For Consumer Product Strategy Professionals

Case Study: How HP Drives World-Class Product Innovation

Openness And Tight Management Define HP's Innovation Process

by Paul Jackson, September 21, 2009

In HP's 70-year history, it has innovated in many new and established technology fields. But how does the firm cope with the inevitable slide — faced by most dominant global firms — into driving established products rather than innovative ones? Whether . . .

For Interactive Marketing Professionals

Accessible Innovation

How Interactive Marketers Can Reduce The Risk Of Innovating In A Recession

by Shar VanBoskirk, September 1, 2009

A down economy provides the perfect environment for interactive marketers to innovate; emerging media provides cost-effective ways to keep firms ahead of competition and customer needs. Forrester's Accessible Innovation framework helps firms overcome . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Being Innovative Means Moving Beyond The Hype

B2B Tech Vendors Need To Focus Innovation On Strategy, Management, And Metrics

by Chris Andrews, August 12, 2009

In a recent survey of technology strategy and marketing professionals, more than 84% said that "providing more innovative products and services" is a primary goal for their organizations given the current economic climate. The data shows just how important . . .

For Consumer Product Strategy Professionals

Driving Consumer Product Innovation

Introducing Forrester's Consumer Product Innovation Viability Scorecard

by Paul Jackson, April 10, 2009

We are entering a period of near-unprecedented change in the consumer product space — available technology, global markets, and new levels of consumer engagement are clashing head-on with recessionary spending pressures, new competitors, and a raft of . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Cisco 3.0: A New Tech Star Rises In The East

Cisco Uses India To Evolve From An MNC Into A Globally Adaptive Organization

by Navi Radjou, December 29, 2008

Cisco is systematically globalizing its US-centric corporate culture. To capture the exploding market opportunities in the eastern hemisphere, CEO John Chambers opened the Globalisation Centre East (GCE) in Bangalore in 2007, which de facto acts as Cisco's . . .

For Information & Knowledge Management Professionals

Enterprise Innovation Needs A Game Plan

by Gil Yehuda, Chris Townsend, December 19, 2008

The practice of fostering innovation by tapping into large groups on the Web to capture their great ideas — also known as crowdsourcing — has received much attention. Yet new trends often breed misunderstanding, and crowdsourcing is no different. Many . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Innovating Strategic Management Paradigms And Models To Thrive Amid Global Change

by Daniel Krauss, Thomas Mendel, Ph.D., December 19, 2008

To navigate to a successful future, you have to understand the patterns of the past. To support strategists in this imperative, Forrester reviewed research on and the practice of strategy and strategic management over the past 100 years. Drawing upon . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Sourcing Innovation From Crowds

by Chris Townsend, December 10, 2008

Crowdsourcing has become a media darling — which, rather paradoxically, represents a major threat to the very innovation vendors that market it. Why? Because trendiness breeds misinformation, confusion, and poorly reasoned use cases — making enterprises . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

The Tech CEO's 2009 Innovation Agenda

CEOs: Execute A Five-Point Innovation Program To Win In 2009 And Beyond

by Navi Radjou, December 1, 2008

As they elaborate their 2009 strategic plans, tech CEOs might be tempted to prioritize "restructuring efforts," such as across-the-board cost-cutting, in order to survive the deepening global economic recession. While these tactical moves are necessary . . .

For Sourcing & Vendor Management Professionals

Embed Innovation Within The Sourcing Contract

Contract For Above- And Below-The-Line IT Services Impacts

by Euan Davis, October 28, 2008

The innovation labors of vendors disappoint sourcing decision-makers. To avoid this disappointment, sourcing groups should link innovation with two broad themes — driving transformation or lowering cost and risk. These themes represent innovation delivered . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Tapping The Wisdom Of Experts

The Practice Of Expert Sourcing Will Organize The Way The World Innovates

by Chris Townsend, September 29, 2008

Corporate use of Innovation Networks is rapidly expanding as many fast followers adopt them. The result? Organizations are now managing diversified portfolios of innovation sources that include not only in-house engineers and product managers but also . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

ICICI Banks On Global Innovation Network Success

Its CTO Brokers And Transforms Technology Into Business Value — Fast

by Navi Radjou, September 9, 2008

ICICI Bank, India's largest private bank, is one of India's most tech-savvy and innovative firms. Its secret? An uncanny ability to continually transform its financial products, operational processes, and customer-facing services by exploiting world-class . . .

