User-centered design vs Design-driven innovation

10

October

2016

5/5 (1)

Over the past years, design has seen a vast increase in attention from scholars. Throughout their innovation processes, firms are investing more in design.

One form of this design is the so-called user-centered design. This popular apporach to design starts with a thorough analysis of the customer and the discovery of needs of the client, hoping to discover any latent needs. However, user-centered approaches usually do not lead to market leadership or the perception of innovativeness, as incremental changes are seen more often.

Opposite to user-centered design is the approach of design-driven innovation. Through this approach, firms aims at radically redefining the meaning of a product to a customer. This form of design does not start from insights of observing or asking the end-user, as opposed to user-centered design. Customers, as has been found, are unable to express any radical ideas on product meanings due to the sociocultural context they are currently immersed in. Hence, any idea is likely to be a mere extension of what is already happening. The driving core of design-driven innovation is the firm’s vision about potential new product meanings and possibilities in the future.

In order to be successful in design-driven innovation, the process of emerging new product meanings should be understood, anticipated, proposed and influenced. The core is to understand the evolution of sociocultural models that shape the consumer’s perception, and be able to propose a new vision and meaning to that. As such, to a design-driven firm it is very useful to be in a network with firms following the same approach of redefining their products. A network, thus spanning outside firm boundaries, in which research and ideas are shared, makes a good basis. For example, Bang&Olufsen, but also Apple, are firms that have a clear vision on how a product should function and clearly use a design-drive approach for their products. As such, this has lead to B&O being widely recognized for its innovative approach to TVs and audiosystems, whereas Apple is largely seen as the biggest innovator in the smartphone/portables industries.

 

What do you think? Should all firms pursue a design-driven innovation process?

 

Verganti, R. (2008) ‘Design, Meanings, and Radical Innovation: A Metamodel and a Research Agenda’, Journal of Product Innovation Management, 25, pp. 436-456.

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Why Polaroid failed to disrupt, but got disrupted

20

September

2016

5/5 (5)

Decades ago, Polaroid was among the leading firms in the photography- and camera industry (Tripsas & Gavetti, 1997). The firm produced top-notch products and was widely known for its instant-photograpy cameras, that were able to directly print the photo after it was taken. Being a technology-driven firm, Polaroid focused on R&D and developing new camera technologies. One of these was the digital camera. Despite Polaroid’s early development of the digital camera, considered a disruptive innovation, the firm got disrupted by the technology itself. Polaroid failed to implement the technology, and remained its focus on instant cameras. How could this happen?

The development of a disruptive innovation comes along with risks and stuggles. Polaroid, being a top-selling firm, wanted to stay in the top position they were in. Having developed a new camera technology, they were afraid to introduce it to mass market as customers, at the time, did not want these products but were looking for instant cameras. We call this inertia or resource-dependence: a firm does not want to harm its revenue streams by investing in products the customer does not want. Ironically, Polaroid got disrupted by the digital camera technology. This is why, according to Christensen (1997) only start-up firms or market entrants are able to develop disruptive innovations. After ditching the digital technology and putting it on the shelves, Polaroid stopped being technology-driven and focused on their marketing efforts, introducing customized and playful versions of their wellknown instant-cameras.

How could Polaroid have averted their disruption, by a technology they developed themselves? First, Polaroid could have become an ambidextrous organization (O’Reilly & Tushman, 2004) by balancing investments between incumbent and new, potentially disruptive technologies. Second, Polaroid could have created a spin-off firm for the digital cameras, perhaps under a different name (Markides, 2006). That way, Polaroid may avert of internal competition between products. However, I argue that Polaroid could have focused on vision communication. Vision communication, as many scholars would agree, helps to steer consumer preferences and educate the market about new product propositions. In doing so, Polaroid could have remained a technology-driven firm yet also introduce their customers to new technologies. If Polaroid were to spread its ideas and vision about their disruptive technology to the market, I’d be convinced that we would nowadays walk around with a Polaroid-original digital camera.

 

References:

Christensen, C. (1997) ‘The innovator’s dilemma: when new technologies cause great firms to fail’, Boston: Harvard Business Review.

Markides, C. (2006) ‘Disruptive Innovation: In Need of Better Theory’, Journal of Product Innovation Management, vol. 23, pp. 19-25.

O’Reilly III, C. & Tushman, M. (2008) ‘Ambidexterity as a Dynamic Capability: Resolving the Innovator’s Dilemma’, Research in Organizational Behavior, 28, pp. 185-206.

Tripsas, M. & Gavetti, G. (2000) ‘Capabilities, Cognition, and Inertia: Evidence from Digital Imaging’, Strategic Management Journal, 21, pp. 1147-1161.

 

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