100 Days of Innovation – #3 : Check your speed

One of the key issues I point out when speaking about innovation strategies, is that organizations need to continually challenge themselves as to whether they can “act fast enough.”

In other words, innovative organizations “check their speed.” If they aren’t responding quickly enough to rapid market, product, competitive and business model change, then they aren’t following one of the key traits of successful innovators. If they aren’t ensuring they are keeping up with rapid consumer and customer preference, service levels or marketing and branding innovation, they become an innovation laggard rather than a leader. If they can’t collaborate and share knowledge as a team, in order to capitalize on new emerging opportunities or respond to threats, then they aren’t operating at the right pace.

I was reminded of this point today, when I saw that Workplace Today, an HR focused publication, reprinted my article, Are We Thinking Fast Enough, which was originally published in Broadband magazine in 2006. The article was written for folks working in the telecom and hi-tech industries, and challenged them to “check their speed.”

Looking back at the article, you can see the speed of change that has occurred. Take a look at the hi-tech gear that surrounds you, and think about quickly things become obsolete. In one of my cabinets in the home office, I’ve got about six generations of Blackberry devices. The first one looks absolutely ancient — and yet, is from about 2001. I’ve also got an MP3 player from 1998 that could hold about five songs. It seems positively old-fashioned.

Such things are reminders that we live in a fast paced world — and that innovators MUST check their speed in order to stay ahead in their markets. Here’s the clincher — it doesn’t matter what industry I’m speaking too — I can point people to similar degrees of high velocity change, and challenge them to think faster.

on the concept of “checking your speed“:

• Read the original article Are we moving fast enough?
• Explore the concept of “thinking fast” in the blog section, “Faster”