Idris Mootee

You've probably come across many self-claimed innovation experts in the past and it seems like anyone who has a different way of saying or doing something is calling themselves one. So many dumb things I’ve heard these people said about innovation. Some are snake oil consultants promising to help clients to innovate and to organize a company for innovation. There are some selling to clients how to be creative. I’ve heard people promising clients that they can improve innovation success rate from 4% to 80%! 80% wow, if that’s the case, this consultancy should worth a few billions at least. Google would have bought them already!

The Authenticity Gap - that should be the title of my next book. Well, I don’t think I have time to write another book, it took me almost 5 weeks last time. I guess I will need at least 8 weeks. But no. Maybe a blog post, it takes only 15 mins. I do like the name, but I guess it won't sell well. Maybe "Authenticity Without Commitment", this is a far better title, I think I can sell 20,000 copies and sell a lot of seminars. Will get sponsorship from BP for sure.

This BP mess is definitely an ecological disaster as well as a brand disaster of the century and it will take us decades to see the real impact. BP has lost half of its market value and there are even considerations for shareholder lawsuits on behalf of BP investors who have lost money because of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

‘The age of ‘Indovation’ dawns’ - this headline from Financial Times caught my attention while I was sitting on a plane flying out of New Jersey. It is an interesting article about Armin Bruck, managing director of Siemens in India, trying to convince the board of the Siemens of the potential of Indian innovation. He gave them the keys to a Tata Nano to convey the “smell and feel” of a revolutionary mass market product and to persuade his company that it should improve its pipeline of local inventions aimed at Indian consumers.

The iPad is cool, almost as cool as the ACE Hotel. I really like this place and it is becoming the place to stay for me in NYC. Forget the W, it is so boring. They were running out of room on my last day of stay so they switched me to this special room with bunk bed. Very cool.

Today is a special day in America, particularly now and it is not another holiday. Over lunch I was watching TV, these military moms talked about their fallen loved ones. My heart aches so much when I hear each of them telling how old their sons were when they lost their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan. These are 19 to 22 year old young men (and women) that never had the opportunity to experience life.

Innovation is hard, it is not about getting the idea at all, it is about managing ideas. So you’ve have a few great ideas, so what? There is a lot of art and science behind moving ideas along corporate decision chain as well as managing unknowns. I remember I used to teach an in-house program for my strategists on “managing the unknowns.” These MBAs struggle with not finding enough data points and as a result stuck in the innovation process. How often these big world changing ideas came from people with MBAs?

When people talk about exploring white space in innovation, often they refer externally to unserved markets or businesses that are outside their core. It is basically where unmet and unarticulated needs are uncovered to create innovation opportunities. White space is where products and services don’t currently exist based on the present understanding of values.

Size is always a big factor in product design and marketing. The iPad essential becomes an iTouch for the tallest man in the world. I always have a problem with oversized drinks in this part of the world, but I also have a problem with the undersized drinks in Europe and Japan. A cup of tea in London is really too small for me and I almost needed to order two. A cup of tea in New York is usually way too big and I have to pour away 30% of it right away.

One big crazy week. We have clients visiting from San Diego, Seoul, London and Boston for big workshops, a local station TV crew (second TV stations this month) filming us at work plus 3 very cool project kick-offs that we need to prepare for (and also pitches). The workshops were great and clients were participating fully and great people. Our team always bring a lot of creative energy to our data rich process which is probably the most rigorous and scientific in the industry.