Lectures

Question 1

Core of the SEOR course

Answer 1

the secret to long term firm survival, survival is the exception

Question 2

Improvement vs renewal

Answer 2

• Improvement is needed for short term money and success
• Renewal is needed for long term success but cost shot term money

Question 3

Sweet spot of optionality

Answer 3

Reinvest into new potentially disruptive processes that would disrupt your own

Question 4

Product life cycle:

Answer 4

• Fluid: product innovation, high uncertainty, high investment, key: adaptability
• Transitional: from informal to formal, flexible and responsive to rigid and predictable, from external orientation to internal
• Specific phase: stable tasks, coordination and control , top-down, predictability

Question 5

two types of innovation discontinuities

Answer 5

• Competence enhancing: (sustaining innovation)
  o Large improvements in price/performance
  o Builds on existing knowledge
  o New product or new processes
  o > established players get benefit
• Competence destroying: (new entrances are the one who benefit)
  o Large improvements in price/performance
  o Existing knowledge becomes obsolete
  o Entirely different knowledge and competencies

Question 6

two types of innovation processes

Answer 6

• Incremental:
  o Core ideas we can always improve
  o Traditional new product development process
  o E.g. faster computer
• Radical
  o Companies do not like this so try to avoid it voluntary. Crisis is needed
  o E.g. internet, cars, airplanes, mobile phones

Question 7

Deeper organizational barriers

Answer 7

• Economic: no motivation
  o sunk costs, invested too much in current, rational perspective to keep going
• Cognitive: no understanding/ability
  o Knowledge and expertise in one domain: lack in other domain. Innovation comes from the other domain
  o Core capabilities = core rigidities
  o Competency traps: use of increasingly inferior resources
   Overvaluing internal knowledge
   Dismissive attitude towards external resources/capabilites
• Social/psychological: fear of risk / discomfort
  o Fear or complacency
  o Resistance to change

Question 8

Organising for radical innovation:

Answer 8

• Separation is a crucial condition for renewal
• The more disruptive, the more seperation

Question 9

A question to ask companies to see how they feel about innovation:

Answer 9

• What happens to the innovation budget in good times, and what happens to the innovation budget in bad times?
• In crisis we cut back in innovation > not walking the talk, not prioritized.
• If they keep it, they prioritize innovation

Question 10

Seperation allows:

Answer 10

an escape of the 3 forces (cog/sos/eco) and foster innovation
Give up autonomy and control for

Question 11

Types of teams:

Answer 11

• Functional: technical, simple problems, sequential approach
• Light weight: incremental inno, coordination through pl
• Heavy weight: adjacent innovation, PL has power
• Autonomous: ‘tiger team’, radical inno, team has ‘carte blanche’, pl is boss

Question 12

Strategic schizophrenia

Answer 12

two key questions
o How can we strengthen our core business?
o How can we disrupt our core business?

Question 13

System 1 vs System 2 thinking

Answer 13

• 1: fast, instinctive and emotionally driven: automatic, effortless, ‘believer’
• 2: slow, well-considered, rational: purposefull attention, subjective, ‘falsifier’

Question 14

Innovation pyramid - asking the why:

Answer 14

• Start with governing thought: answer a question
  o Key line: sub-conclusions that substantiate the main answer
   Support lines: data, facts, or givens that support the key line
  ^^ should be mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive (add up together)

Question 15

What culture is supportive of strategic entrepreneurship?

Answer 15

• Willingness to cannibalize (opposite of barriers: economic)
• Strong future orientation (opposite of barriers: cognitive)
• Tolerance for risk (opposite of barriers: social/emotional)

Question 16

Strategic entrepreneurship phases:

Answer 16

• Discovery: experimentation and risk taking Entrepreneurial
• Incubation: transition
• Acceleration: efficiency and risk aversion Managerial
• Hand over to business

Question 17

Balancing two kind of capabilities:

Answer 17

• Exploration oriented: doing the right things
  o Creativity, vision, flexibility
• Exploitation oriented: doing the things right
  o Planning, perseverance, precise

Question 18

Three horizons within companies (Mckinsey standardized)

Answer 18

H3: future business (5+ years)
H2: tomorrows core business (3-5 years)
H1: core business (1-3 years)

Question 19

Crossing the chasm model – Geoffrey Moore (important)

Answer 19

• Needs of the mass market are often different from the early adaptors
• Only way to cross this, try, fail, learn, no scientific way (bezos example)

Question 20

4 innovation traps within companies:

Answer 20

• Skipping h2 from h1 to h3
  o Philips hue, went for diy stores, turned price competition as went to current market, had they gone h2 they learned they should have gone luxury
  o Often happens in corporate frameworks
• It’s not perfect yet (escalation of commitment)
  o Mass markets does not need perfect products, they need good enough
  o Never makes it out, move to slow
  o Paradox, feel like a project is their baby, but lose rational reasoning if too continue, its good but should not make the decisions
• Catch 22,
  o if it gets successful they claim it, if it goes wrong they blame you
  o H1 and H3 try to claim, H2 gets the blame
• Team conditions: Try, fail, learn, improve sequence,
  o Try and fail, phycological safety, you can fail and not be made fun of
  o Learn and improve, constructive conflict, hard on content, soft on person
  o Safety and conflict are opposite, so paradox, inno team challenge
  o Booking.com looked at these conditions not the contents or projects

Question 21

Organizational identity:

Answer 21

• Foundation (domain): Who are we as an org, what is our DNA, where do we belong
• Role: what is the role we have within the domain

Question 22

Conditions for integration of innovations:

Answer 22

• Ability to integrate
  o coordination & exchange of knowledge = cognitive integration
• Willingness to integrate
  o Reduction of conflicts between inno teams and org = economic & emotional integration

Question 23

Conditions for integration of innovations (like the main pic of the course):

Answer 23

• Structure & systems
  o Control systems
  o X-functional interfaces
• Strategy & leadership
  o Strategic paradox
  o Shared vision and identity
  o Sponsors
• Culture & people
  o Rotation of people
• Process
  o Shared decision

Question 24

Balancing act among 3 dimensions:

Answer 24

• Temporal: short term vs long term
• Behavioural: freedom vs control
• Learning: forgetting vs borrowing