Inside Outside Innovation

Aviad Stein is the Director of Client Partnerships at Alpha, a consumer insights company. He has worked with Tumbler, Bloomberg, Nordstrom, and Dun & Bradstreet on customer-centric innovation strategies. Brian Ardinger, Inside Outside Innovation Founder, talks with Aviad about his experiences with experimentation and digital transformations. Podcast Highlights: - Aviad has taken many companies of different sizes through digital transformation. Created an innovation incubator at Nordstrom. Built online and mobile ecosystem for users engaging in-store and online. Bloomberg Digital team developed Audio/Video digitalization. Bringing content to consumers and creating partnerships. - Advice for working in large companies? Take one challenge at a time. At Nordstrom, identified acquiring new users. How can tech support them? Bring teams together to solve this goal. The business wanted to leverage tech. Customers wanted tech to engage with the company. Gathered customer feedback, then took to tech to create those services and create value. - Alpha Platform: Helps corporations manage products: feature, functionality, and target audience; Runs experiments based on hypothesis or assumptions on ideas at speed and scale to get directional input, and understand market opportunity. Smaller teams can get the same knowledge, as larger teams, and move faster. - Alpha works with one-third of Fortune 100 companies. $900 billion on experimentation is going to waste this year. Need the test and learn methodology. Alpha is a collaboration tool that enables teams to move much faster, based on input from their target audiences. - Mistakes of product people - Can't take action on relevant data. Can they identify business goal and objectives? Need to measure the success of what you've been validating. Must be able to execute successfully. - The Alpha Team is coming to the IO Summit with the Alpha Bar. Helps companies test different assumptions about their business. For More Information For more information, check out alphahq.com to request a demo or connect with Aviad Stein at aviad.stein@alphaux.com For similar podcasts, check out:  Ep. 20 – Lisa Kay Solomon with “Design a Better Business” Ep. 34 – Laura Klein w/ lean startup for product design Ep. 48 – Founders of Nex.tt This week's podcast is sponsored by RSM - Audit, Tax, & Consulting Services for the Middle Market Find this episode of Inside Outside Innovation at insideoutside.io. You can also listen on Acast, iTunes, Sticher, Spotify, and Google Play. FREE INNOVATION NEWSLETTER Get the latest episodes of the Inside Outside Innovation podcast, in addition to thought leadership in the form of blogs, innovation resources, videos, and invitations to exclusive events. SUBSCRIBE HERE For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

After working at Nike for 20 years, Lorrie Vogel founded ImagineNOW, an Innovation consultancy. She talks with Brian Ardinger, Founder of Inside Outside Innovation, about building an innovation portfolio. Lorrie started her career at Nike working in industrial design, then led innovation and sustainability, and finally served as Vice President of Material Science and Innovation. Today, Lorrie leads an innovation consultancy, where she helps others with emerging science and tech, systems, and innovation teams.  Key Points - Nike’s approach is very systematic. Every team has a process. Nike does early prototyping. - As we brought new innovation into the portfolio, we became more systematic when looking at tech. If it was successful, how would it impact our business? - If you work in innovation, you need a filter. Evaluate - Does it drive revenue, decrease cost, reduce environmental footprint, strategic IT, new better performance, and brand value? Look at it from different perspectives, which innovations are below this line. Does it add value? Look for the game-changer. But sometimes, specific teams want to elevate various activities for different reasons. - Make sure portfolio is broken up across business teams so every team benefits. If your company is committed to reducing enviro footprint, you need to have some key components to address this. Bulk of your innovation should be revenue focused. - How do other companies address? Google makes sure value is there in new innovation, but they can do almost anything. Think about what stage are you in your company. Don’t do it in a vacuum. Sometimes it’s around can I make this happen, but is the marketing team excited? Need to have all teams engaged. - Even by having a system, need to think about the budget. The more you learn, need to continue to evaluate. Dynamic portfolio. Monitor the market because sometimes the market is not ready for the newest innovation. - Innovator Traits - Be alright with ambiguity. Every group that performs well are reaching out to others. Open to collaborate. Design boards help others understand. For More Information For more information, go to imagineNOWinc.com or find Lorrie Vogel on Linkedin. This week's podcast is sponsored by Husch Blackwell   For similar podcasts, check out: Ep. 123 – Gatorade’s Xavi Cortadellas on Breakthrough Innovation Ep. 81 – Jack Elkins with Orlando Magic Ep. 77 – Renata Policicio with ESPN Find this episode of Inside Outside Innovation at insideoutside.io. You can also listen on Acast, iTunes, Sticher, Spotify, and Google Play. FREE INNOVATION NEWSLETTER Get the latest episodes of the Inside Outside Innovation podcast, in addition to thought leadership in the form of blogs, innovation resources, videos, and invitations to exclusive events. SUBSCRIBE HERE For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

