Top 10 Clayton Christensen Insights - World Innovation Forum
Taking a slightly different approach than other World Innovation Forum bloggers, I've distilled the first 90 minutes with Clayton Christensen down into these Top 10 Insights:
- Largest markets don't represent the biggest growth opportunity - non-existent markets are key
- Sustaining innovation improves product past what people need - disruptive innovations often win by being inferior but closer to customer needs
- Low cost strategy only works when you are fighting against a high cost competitor - prices fall if only low cost competitors exist
- A good disruptive strategy creates an incentive for leaders to exit the contested area and focus on higher margin businesses
- Biggest opporunity in China isn't low cost labor, it's the untapped market of non-consumers
- Clayton Christensen believes that green energy opportunities are not in high tech solutions but in low tech developing world instead
- Be careful about outsourcing too much of your operations - you can end up creating competitors (Compaq/Flextronics example)
- Good companies survive by setting up separate businesses with an unfettered charter to kill the mother company
- Clayton Christensen doesn't seem to believe that listening to customers is key to innovation
- Listening to customers doesn't necessarily tip off leaders to possibilities of disruptive innovation
Finally, I'd just like to say that if you've never seen Clayton Christensen in person, he is a gentle giant with a calm demeanor, and surprisingly funny.
Update May 24, 2009 - Here are the slides from Clayton Christensen's presentation at the World Innovation Forum:
What do you think?
Braden Kelley (@innovate on Twitter)
Labels: Braden Kelley, Clayton Christensen, Top 10, World Innovation Forum
posted by Blogging Innovation at 8:41 AM
2 Comments:
Braden, I would contend point 9 -"Clayton Christensen doesn't seem to believe that understanding customers is key to innovation".
I think the point he has been making for many years - and which I agree with - is that companies make the mistake of glibly accepting stated customer requirements as bona fide inputs to guide their development decisions.
Ultimately, lacking the knowledge of what inputs are needed - companies accept the imprecise statements they get from customers and then have marketing and development teams "translate" them into something more useful. But interpreting these inputs only introduces more variability into the process.
However the right framing of gathering customer inputs - that is, as Clay states - the job-to-be-done - ensures that all participants in the process - customers, observers, interviewees, partners, employees -are framing the needs capture and interpretation around the same unit of analysis. This is neither the customer, nor the product but the job they are trying to get done.
Knowing how to get needs on the job, as well as how to apply them, will help companies successfuly grow, enter new and disrupt markets.
Thank you for the comment Chris. I actually re-worded #9 because you are right. The point was more about the link between listening to customers and innovation and tightly linked to #10.
- Braden
Post a Comment
<< Home