Time only moves in one direction, and with it we must keep evolving. Technology has become central to our development as a species and is likely to remain so. In an upturn, people invest in it to grab market opportunities. In a downturn, they invest in it to drive efficiencies and minimise costs.
By Timothy Thomas, country manager at Epson South Africa
If we are to address the world’s social, economic and environmental challenges, we need to draw on our best resource. Innovation. Those who can sustainably harness technological innovation will be the winners in the future. There will always be room for new ideas and solutions, enabled by technology.
But this begs the question; how can organisations around the world nurture innovation?
There is no silver bullet, but there are some simple steps that can help. Here are some of the key ingredients for an organisation to consider:
Have a focus
Innovation works best when there’s a problem to solve and a brief to meet. This doesn’t mean being restrictive, it’s about knowing the result you need to achieve. Unfortunately, some organisations that commit to innovation end up falling into a trap that leads to little to no impact. This is because they don’t take the time to define the problem they are seeking to solve, or put in place the right level of focus to sort through and manage ideas.
Many assume that just because chaos and creativity are friends, unconstrained efforts will lead to ideas that set the world on fire. But, innovation is something different. It creates value. As Steve Jobs once said, “People think focus means saying yes to the thing you’ve got to focus on. But that’s not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. You have to pick carefully. Innovation is saying no to a 1,000 things.”
The more you focus your innovation efforts, the greater the chance that you will come up with a creative solution. For Epson, innovation is meeting its customer needs sustainably. Through the development of its Heat-Free technology, Epson has helped organisations to reduce their environmental impact by providing products and services that are built around efficient, compact, and precision technologies, with reduced energy consumption and increased accuracy and performance.
Have a foe
Competition is a key enabler of innovation. Fundamentally, it forces organisations to innovate through differentiation when it comes to their product offerings and business models. Tech is rapidly evolving, and industry frontrunners are battling it out to adopt more efficient production processes, and to offer new and improved products and services to customers.
At Epson, one example of this differentiation is our focus on inkjet printers over laser. Having recently announced that it will halt the sale and distribution of laser printers by 2026 owing to environmental concerns, the business aims to eventually displace laser altogether.
In fact, switching from laser to inkjet printers could halve printing-based global energy emissions, delivering global electricity savings in excess of 2,240 GWh per year, equivalent to approximately 1,3-million metric tonnes of carbon dioxide annually, which is the amount produced by 280 175 cars driven for one year.
Invest in knowledge and training
The global investment in research and development (R&D) is staggering. In 2019 alone, organisations around the world spent $2,3-trillion on R&D – about half of which came from industry and the remainder from governments and academic institutions.
Investment in R&D yields the critical technology from which organisations can develop new products, services, and business models. But for R&D to deliver value, its role must be woven centrally into the organisation’s mission.
R&D staff need STEM skills – now and in the future – and these need to be valued. To foster innovation, organisations need to allow employees to explore and learn new skills and understand the cutting-edge developments in science and engineering.
A catalyst
Given the highly complex, uncertain and dynamic environments facing organisations nowadays, it is more important than ever to adopt an innovative mindset. Innovation needs to be a priority and for that to happen, you need a catalyst: a source of inspiration to others, a champion for new ideas, and a force of creative energy.
But a catalyst can both be tangible and intangible. Whether it’s a structure, a leader or a plan that sparks people into action, someone or something needs to begin the chain.
Collaboration
For innovation to thrive, it needs an environment that champions experimentation and the co-creation of bold and visionary new ideas. Few organisations can do this alone. There needs to be an increased collaboration between businesses, academia and the public and third sectors.
Having a genuine culture of collaboration can help organisations define and refine their mission. For example, Epson is breaking its long-established structures to drive more collaboration within and beyond its business. Epson launched Epson X in 2020 – a dedicated venture capital innovation fund to accelerate collaboration and open innovation. It aims to combine Epson technology with other know-how to solve societal issues around the globe.
As part of a collaborative consortium Epson has contributed to the development of Pararesin, a new form of bioplastic that uses paramylon, a stored polysaccharide in Euglena algae. The consortium aims to supply approximately 200 000 tonnes of this marine-degradable, biomass-derived plastic annually by 2030 as a practical alternative to conventional plastics.
Execution
A great idea is nothing unless the structure exists to realise it. A lot of organisations encourage innovation, but they don’t actually take the plunge and follow through on the new ideas that come up, so they never get to see how they function in the real world.
For innovation to be successful, operations, manufacturing, processes and organisational structures need to be in place. This includes having the right teams and tools, supported by effective collaboration and decision-making as innovation progresses from idea to selection and then execution.
Those who execute tactfully in the areas mentioned above will enable their organisation to perform at the highest level with the best chance of success. While ‘ideation’ might be the most recognisable and ‘glamorous’ part of innovation, ideas go nowhere without execution.
Innovation rarely happens by chance – there is no shortcut and no substitute for the factors that lead to it. To navigate this complex path requires organisations to follow the recipe, building the right ecosystem and taking a strategic approach to identifying, then backing and supporting the innovations of the future.
Those who get it right, will be the ones that reap the rewards.