David Bland is the Founder of Precoil and the Co-Author of Testing Business Ideas, along with Alexander Osterwalder. David talks with Brian Ardinger, Inside Outside Innovation Founder, about risk, generating evidence through experimentation, and listening to customers. David’s new book is a field guide for rapid experimentation. Through tactical examples, it describes what he’s seen with various teams and testing in the market. It also describes product and backend business model testing, in addition to 44 experiments organized from low strength of evidence to high strength of evidence. Key Points - Think about risk - I have this risk. Should we do this? Can we do this? Companies need to generate more evidence before jumping to build. Learn about desirable, viable, and feasible. - What has changed in the experimentation process? Originally landing pages were it. Now we need to think about the hypothesis we’re trying to test. Experimentation terminology and processes are being adopted by product managers. - Business Model Canvas - People stop with how to address risk and making that a repeatable process. Need to connect to outcomes. Discovery isn’t a phase. It’s continuous. Look at retail and automotive.  - Need for experimentation taking hold. Need to move fast and put learning into action. Learning from customers gets you farther.  - Companies need to teach experimentation. Democratizing process. Multi-year journey. - Innovator Skills and Talent: Creative problem solvers that can deal with uncertainty and take initiative. Find and give people a chance to be entrepreneurs. Exhibit behaviors that are customer-centric, data influenced, and willing to test the status quo. - Environment for innovators is crucial.  For More Information Check out David’s new book Testing Business Ideas at precoil.com, Strategyzer.com, or on Amazon. This week's podcast is sponsored by RSM - Audit, Tax, & Consulting Services for the Middle Market   For similar podcasts, check out: Ep. 164 – Josh Seiden, Author of Outcomes Over Outputs on Being Outcome Centric Ep. 140 – Melissa Perri, Escaping the Build Trap Author and Produx Labs CEO Ep. 126 – Barry O’Reilly, Author of Unlearn & Lean Enterprise   Find this episode of Inside Outside Innovation at insideoutside.io. You can also listen on Acast, iTunes, Sticher, Spotify, and Google Play. FREE INNOVATION NEWSLETTER Get the latest episodes of the Inside Outside Innovation podcast, in addition to thought leadership in the form of blogs, innovation resources, videos, and invitations to exclusive events. SUBSCRIBE HERE For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Scott Lenet, President of Touchdown Ventures, takes a different approach to investing. With a tagline of VC as a Service, Scott helps companies set up and run their funds. Scott talks with Brian Ardinger, Inside Outside Innovation Founder, about corporate venture. Corporates can be some of the best investors on the Cap table and achieve multiple objectives, from financial to strategic.They can also help themselves while helping the startup. How have corporates changed their startup investing? - There's a correlation between corporate venture success and longevity/experience of managers. Touchdown works hand-in-hand with corporations. - Companies should set themselves up for learning, but not as a tire kicker.  - Touchdown is seeing demand from every industry. It's not only from large corporations, but also from mid-market and startups in SF.   - How do we stay innovative? All companies can see disruption. Can I do learning without investing? No. Startups won't share info.   How do you help companies think beyond their existing industries?   - Corporate venture capital helps you do this - Companies should be investing, differently = Core, adjacent, or disruption. Where do we want to focus our investments? - VC investing in 1% of what you see.   - Intel capital or M12 ventures - Commitment to the program and helping startups. Good financial fiduciaries. Provide strategic value for startup and corporation. Relevant to businesses. Intel backs disruptive innovators.  What should startups think about for corporate venture? What should corporate venture think about for startups? - Need to recognize corporations are large — many decision-makers. VCs can help you work with corporates.   - Can deliver strategic benefits for startups. Engage in market. How do we maintain dominant positions and partners? - Need a change of mindset to reap benefits in this space.  