Saturday, December 8

Definitions: National Innovation

Brent Edwards, who writes the Innovation Science blog, presents U.S. presidential candidates' definitions of innovation. It's amazing how different the definitions are among the candidates. Brent thinks that Senator Barack Obama provided the best of the bunch:

"Innovation is the creation of something that improves the way we live our lives."

You can see from all the various definitions just how difficult it is to come up with a standard definition: one that is broad enough to cover all the important elements of innovation yet short enough to be practical. I've always liked the definition I use on this blog: "The profitable implementation of ideas," as it highlights the value creating/profit element of innovation. That said, the Broken Bulbs definition looks at innovation at the firm level, not the national policy level.

If I were to tweak this definition for national-level innovation, I'd probably remove the term "profitable" and replace it with something that highlights innovation's positive role in society. Something along the lines of: "The implementation of widely dispersed ideas that, for the most part, contribute to the progress of a nation." You could extend this last part to the progress of humanity if you want (not a bad idea methinks).

If you're talking about firm-level innovation, use the first definition. If you're discussing national-level innovation, use the second definition. Both levels need to be considered because the one influences the other.

Porter (1980) and Christensen and Raynor (2003) agree that while sound macro policies are necessary for national development, they are not sufficient in themselves. In the case of Japan, Christensen and Raynor write: "There truly seem to be microeconomic roots to the country's economic malaise."

Al Ries, a brand consultant, takes a different view: he thinks that Japan suffers from a branding problem (in addition to a huge demographic problem). This video is interesting and should be watched by anybody who is thinking about pouring any money into the latest "Asian Miracle" via the China stock market. More on that in another post!



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