For Technology Product Management & Marketing Professionals

Beyond Innovation: Adding Adoption To Your Business Objectives

Unchecked Innovation And Competition Can Leave Your Customers Behind

by Tom Grant, Ph.D., July 25, 2008

Vendor strategists compete in an industry of constant change and innovation, and they have to build and sell new features and capabilities to an increasingly business-minded buyer. The dynamics of the tech sector leads vendors to focus too much on the . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

How Tech Vendors Can Help Indian Firms Innovate

Vendors Must Learn To Co-Create Value With Innovation-Hungry IT Users

by Navi Radjou, July 3, 2008

With an economy growing at 7.5%, Indian companies are eager to transform their products, services, processes, and even business models. This document outlines Indian firms' multidimensional innovation needs and illustrates how tech vendors can effectively . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Advocate Your Clients' Business Innovation

by Thomas Mendel, Ph.D., May 19, 2008

In the emerging business technology era, CIOs are eager to play a significant role in business innovation. With their in-depth technology and industry expertise, tech vendors should proactively offer them their business innovation management services.

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Forrester's Tech Horizons Methodology: Predicting Which B2B Innovations Will Succeed

How To Evaluate The Potential Of An Invention Or An Emerging Market — Before You Begin The Forecasting Process

by Chris Andrews, May 8, 2008

Evaluating the potential of emerging markets is becoming an increasingly critical component of innovation. Companies are realizing that they can no longer generate all of their innovation internally and are instead looking to external sources — such as . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

The Tech CEO's Guide To Implementing Customer-Focused Innovation Networks

by Navi Radjou, May 8, 2008

To win in the emerging partner-rich, user-empowered global IT ecosystem, Forrester believes that tech providers must form customer-focused Innovation Networks (CFINs) in which they co-create innovation value with their corporate clients. But implementing . . .

For Marketing Leadership Professionals

Sir Richard Branson On Innovation And Its Role In Marketing

by Henry H. Harteveldt, May 7, 2008

Forrester interviewed Virgin Group Chairman Sir Richard Branson at Travel Industry Associaton's (TIA's) TravelCom 2008 on the occasion of his receiving the conference's first-ever Steve Fossett Innovation Award. Richard made several points about innovation . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Inquiry Insights: Innovation, Q1 2008

by Navi Radjou, Chris Townsend, April 10, 2008

After several years of dedicated research coverage of innovation as a management concept, Forrester's analysis of its client inquiries shows a steady increase in the volume and specificity of client questions around this topic. Inquiries from user companies . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Creating Competitive Assessments That Support Action And Enable Innovation

Using Criteria-Based Evaluations To Assess The Competition

by Chris Andrews, March 6, 2008

A competitive assessment, when executed properly, can help your company understand a technology marketplace, prioritize resources, and create a differentiated go-to-market approach. Creating effective assessments is complicated by the fact that there . . .

For CIOs

IT Can Help Accelerate Business Innovation

Making Product, Business Model, And Process Change Sustainable

by Bobby Cameron, February 21, 2008

Innovation has reached the level of near-meaningless cliché, with execs wishing they were engaged in more of it — even though these execs are unclear about what they want. For their part, CIOs want to create a greater role for IT in business innovation, . . .

For Sourcing & Vendor Management Professionals

Tapping The Full Potential Of Offshore Product Development

Ten Best Practices To Maximize Value And Savings

by Sudin Apte, February 5, 2008

Sending IT and applications related work offshore is a routine business decision in most enterprises. But now organizations and R&D heads are debating whether to send product development offshore as well. Skewed views about the nature of the work, . . .

For CIOs

Case Study: CIOs Can Learn From Kimberly-Clark's Innovation Design Studio

by Bobby Cameron, December 12, 2007

Innovative initiatives cascade from corporate strategies down to action. Example? Kimberly-Clark Corporation (K-C) advanced its enterprisewide strategy "to become an indispensable partner to \[its\] customers" with a virtual reality system that helps . . .

For CIOs

Position IT For Innovation By Fixing Duplication And Ambiguity

Workaround Cultures Create An Environment That Saps IT's Attention

by Alexander Peters, Ph.D., July 13, 2007

CIOs who wish to position IT for more sustainable contributions to business productivity and innovation must first address two problems that have consumed IT since the early days of client-server: 1) duplication within IT assets and organizations, and . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

How IT Consultants Can Finally Profit From Clients' Business Innovation Demands

by Navi Radjou, May 18, 2007

The unfolding business technology (BT) era — where business and technology fuse together — is making firms' need for business innovation more complex and time-sensitive. Yet clients' unwillingness to pay a lot for innovation frustrates IT service providers . . .