For more information For more information, on Scott Lenet or Touchdown Ventures check out touchdownvc.com For similar podcasts, check out: Ep. 152 – Acceleprise’s Olivia O’Sullivan on Investing in Corporate/Startup Collaboration Ep. 133 – Drive Capital’s Chris Olsen on Investment Innovation in the Midwest Ep. 42 – John Bungert with MetLife on Working with VCs and Internal Innovation Campaigns Find this episode of Inside Outside Innovation at insideoutside.io. You can also listen on Acast, iTunes, Sticher, Spotify, and Google Play.   FREE INNOVATION NEWSLETTER Get the latest episodes of the Inside Outside Innovation podcast, in addition to thought leadership in the form of blogs, innovation resources, videos, and invitations to exclusive events. SUBSCRIBE HERE For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Josh Seiden is the author of Outcomes Over Outputs, Sense and Respond, and Lean UX, in addition to being a designer, strategy consultant, and coach. He has worked with companies like S&P, Fidelity, and AMEX. He also started the Sense and Respond Press, which focuses on short, actionable books about innovation, product management, and digital transformation. Josh spends much of his time consulting and training teams to work together effectively and create business outcomes. In this podcast, Josh talks with Brian Ardinger, Inside Outside Innovation Founder, about applying outcomes over outputs. When thinking about being outcome-centered in a complex, emergent system, Josh suggests defining outcome as a change in behavior that creates business value. E.g.- Twitter. The challenge is to focus all work around outputs, rather than features. The highest level of outputs is impact, including revenue, costs, and customer satisfaction. Increasing customer satisfaction isn't solved through new features. Getting the outcome level right is a challenge. Outcomes must be measurable and observable. Testing these outcome assumptions is critical, as is collaboration among teams. E.g.- HBR.org Josh Seiden and Sarah Hudson will be at the Inside Outside Innovation Summit, Oct 20-22, in Lincoln, NE.  For more information For more information, see Joshuaseiden.com, on Twitter @jsiden, or check out Senseandrespondpress.com. For similar podcasts, check out: - Ep. 156 – Jeff Gothelf, Co-Author of Lean UX, Sense & Respond, and Lean vs Agile vs Design Thinking on Building a Culture of Innovation - Ep. 140 – Melissa Perri, Escaping the Build Trap Author and Produx Labs CEO - Ep. 126 – Barry O’Reilly, Author of Unlearn & Lean Enterprise Find this episode of Inside Outside Innovation at insideoutside.io. You can also listen on Acast, iTunes, Sticher, Spotify, and Google Play.   FREE INNOVATION NEWSLETTER Get the latest episodes of the Inside Outside Innovation podcast, in addition to thought leadership in the form of blogs, innovation resources, videos, and invitations to exclusive events. SUBSCRIBE HERE For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Kathleen Cohen is the founder of the Collaboratorium, a consultancy that creates enhanced guest experiences, in multi-use environments, through digital, AI/ML, XR, computer vision, and immersive and experiential thought leaders. She has previously worked with  DreamWorks, IBM innovation, and Disney Resorts, among others. Kathleen talks with Brian Ardinger, Inside Outside Founder, about innovation’s future through experiential technology. What changes have you seen in innovation? - Kathleen was first an artist, then moved to digital, and now back to physical space. - Innovation brought the data layover to experiences, and now AI and Machine Learning are making an impact. How has innovation changed because of tech? - Started as a digital strategist and now calls herself an experiential strategist - Kathleen helped launch Disneyworld.com and soon found herself asked to join the 1st meeting on Disney’s creative team to help re-architect Epcot. Although Kathleen started her own consultancy at that point, her colleagues helped create the magic band. It took nine years with substantial design challenges but brought Disney closer to the customer. Now for six years, the magic band has been collecting data which they can use to tell stories. Disney brought a holistic approach to the innovation experience. What other companies are innovating? - Companies that are moving to the spatial web, spatial web computing, meta-verse building, and world-building  - E.g., Magic Leap moved from Goggles to focusing on a Metaverse. - How do we use the Metaverse in urban planning? Meeting Your Digital Twin Talk is a move towards humanism - If I looked at your digital trails, would you look different than your data says? - ACLU of AI and Algorithmic justice league - Organizations questioning AI - Where is agency over identity? What is mine? - Questions of digital rights and citizenship when creating digital humans Are there common characteristics people should be building on to be better innovators? - Storytelling vs. data-driven  - Need for artists asking collaboration questions.   