Beyond the Suggestion Box. Clearly you need something more than a casual "that's (not) a good idea". And, although you need a regularly scheduled portfolio evaluation, innovative teams need a prompt response.

Organizations need both a regularly scheduled meeting to evaluate the projects in the Innovation Portforlio, and they need to assign Innovation Advisors to help guide each project through the process.

A team or individual with an innovative idea or project can't wait six weeks for the next scheduled Innovation Portfolio Evaluation meeting; they need quick feedback and guidance as to whether or not they are on the right track.

Some questions and answers

Q. What skills and knowledge does the Innovation Advisor need?

A. That depends on the type of innovation. For incremental innovations, the Advisor needs a strong knowledge of how the user community uses the existing products. For a disruptive innovation, the Advisor needs a completely different set of knowledge and skills, namely, patience, creativity, and a good understanding of what is required to see a disruptive or radical innovation through to the production stage.

Q. How should the evaluation team evaluate the innovation portfolio?

A. The team needs a clear understanding of corporate strategy, the ability to focus on long-term objectives, experts from multiple domains, and a clear set of metrics to use in the evaluation process. Binz and Reichle suggest a modification and expansion of Quality Function Deployment, which considers aspects of novelty and enhanced customer and manufacturer benefit.

"Building an Innovation Evaluation Process for Your Organization," two-weeks of intensive work with your Innovation Team request schedule

"Instilling an Innovative Mindset," a full-day workshop for individual contibutors. You will learn

• to promote and foster an environment where innovation flourishes,
• to step back, look at trends and the big picture, and analyze what the trends indicate
• to adapt, learn new things and grow
• to inspire others with your personal passion

For more information, request schedule

"Leading Innovation," a two-day workshop for engineering managers, delivered by Leslie Martinich. Participants will learn practices listed above as well as

• how to build an innovation ecosystem
• the role of relationships, networking and customers
• the skills required for participation in an innovation hub
• dealing with failure
• how to manage an innovation portfolio
• metrics to measure

For more information, request schedule

"Premature opitimization is the root of all evil." --Donald Knuth

"How to Measure the Success Potential and the Degree of Innovation of Technical Ideas and Products, " H. Binz and M. Reichle, in The Future of Product Development, Springer, 2007.