Only companies that can consistently bring imaginative, value-adding new products, services and value propositions to market will survive and grow in today's rapidly-changing markets. Yet, most companies today are frustrated by their inability to turn ideas into profitable realities. Their "innovation process" is almost an oxymoron. In reality it is ad hoc, piecemeal, seat-of-the-pants - and heavily reliant on happy accidents.

This is decidedly not the case at a small but rapidly-growing group of companies. In Driving Growth Through Innovation, acclaimed author and consultant Robert B. Tucker takes you behind the scenes in 23 Innovation Vanguard Companies to benchmark how they have revamped their innovation approach for growth, profit and competitive advantage.

"Driving Growth Through Innovation is an excellent synthesis of innovation best practices. It's also an accessible primer for jump-starting innovation initiatives at workplaces where there are more ideas than actions." Michael Schrage, Co-director, MIT Media Lab's eMarkets Initiative and author of Serious Play Buy this book "At a time when American companies desperately need to capitalize on people's creativity and discover new profit streams, Driving Growth Through Innovation gives us a roadmap for total enterprise transformation. This book is destined to change how companies achieve growth in the 21st century." Joyce Wycoff, Cofounder, InnovationNetwork "…a very readable and enjoyable book. It will stimulate your creative juices." Glen Nelson, MD, Vice Chairman of the Board, Medtronic Corporation "I think you would profit by reading this book." Art Fry, Inventor of 3M Post-it Notes®

Driving Growth Through Innovation doesn't just describe their leading edge methods. It shows you, step-by-step, how to map out and implement your own 21st Century Innovation Blueprint that will enable you to win new customers, grow revenue, and sustain the momentum.

You will learn how to:

• Design and implement an enterprise-wide innovation strategy in your company
• Gain the edge by discovering and fulfilling unmet and unarticulated customer needs
• Create a system to ensure that good ideas don't get lost - or show up in the hands of competitors
• Discover product, process, and strategy ideas that have the potential to become breakthroughs
• Sell ideas, internally and externally, and overcome obstacles to achieve acceptance by users
• Involve everyone in the idea-to-implementation process

An Outline of Driving Growth Through Innovation

 Introduction: What It Takes To Drive Growth

Five Principles for Driving Growth Through Innovation

• Innovation Must be Approached as a Discipline
• Innovation Must be Approached Comprehensively
• Innovation Must Include an Organized, Systematic, and Continual Search for New Opportunities
• Innovation Must Involve Everyone in the Organization
• Innovation Must Be Customer Centered

 Chapter 1: 21st Century Innovation

In this chapter, you'll see why the Growth Gap can't be closed by traditional methods, how innovation can be categorized by type and level, and how companies in the Innovation Vanguard are transforming their futures via an all-enterprise approach to innovation. Specific topics covered include:

• The Growing Growth Gap
• Why Traditional Methods Won't Close the Gap
• Innovation: Key Driver of Growth and Profitability
• Recognizing the Role of Innovation
• A Simple Definition of Innovation
• The Three Types of Innovation
• Why Not All Innovations Jumpstart Growth
• Radical Innovations
• Taking an All-Enterprise Approach

 Chapter 2: Leading Innovation

In this chapter, the book focuses on the five essentials that a firm's top managers must wrestle with if innovation is to become an embedded, growth-driving process. These essentials include:

• How to Design and Implement an Innovation Strategy
• The Need to Spreading Responsibility for Making Innovation Happen
• Allocating Resources and Deciding on Levels of Risk
• Establishing Innovation Metrics
• Rewarding & Encouraging Innovation

 Chapter 3: Creating the Culture

This chapter covers 11 Strategies for creating an Innovation-Adept Culture.

• Assess Variance Between Present Climate and Optimum Climate
• Describe Your Organization's Barriers to Innovation
• Describe Your Current Innovation Process
• Address the "Lack of Time" Barrier
• Institute Practices that Create Openness
• Balance the Mix of People
• Identify Mavericks
• Improve or Change the System
• Examine Your Attitude Regarding Innovation and Individual Contributors
• Identify and Develop Champions.
• Identify and Recruit Innovators.

