Innovation and NPD 2 day workshop 20 November 2014 and 2nd December

I shall be running a two day Innovation and New Product Development course at the Re:Centre in Bradford on Thursday 20th November and Tuesday 2nd December 2014.
Slightly odd dates, but that was the only way to fit it into this year.
The days are separated so that we can work on the basics and principles on the first day, and then really get down to how to make in happen in the second day.

The event is free if you are an eligible company (if not sure then do contact the Re:Centre to check- if you are based in Yorkshire you are likely to be eligible).

Hope to see you there.
Booking details will be on the Re:Centre website.

The Demise of HMV

Nothing could save HMV - the future (for good or ill) is digital downloads.  All HMV, Waterstones and Blockbusters can hope to do is manage the decline down to a niche of collectors who actually like the physical objects. 
If you accept that what we want is the music/film/words, then CDs/DVDs/Books are just the media and shops selling them are doomed.

Actually doomed is the wrong word.  It suggests something that is going to happen, when it already has.

Myself, I used to love shops - but I don't need or use them now apart from to find things to download.  It's part of what killed the Word, you know... my favourite magazine apart from the Economist, which incidentally I now read exclusively in an electronic version.  The paper copy goes into the bin each weekend, because it arrives after I have already read much of the newpaper.

This change may be a good thing or a bad thing, but it is here and no doubt people will continue to talk about it until our generation(s) shuffle off this mortal coil.  But the younger generations will struggle to understand why we are nostalgic.  Why worry about something being replaced by something that gives you what you want quicker (and cheaper, with more choice)?

Interesting article about this from their marketing agency here, which lead me to think about the book How the Mighty Fall by Jim Collins.

In business you need to worry about this sort of thing if you intend to still be in business in say 20 years.  Will we need taxis if we have self-driving cars?  (yes, until the drink driving rules change, but after that?)  Will we need lorry drivers?

I think my core businesses of trainer and consultant are safe for my working life time (30 years at most), but I would not like to bet that they will be in 50 years.  How about your job?

"The future is already here..

it's just not evenly distributed."  William Gibson.

One of my favourite quotes (I shoehorn it into quite a lot of presentations - sorry).

An example of the truth of this can be found in a recent blog entry here, by Mark Evanier - writer of the very funny Groo the Wanderer comics, and much else.    He listed the technology he used on a recent trip that was not available say 10 years ago.  It is an extensive list. 

We often don't notice the incremental changes in our world brought about by technology - apart occassionally to laugh at the huge mobile phones that people carry in 80s movies.  Or is it 90s movies?  We don't notice how the plots of movies have changed because technology means we can send a text message to the Police for help, or something similar.  How would the end of The Italian Job have been if Michael Caine's idea had been "I'll get my phone out and call the Italian AA"?

The world keeps changing.  Do try to keep up.

Timeline of the future

As the great Yogi Berra said “it’s very difficult to make predictions – especially about the future”. However that does not mean that we should not try to. It can help to shape our business strategy, protect us from shock changes, and besides it can be great fun.

Myers Briggs personality profiles suggest that only 20% of are mainly focussed on the future – 40% are focussed on what we learn from the past, and 40% on the here and now. That is pretty much what you would expect from human beings who evolved in the Savannah - too much dreaming of what might be is not much help in escaping lions, and in fact it might get you eaten.

The same applies in business – not learning from the past, and not focussing on the immediate threats are fatal for businesses. However there is always a need for at least a few people in a business to keep scanning the horizons, and thinking about how things change.

The old metaphor about boiling a frog is appropriate for our attitude to change. Today the internet is pervasive in our society – and most of us forget that a matter of a decade ago it barely existed. Most of us have mobile phones, and we have forgotten what we did before them. Films from the 1990s can feel strangely dated when the central problem could be easily solved in the characters had mobile phones, let alone Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

This makes it difficult for us to think about some of the major changes that can happen to our industry. The rise of 3D printers, which seems like a science fiction technology but is being used in aerospace, changes a lot of our ideas about manufacturing (see The Economist). The internet is of course changing other industries, and in some cases making them redundant – I can’t believe there is a major future in printing yellow pages telephone directories or CD pressing plants.

So what industries will remain unchanged?

Well haulage and distribution will still be essential to move some goods around – despite 3D printers, we are still likely to need to move chemicals and similar raw materials. However it may change significantly within a generation to include much better IT based planning and even more significantly robot driven lorries (it is on the way, trust me).

Television, if we continue to call it that, will probably merge with the web, and be shown on the sort of printed electronics paper thin screens that I have mentioned before.

