Yes, Innovation Is Messy!

Today, innovation happens fast and the outcome is not always fully prepared for the customers.

We see this fairly often within the IT industry (think Microsoft which earned the reputation for “saving” the final debugging for the customers) and this is also the case with mobile payments at Starbucks as you can read about in this article: Starbuck’s Execs Respond to Square Criticism: Innovation Is Messy

In the article, I like this qoute by one of the Starbuck’s executives: “We don’t want to wait on innovation,” Brotman explained. “Because if we waited until we could make it perfect across every single experience of every single store, we would have to move much more slowly for the vast majority of our customers. So we’ve taken an approach that’s not always perfect, but we think it’s the best thing for our brand and customers.”

He also said this: “It’s not always the most stress-free way to launch and scale, but it’s the fastest,” Brotman said. “We’re willing to do that. We do not want to sit on our hands. If we feel excited about something, we’ll get it out there, learn our lessons, and then correct the mistakes. That helps us be a leader.”

This is a great mindset for innovation. It has been cultivated for a long time within the IT industry. I wonder to which degree this will spill over into other industries.

What do you think? Or better yet: Can you share some cases in which companies outside the IT industry do this?

image credit: wikimedia

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Stefan Lindegaard is an author, speaker and strategic advisor who focus on the topics of open innovation, social media and intrapreneurship.