To find out more - To find out more about Kathleen or The Collaboratorium, email kc@thecollaboratorium.com or see http://thecollaboratorium.com For similar podcasts, check out: - Ep. 134– Paramount Pictures’ Futurist Ted Schilowitz on VR, AR & Mixed Reality - Ep. 135– Nara Logics CEO and E.N. Thompson Lecturer Jana Eggers on Artificial Intelligence’s Past and Future - Ep. 145– Laura Anne Edwards, DATA OASIS founder, NASA Datanaut, TED Resident & SheCanHackIT on Sustainable Innovation and Big Data Find this episode of Inside Outside Innovation at insideoutside.io. You can also listen on Acast, iTunes, Sticher, Spotify, and Google Play.   FREE INNOVATION NEWSLETTER Get the latest episodes of the Inside Outside Innovation podcast, in addition to thought leadership in the form of blogs, innovation resources, videos, and invitations to exclusive events. SUBSCRIBE HERE For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Leaders need to have a balanced stance to invest in core, adjacent, and breakthroughs innovation for the long-term sustainability of their corporations. Currently, corporations put 95% of their focus on operational excellence and 5% on innovation excellence.  Gordon Stannis is Director of Design & Strategy and Partner at Twisthink. Gordon talks with Brian Ardinger, Inside Outside Innovation founder, about how to grow innovation excellence.  Twisthink was launched two decades ago, to solve business problems through the "twisting" of design and creative technologists. For Crown, Twisthink developed a digital glove that drives a 3-ton truck in a warehouse. It solves a safety problem by driving remotely, and also eliminates 70% of footsteps from the worker’s daily routine. Crown was able to increase the price of the product by 2X. What process does Twisthink go through to work with clients? - Understand stakeholders and pain points and then begin to solve problems.  - Use any process that yields results as fast as possible, as cheap as possible.  - Create a prototype and then watch people use it. Expensive option.   - The Visual Research tool is a one-month option. Create plausible processes and scenarios. 10-15 Interviews with stakeholders. Then start design process.  How do you move from idea to the market place? - Innovation phase - Human centered design - Product Development process How do you hire talent and team for innovation? - Curious, courageous, don’t mind failing, strong work ethic, and easy to get along with.  For more information  For more information about Godon or Twisthink, check out http://twisthink.com/io/ For similar podcasts, check out: Ep. 90 – Teresa Torres w/ Product Talk Ep. 106 – Amy Jo Kim – Innovation Consultant and Author of Game Thinking Ep. 108 – Taylor Dawson with GE on Product Innovation Find this episode of Inside Outside Innovation at insideoutside.io. You can also listen on Acast, iTunes, Sticher, Spotify, and Google Play.   FREE INNOVATION NEWSLETTER Get the latest episodes of the Inside Outside Innovation podcast, in addition to thought leadership in the form of blogs, innovation resources, videos, and invitations to exclusive events. SUBSCRIBE HERE For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Omar Luqmann-Harris is the author of Leader Board: The DNA of High-Performance Teams. While leading teams around the world, he saw an employee engagement gap emerge because traditional leadership principles didn’t change with the workforce of today. Omar talks with Brian Ardinger, Inside Outside Innovation Founder, about why employees won’t respond to old ways of leadership. Omar first looked at the titans of leadership and applied their principles to his teams around the world. Then he created new methods to determine what works today. Leadership 1.0 - Late 1800s to post WWII - Farm to the Factory - Hierarchy, homogenous workforce - Henry Ford Leadership 2.0 - Post-WWII - 1990s - Diversity, American Dream Phase, Teams - JFK and Space Race Leadership 3.0 - 1990s - now - Information Revolution - Solution to innovation - Leadership different, organizations are flatter and connected. Work has changed from individuals to teams, moving from A Players focus to Team Focus. Now everyone on the team is excellent at something. Empower them to lead.  Leader Board - Takes a narrative format to teach and demonstrate principles. Shows how you can apply principles. - Pprovides team performance and acceleration principles, utilizing the stages of group formation. - Provides loads of free templates and tools to implement principles. Obstacles to developing teams - Bringing in new people - Focus on WHOM - Work ethic, heart, optimism, and maturity - Provides assessment 1. What defines a successful day? 2. What do you do to help people outside of work? 3. What is your biggest failure? 