Strategy & Practice Management
Quinlan & Associates Report - innovation in the digital age
Quinlan & Associates, an independent strategy consulting firm specialising in the financial services industry, has released a thought leadership paper on delivering innovation in the digital age. The report looks in detail at how technological advancements have fundamentally reshaped the nature of innovation in today’s society and how companies across the globe are responding to this change, especially as the world enters a “new normal” post-Covid-19.
Please CLICK HERE to download the report.
The report, produced by Benjamin Quinlan, CEO & Managing Partner, and Evan Schnidman, Subject Matter Expert, offers comment on an array of subjects, including the need to innovate, shortfalls in innovation frameworks, and getting innovation right, whilst also exploring real-world interpretations.
In the executive summary, Quinlan and Schnidman explore the ideology surrounding the need to innovate constantly to avoid falling victim to the pages of history, such as the fate which befell firms such as Blackberry and Kodak, as firms work to keep pace with the constant new waves of digital disruption. Quinlan and Schnidman specifically draw attention to what they term as ‘the rise of the platform economy’ – noting a deviation from individual corporates to marketplaces.
In the face of this technological evolution and shift in business model, bolstered by the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, many firms are reportedly exploring digitisation avenues with a fuelled urgency, further boosting the estimated USD1.02 trillion to be spent on digital innovation initiatives by 2025.
However, expresses Schnidman and Quinlan, nearly two-thirds of this spend will reportedly prove to be fruitless due to these investments ‘missing the mark.’
The foreword reports that many large firms’ efforts at carrying out digital innovation initiatives are underwhelming, namely due to barriers to innovation, poorly defined strategies, and a notable reliance on ‘Innovation Labs’ and ‘Innovation Days,’ thus genuine innovation ultimately falls by the wayside.
“Although this is a logical tactic for maintaining brand reputation and espousing a company’s technological capabilities in the short-term, it is simply unsustainable in the long run.”
Genuine innovation, according to Quinlan and Schnidman, comes as a product of the implementation and following of a ‘robust innovation strategy’, supported by processes facilitating effective enablement and delivery.
Firms need to be targeted in their digitisation and transformation initiatives, looking to address determined internal and external considerations, bound within the firm’s resources, processes and systems, says the Paper.
The biggest challenge large organisations may face is changing their firm’s culture, namely “a deeply ingrained internal resistance to change and failure, both of which are crucial parts of the innovation process.”
Schnidman and Quinlan offer a warning to firms who fail to undertake digital innovation, offering the admonition that a wake-up call awaits for those organisations who fail to take up the mantle, with the consequences accelerated further still by the appearance of Covid-19.
“Faced with the world entering a new normal, we believe the time for experimenting is over – it’s time for companies to move beyond the buzz.”
Please CLICK HERE to access the full Report - Beyond The Buzz
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