 Chapter 4: Empowering the Idea Management Process

This chapter will assist you and your organization in designing and implementing an effective system that encourages, solicits and channels ideas from throughout your organization. It explains what an idea management system can do for your firm, and provides you with eight distinct models of idea management, including:

• The Suggestion System Model.
• Continuous Improvement Model.
• The Open Door Model.
• New Venture Team Model.
• The Incubator/Skunkworks Model.
• The Top-Line, All Enterprise Model.
• The Innovation Tea m Model.
• The Innovation Catalyst Model.

 Chapter 5: Mining the Future

Do you sometimes feel your organization is not looking out ahead often enough, nor far enough? This chapter will arm you with six powerful new ways to visualize the future of your customers and overall market, and is based on research into the methods at Innovation Vanguard companies. You'll Learn to:

• Scan and Monitor the Sources of Opportunity
• Create Your Personal Future Scan System
• Integrate Future Scanning with your Idea Management System
• Assault Industry Assumptions
• Broaden your Company's Vision
• Strategize Your Place in the First Mover, Fast Follower Race

 Chapter 6: Fortifying the Idea Factory

What do you do after having immersed yourself in the future to seek out potential breakthroughs? Most firms can stand to improve this "fuzzy front end" of the innovation process, and this chapter arms you with seven guidelines and numerous case examples for how to go about it. Case examples reported here show how a leading pharmaceutical firm, a global financial services company, and a golf club manufacturer all discovered breakthrough ideas by activating the creativity of their employee base, by listening to "lead users," and delving more deeply into their customers' unarticulated needs, wants and desires. You'll discover new ways to:

• Involve Everyone in the Quest for Ideas
• Involve Customers in your Ideation Process
• Involve Customers in New Ways
• Focus on the Unarticulated Needs of Customers
• Seek Ideas from New Customer Groups
• Involve Suppliers in Product Ideation
• Benchmark Ideation Methods

 Chapter 7: Producing Powerful Products

This chapter provides you with an inside look at companies that have redesigned their product development process to drive growth. You will master six powerful methods you can use to improve your firm's batting average with new products. These include:

• Study Previous Breakthrough Products
• Focus Relentlessly on Value Creation throughout the Development Process
• Design and Implement a New Product Development Process
• Use a Learning Strategy for More Radical Ideas
• Use Cross-Functional Teams
• Use Rapid Prototyping

 Chapter 8: Generating Growth Strategies

This chapter makes clear that no matter how seemingly bulletproof your firm's current business model, it will be challenged by new ones. Therefore strategy innovation is just as important as product or process innovation, and is first and foremost an act of imagination: the ability to see how something could work better from the customer's standpoint, in a way that in turn profits the sponsoring firm. Master six powerful methods of jump-starting the search for your next strategy breakthrough. You'll learn to look for:

• Opportunities in Market Positioning
• Opportunities in Customer Outsourcing
• Opportunities in Understanding Customer Needs
• Opportunities to Reinvent your Business Model
• Opportunities to Redefine Value- Added
• Opportunities to Rethink How Your Product or Service Gets Into the Hands of Customers

 Chapter 9: Selling New Ideas

This chapter addresses the final, yet essential issue of successful innovation: can you sell it? No matter how strong an idea, you and your company must be equally skilled at convincing, converting, cajoling and otherwise creatively "building the buy in" for new ideas with employees, customers, suppliers and other stakeholders. You'll master the seven essentials of selling new ideas in the 21st century, including:

• Make Everyone an Idea Evangelist
• Focus on the Customer's Mean Time to Payback
• Make it Safe for Customers to Experiment
• Sell Conceptually
• Build Markets for Your Products and Services
• Convert the Early Adopters and Gatekeepers First
• Persistence in the Face of Setbacks

 Chapter 10: Taking Action in Your Firm

This final chapter will help you further assess all the ideas and strategies you've gained from reading this book and prioritize the steps to take to implement them. You and a core team of people will want to prepare an innovation initiative that addresses each of the following key areas:

• Objectives
• Leadership and Metrics
• Culture
• Idea Management
• Future Mining / Ideation Capabilities
• Responsibilities and Timeline
• Deciding Where to Start

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