C Innovation
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Wikipedia
A chief innovation officer (CINO) or chief technology innovation officer (CTIO) is a person in a company who is primarily responsible for managing the process of innovation and change management in an organization, as well as being in some cases the person who “originates new ideas but also recognizes innovative ideas generated by other people”. The CINO also manages technological change.
The term “chief innovation officer” was first coined and described in the 1998 book Fourth Generation R&D. Organizations with a CINO/CTIO are practicing part of the fourth generation of innovation theory and practice to emerge since 1900. Successful chief innovation officers focus on delivering on the key principles behind innovation – leadership, creating networks, harnessing VOC/HOC in idea development, leveraging the right incentives, and building/running an effective, transparent, and efficient innovation process.
The CINO is responsible for managing the innovation process inside the organization that identifies strategies, business opportunities and new technologies and then develops new capabilities and architectures with partners, new business models and new industry structures to serve those opportunities.
CINO/CTIO does not have to report to the CEO or another C-level executive. However, for such role to succeed it requires organisational support from the highest level possible and reporting to the CEO or one of its direct reports is a common practice. CINO/CTIO is a functional title, similar to the chief information security officer. The words “chief” and “officer” are used to communicate that a person in this position is responsible for driving innovation throughout the entire organization. Using a functional “chief … officer” title helps to communicate that this is a cross-organizational position and enables this person to work across organizational silos.
The CINO/CTIO focuses on radical or breakthrough innovation. The coined term CINO/CTIO is used to differentiate the position from the chief information officer, who is responsible for the information technology and computer systems that support enterprise goals.
A chief technology innovation officer (CTIO) is focused on the organizational innovation through technology. This is an important strategic position especially in an organization that has significant technology component in addition to the traditional information technology. This position is typically held by a person with a broad technical expertise in that organization’s industry.
The title chief technology innovation officer is commonly used in the organizations that have a technology component as a part of its core business. The CTIO is responsible for maintaining organizational technological strategy, defining the requirements for new technology implementations and communicating them to key business stakeholders.
The CTIO is responsible for organizational leadership on technology issues, management of the technology research and review function, ensuring the alignment of technology vision with business strategy, and for driving technology innovation throughout the entire organization. The position can also be responsible for tracking new technology developments in areas of interest to the organization to ensure that it maintains a technological edge within the industry, analyzing and improving upon technology standards and maintaining organizational awareness of new technologies.
Innovation by businesses is achieved in many ways, with much attention now given to formal research and development (R&D) for “breakthrough innovations”. R&D help spur on patents and other scientific innovations that leads to productive growth in such areas as industry, medicine, engineering, and government. Yet, innovations can be developed by less formal on-the-job modifications of practice, through exchange and combination of professional experience and by many other routes. Investigation of relationship between the concepts of innovation and technology transfer revealed overlap. The more radical and revolutionary innovations tend to emerge from R&D, while more incremental innovations may emerge from practice – but there are many exceptions to each of these trends.
Information technology and changing business processes and management style can produce a work climate favorable to innovation. For example, the software tool company Atlassian conducts quarterly “ShipIt Days” in which employees may work on anything related to the company’s products. Google employees work on self-directed projects for 20% of their time (known as Innovation Time Off). Both companies cite these bottom-up processes as major sources for new products and features.
An important innovation factor includes customers buying products or using services. As a result, organizations may incorporate users in focus groups (user centered approach), work closely with so-called lead users (lead user approach), or users might adapt their products themselves. The lead user method focuses on idea generation based on leading users to develop breakthrough innovations. U-STIR, a project to innovate Europe’s surface transportation system, employs such workshops. Regarding this user innovation, a great deal of innovation is done by those actually implementing and using technologies and products as part of their normal activities. Sometimes user-innovators may become entrepreneurs, selling their product, they may choose to trade their innovation in exchange for other innovations, or they may be adopted by their suppliers. Nowadays, they may also choose to freely reveal their innovations, using methods like open source. In such networks of innovation the users or communities of users can further develop technologies and reinvent their social meaning.