traditional model, innovation takes place behind the closed doors of companies’ research departments. This has the advantage that the innovation is entirely owned by the company and can be fully exploited until its competitors catch up and introduce similar products. The disadvantage is that the company’s internal resources are likely to be much more limited than large communities of users or experts. Opening up the inner workings of products can also...

New solutions are being sought in all areas to combat climate change. In addition to renewable energy, saving energy is an important pillar of this effort. For example, approaches at home to make saving energy more simple. Climate-KIC, a large “Knowledge and Innovation” community, joined ranks with companies such as Vattenfall to sponsor a Europe-wide idea contest exploring the topic. We came up with a special dynamic that resulted in the participation of over 800 participants.

The first stage saw the competition held online, whereby we had established the following typical phases in conjunction with Climate-KIC:

1. Phase: Idea generation
2. Phase: Collaboration
3. Phase: Pitch ideas and vote

The effort kicked off across different networks by mobilizing smart folks looking to implement new ways to improve indoor climate and asking them to contribute ideas. The winner not only had...