Innovation Day… just a fad???

Stephan Chundoo February 19, 2021

February 16, 2021 marked the yearly anniversary of Innovation Day - a day celebrated by companies seeking inspirational ideas to meet the challenges of tomorrow today!

It is one of the fewer known days of the year, but with it carries the weight of reflection.

Imagine if Kodak or BlockBuster had truly reflected on the themes and the ideas that a day like Innovation Day was promoting. Today, we may have been using a Kodak K Phone, or instead be streaming BlockBuster Originals in our living rooms!

With the pace of technological change, it is even more important for companies to take time to reflect on how to innovate and improve on existing products, services or processes. Find an unloved problem to solve or create a new way for customers to engage with your vision.

Motivating employees in a fading or contracting business is always much harder to do compared with an environment where people are allowed to do things differently, experiment and find new solutions for customers, all the while helping your business set itself apart from the competition.

Is innovation really that novel?

Business Innovation is the creation, development and implementation of a new product, process or service that improves business efficiency, effectiveness or competitiveness, and affects positive change.

A business can innovate by reviewing and improving how it does things today; or it can take a more radical approach by starting over from scratch with a brand new solution to the current problem.

Research and development (R&D) is a common term used in the business world to describe the process and investment in innovation, however this does limit the type of innovation that can take place on a day to day. Teams don't usually go into the R&D meeting room for the R&D cone of silence. Most innovative ideas come from talking to customers about how they engage with your service, why they use it in the first place, and the impact that your product or service is having on their business, asking the questions… How could it be done better?

For businesses today, the ideation process may be well ingrained in the way employees engage within their teams, however sometimes these ideas do not make it to the short list or are on the radar of the “leadership team”. Unless the leadership team is open to new ideas and can be convinced of the business case and merits of any new idea, then unfortunately many ideas could end up on the cutting room floor…

Take communication innovation for example; it has permeated through the way leaders run their business today. Companies that have diversified away from email, can now use collaboration software to engage in dialogue in one-on-one, one-to-many, many-to-one, or many-to-many. Learning & development, ideas and connections can now occur with the click of a few buttons.

Imagine trying to do this with a fax machine today - productivity and immediacy would come to a grinding halt!

Despite these new software tools, business innovation works best when it results in satisfied customers whilst meeting the goals and objectives of the entire organisation.

Making innovation a habit

There is no one size fits all approach to creating, prioritising and investing in new ideas. Essential ingredients involve having an element of trust within each of the team members, open dialogue and alignment with the businesses common purpose/vision, and also creating a relatively safe environment for conversations around these ideas. A bit of a ‘no sacred cows’ approach. Some of the best ideas are just as likely to come from the frontline team, as they are to come from Product or C suite teams. It has to become a way of life and how the business is run.

Innovation in practice

At Procuret, we see opportunities to help customers solve new and existing payment problems. We talk about it in our morning stand-ups, team catch-ups, and continuously seek customer feedback on how we can improve the way customers engage with our solution.

With aim to help businesses grow, Procuret sets out to build a payment platform capable of meeting the rapidly evolving needs of customers. Our product-first approach and innovation ensures customers truly benefit from them. We work hard to make payments better for everyone and build products customers love.