Each week I scour articles, wading through the dogs, and bringing you the best insights to help product managers, developers, and innovators be heroes.

Product Innovation Tips Around the Web

5 examples of how large organizations foster employee innovation and are changing their culture. “Many companies are now starting to focus on developing various types of cross-organizational innovation programs and in some cases these programs have been going on for years. Here are just a few that I wanted to highlight.” Read more at Forbes http://www.forbes.com/sites/jacobmorgan/2015/04/08/five-uncommon-internal-innovation-examples/

3 tips for unsticking innovation in an organization. “As staff members, we try to see beyond the confines of the status quo and help our company continue to evolve. But what happens when certain areas of your business begin to stagnate? No matter your company’s product or service, you have likely experienced the frustrating feeling of being stuck and not innovating quickly enough.” Read more at Forbes http://www.forbes.com/sites/chuckcohn/2015/04/03/how-to-jumpstart-innovation-when-youre-feeling-stuck/

4 traps innovators inside large organizations need to avoid – fav is fight 2 battles. “Innovators inside an established business, however, face a unique set of challenges that we summarize as the “four traps” which can arise. With care, innovators will overcome these challenges.” Read more at Entrepreneur http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/244333

More companies are viewing innovation as incremental improvements, including Boeing. “The shift reflects how sharply the industry has changed. Boeing Chief Executive Jim McNerney last year declared its era of technological boundary-pushing ‘moon shots’ over. Airlines, he concluded, don’t want to pay more for advanced technology. Saving up a host of advanced technologies for a single new project has proved too expensive and disruptive.” Read more at the Wall Street Journal http://www.wsj.com/articles/at-boeing-innovation-means-small-steps-not-giant-leaps-1428016900

Examples to remind Product Managers to kill projects early, not late. “Her team had just spent 3 years and many millions of dollars designing and building a very innovative new product line moving the company into battery driven products. She was shocked when, at the last moment, her sales colleagues sank the deal with concerns about the technology partner’s supply reliability and the brand reputation effects they might suffer if the new technology was not as robust or serviceable as expected.” Read more from Industry Week http://www.industryweek.com/product-development/obstacles-new-product-growth

An example of crowdsourcing consumer ideas from the 106 year old Tillamook cheese company. I toured the headquarters and factor of Tillamook last year. The spirit of the people is what most caught my attention – they care about each other, their customers, farmers, and making great cheese. No wonder they have remained in business for more than a century. Read about their new crowdsourcing efforts at Fast Company http://www.fastcocreate.com/3044709/do-you-have-strong-opinions-on-cheese-tillamook-is-crowdsourcing-product-development-and-mor

Teaming with Quirky to crowdsource ideas. “Harman International has teamed up with Quirky, the crowd-sourced product-development company, to jointly develop audio products with Quirky’s online community.” Read more at Twice  http://www.twice.com/news/audio/harman-quirky-team-headphones-tomorrow/56676

15 must read marketing books. “By reading the right books, you can teach yourself more about marketing than you’d ever learn in an MBA class. Want to know where to get started? You can’t go far wrong with these 15 books.” See the list at Social Caffeine http://lorirtaylor.com/diy-mba/

 

Still Important – Product Management Flash from the Past

Stanford lecturer describes CEO’s influence on innovation and comments on Apple’s lacking innovation. “Then he introduces a thought-provoking idea — that between their rapid growth and maturity phases, companies have what he calls the moment of maximum optionality. At that point, the company can essentially milk its success — which it will do if its CEO is operationally-driven – or apply the capital and talent it has attracted to attack new market opportunities — the likely approach of an opportunity-driven CEO.” Read more at Forbes http://www.forbes.com/sites/petercohan/2015/04/01/stanford-lecturer-on-apples-innovation-drought/