4. Tell me about a colleague you worked with that disappointed you, and that you still had to work with. Differences in hiring between startups and corporations - Startup hiring is much more important - Scaling - Focus on raw material - Stay involved For More Information For more information about Omar, check out www.omarlharris.com or find his book on Amazon. For similar podcasts, check out: Ep. 148 – Francesca Gino, Harvard Professor and Author of Rebel Talent: Why It Pays to Break All the Rules in Work and in Life Ep. 117 – Nicole Rufuku, Author of Hiring for the Innovation Economy Ep. 104 – Shane Snow – Author of Dream Teams: Working Together without Falling Apart Find this episode of Inside Outside Innovation at insideoutside.io. You can also listen on Acast, iTunes, Sticher, Spotify, and Google Play.   FREE INNOVATION NEWSLETTER Get the latest episodes of the Inside Outside Innovation podcast, in addition to thought leadership in the form of blogs, innovation resources, videos, and invitations to exclusive events. SUBSCRIBE HERE For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Savannah Economic Development's Jen Bonnett - VP of Innovation/Entrepreneurship & ED of The Creative Coast talks with Brian Ardinger, Inside Outside Innovation founder about Startup Ecosystem Building. Jen recently moved from Atlanta, where she founded Startup Chicks, led the state of Georgia's technology incubator, and helped the ATL startup community. She ranks ALT in the top startup ecosystems in the country. Highlights from their Conversation: - Savanah has three University assets. Similar to Boulder.  - Why the Creative Coast? Savanah has a thriving arts community. How do you teach artists to thrive online?  - Digital technology a significant focus. Also, healthcare tech and logistics.   - E-commerce - creative meets the port.  - Jen knew community and leaders. Began by building Ecosystem map — missing investor community.  - Savannah is a significant port. - Startups don't know each other or their peer groups.  We are creating peer group and revenue meetups. - "Slowvannah" - Blog post - Savannah has high net-worth individuals, but they don't know how to invest in startups.  ATL has involved ecosystems.   - Jen was active in ATL in recruiting corporations to be involved in the startup ecosystem.  - She's talked with all major Savannah corporations. They want help in how to engage.  - Trends in ecosystems - 20-year game. The corporate tie-in is key, as well as collaborating with other cities. Figure out what you do well and focus on those industries. For More Information For more information about Jen Bonnett or Savannah and the Creative Coast, check out thecreativecoast.org or email jen@thecreativecoast.org. Find her on Twitter @Jen_bonnett For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy

Oscar Allain is Vice President of Cross-Cultural Strategy and Research at UM Worldwide. He focuses on reaching the rapidly changing multicultural audiences in the US. Oscar talks with Brian Ardinger, Inside Outside Innovation founder, about brands being part of the cultural conversation and doing it the right way.  Key Points - WAVE is UM’s annual study to gain a better understanding of the digital world. This year they decided to quantify the Remix cultures.  - Remix Culture studies the movements within cultures that are being influenced by ethic or minorities such as Hispanics, Asians and LGBT communities. They want to understand what the implications are for certain businesses.   - ReMix’s four cultural pillars - Resist, Retrograde, Re-globallize, Recreate - Latinos have changed over past 20 years from need to assimilate to amping up on sense of identity.  - Ethnic Cultures are part of movement/generations that speak up against things that don’t align with values, ability to retro-culturate, have a cultural mindset that impacts mainstream culture, and maintains an entrepreneurial spirit.  - Quantify Remix mindset - Not generational. In Nigeria it’s 16-24 year olds, in China it’s 25-34 year olds, and in US it’s 16-44 year olds. These are groups leading the conversation and are the agents of change.  - How do brands play in conversation? - eg - Nike (Resist), Netflix (Retrograde), Uniqlo (Reglo), Starbucks (Recreate) - Brands are encouraged to be a part of the cultural conversation and doing it the right way.  - Best Brands are true and authentic to the brand and consumer. Need to recognize new movements like LantinX and keep focused on changing cultures.  For More Information For more information on Oscar, Remix Culture, and UM Worldwide check out umww.com For similar podcasts, check out: Ep. 134 – Paramount Pictures’ Futurist Ted Schilowitz on VR, AR & Mixed Reality Ep. 130 – Canopy Insight’s Victoria Gerstman on Culture’s Influence on Brands & Semiotics Ep. 122 – Jeff Rohrs, Yext CEO and Author of Audience: Marketing in the age of subscribers, fans and followers Find this episode of Inside Outside Innovation at insideoutside.io. You can also listen on Acast, iTunes, Sticher, Spotify, and Google Play.   FREE INNOVATION NEWSLETTER Get the latest episodes of the Inside Outside Innovation podcast, in addition to thought leadership in the form of blogs, innovation resources, videos, and invitations to exclusive events. SUBSCRIBE HERE For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy