I once saw a t-shirt that said, Innovation Or Extinction. Though cost cutting and efficiency contribute towards the success and growth of any business, it is innovation that is the key factor that drives sustainability and profitability. Only those businesses that continuously offer innovative products, services or processes can enjoy long-term success.
In order to stay ahead of the competition businesses need be innovative at the front-end, which is concept development as well as the back-end, which involves implementation of those concepts. However, this can prove to be problematic for many managers mainly because it is at odds with the analytical and rational processes they have studied in business school. Innovation is about making non-linear jumps and learning to take the available information and transforming this raw material into workable concepts. That is the secret of why, given the same set of circumstances, many businesses succeed while others fail.
New ideas drive innovation, which if implemented, drives business growth. Globalization has given rise to increasing competition and businesses that do not innovate, can rapidly get left behind in the...