My industry, consulting and training, will no doubt be changed by intelligent systems and training on demand media. I think though that will always be people who prefer to engage with (flawed) individuals rather than a (perfect) computer database.

Health is changing massively – our life expectancy rises by about 3 months every year. Think about that. The consequences are massive – and not just for pensions. This is a societal change that we don’t notice happening even though it is happening rapidly. Partly this is because medicine is advancing so fast – people live who would have died a decade ago, and people are born who would not have existed 30 years ago (including my children).

Prof. Bryan Cox in his Wonders of the Universe TV programme has reminded us that planet earth will one day be destroyed by the sun. Luckily that will be in about 6 billion years, so no need for us to worry just yet.

Trying to think on that timescale can be fun – when you think that human beings have only been around for less than a hundred thousand years. Will people in the year 3011 even be recognisable to us as people? A website providing a timeline of the future can be a way of stimulating thinking, and broadening our horizons (click here) – as can thinking about the Clock of the Long Now (see the picture for the prototype). I don’t agree with all of their projections (some I think will happen much quicker, others not at all) but that is not the point. It won’t tell you what will happen to your industry next month, or even next year, but it does help us stop thinking that the future will be just like the past.

Your Flat screen is fat

I recently attended an event organised by Chemicals NorthWest on Printable electronics. You may not have heard much about this emerging technology, but it is going to change a lot of the world around us. The sector covers quite a broad range of activities, but the key factor is (as you might expect) electronic components that can be printed on surfaces in a similar way to printing newspapers on paper. Or perhaps slightly closer, printed wallpaper.
There are a myriad of related issues and concepts, such as organic polymer batteries, light sources and the like, but essentially when this technology comes through we can expect to have our televisions as wallpaper in our living rooms – or potentially on the windows. And our energy produced by thin films of photocells on our roof or any other surface (flat or not)

One of the nice things about this is that it is an area where British companies are in with a good chance of establishing a strong position. This is a disruptive technology, so all the companies trying to develop it are pretty much starting from the same position. Ultimately the devices might be assembled in the far east, which is a shame for UK manufacturing, but the real money could be in the design and manufacture of raw materials and components, and the use of design of the end product. In these areas UK businesses are well placed.
Although I was aware of the technology, I was not aware of how advanced it is until this conference. We were shown a Sony OLED TV – which had better colours than most HD TVs, and was at most half the thickness of an IPod. And this dates from about 3 years ago.
The world will look more like Minority Reports than many of us expected, and it will be with us far sooner than I expected. This is expected to be a market worth hundreds of Billions by the end of the decade.
Of course, at the moment it is all quite staggeringly expensive – but that can change over time. And with it will come an even more futuristic world than we can imagine. Of course, when it does arrive we will take it for granted in about six months.
The opportunities for British business are significant. Dr. Chris Drew of Soris compared the state of this industry to that of pharmaceuticals in the 1950s – fast paced, very high specifications, very technical, great potential, still largely undeveloped. The UK was able to take advantage of that – let’s hope we can do the same again.

New Product Development (two day workshop) 22/23 March 2010

I shall be running a 2 day event for the SME network at Bradford University School of Management at the end of March 2010.

All businesses need to develop new products and services in order to keep up with changing customer requirements and to beat the competition.
These can be new physical products, new services or even just new ways of delivering your existing
products. The path from idea to successful delivery and profit can be long and difficult.
This two day seminar will go through the process with case studies, worked examples and exercises to allow
you to create a template for new product development for your business.

· Why NPD?
· Stages of NPD
· What products/service?
· Generating ideas
· Research and development
· Stage gate processes
· Market testing
· Launching new products
· Feedback and continual improvement

If you would like to sign up to this event please contact us on smenetwork@bradford.ac.uk

NPD - slides

As promised.

NPD - a personal case study

On Tuesday night I gave a personal case study on New Product Development at the SME Network at Bradford School of Management. Apologies for the delay in putting the slides up.

I am experimenting with using docstoc.com for hosting these files, so please forgive any unusual formatting. You should be able to access a PDF file by clicking here, or on the title. And just to be sure I shall attach the slides as Jpegs as well.

NPD case study presentation -

Evening Master Class – New Product Development – 9th February 2010

I shall be speaking at the Bradford University School of Management SME network event on Tuesday 9th February 2010. The event is supported by a range of funds, and so is free to attend.

Dr Rana Tessabehji will be presenting before me, with an interesting talk entitled : Killer Ideas, developing new products and services. I will then be talking through a case study from my days in the chemical industry

The event kicks off at 5pm for coffee, with presentations from 5:30 to 7:15pm, followed by networking. Directions to the venue can be found by clicking here.

We hope to follow this event with a full day event later in February or March 2010.