Tomorrow’s leaders may need to get comfortable with being uncomfortable

Preparing for the 4th Annual Open Innovation conference coming up April 7 - 9th, our team got talking about what we could share with Intuit, General Mills, GlaxoSmithKline, Nestle, Motorola, Merck & Co., NASA at the event that would be worth their time?

We talk to businesses every day about cross-enterprise crowdsourcing. Mostly we get asked about the how to’s and ROI of open innovation for seeking research or technology breakthroughs, new product and service ideas, testing and building world-leading brands, and anticipating consumer and citizen preference and behaviour trends.

Truthfully, these business cases for crowdsourcing are pretty common sense.

What we notice is relatively uncommon though is an understanding that crowdsourcing isn’t about getting more people participating in business as usual, it’s about how we need to change what’s usual about business to get more people contributing. Shifting to open innovation means evolving how organizations identify new strategic direction, manage knowledge and input, and form real relationships with people not just as employees. We’re not the only ones observing this - Boris Pluskowski blogged a warning “Is there a lack of innovation or originality in the innovation practice itself?”

Let me come clean here. I’m a member of the “has been” generation - the over 35 crowd. I have been caught on video ranting that I’m too set in my ways to fully embrace gmail after a decade plus on Outlook. I relate to a love of mastery versus uncertainty - big time! But as so many of us have learned - we cannot change our odds of succeeding without changing anything at all.

So when we have some time to workshop on innovation with GM, Nestle and Nasa here’s what are going to talk about:

Where is all this going? - The enterprise-wide opportunities of open innovation

- Talent scouting: How will tomorrow’s bright minds want to contribute to your organization - as employees and outsiders?
- Venture financing: How can open innovation take the risk out of choosing the up and comers most worthy of investment in your space.
- Testing: Whether you need to test a mobile app globally or a new drug with select patients, how can going open take speed and cost out of your business?

Some things to brace for and embrace:
1. Key contributors need not be employees, so you won’t control them so much, nor will you own them exclusively.
2. You may receive a multi-million dollar product or venture idea from a guy you known mostly as lapdoglover - judge the invention not the userid (remember it might be his kid or grandkid that picked the ID for him)
3. It’s not having a digital suggestion box that invites the world that’s game-changing, it’s the ability to apply crowd effort and technology to filter statistically most-likely-to-succeed ideas to the top, fast, so you can have them in market first and faster.

4. Information management and governance just went warp - If privacy and IP ownership make your fists clench, sign up for some serious meditation and laughter therapy ahead (and get involved with us in the thinktank: IBM Information Governance Council)

Hope to see you at the conference in Philadelphia. Introduce yourself!

Readiness tips for crowdsourcing the first-time, and every time after

I spent much of the day yesterday with Carrie Maynard at PWC working out the game plan to launch and manage a community which PWC is creating to uncover how Canada can best lead in a digital economy. It’s an initiative that combines some of the things Chaordix is most passionate about - change making, technology and tapping a crowd.

As we countdown to launch, it was a chance to bravely run through some crowdsourcing worst case scenarios that are worth it….

1. Nobody comes - like the party where you have set out appetizers for 50 and 3 guests show. This is a risk when there’s no thinking on crowd recruitment and promotion. So it’s avoidable, but if it does happen the loss is really in face and time. And that’s always the risk of innovating.

2. Nobody comes and everybody notices - this is a twist on #1 where paparazzi on the front lawn merrily shoot photos of you hucking appetizers in the trash which they publish alongside scathing reviews. This one hurts a little - especially with condolences rolling in for weeks. Best response here - read the criticism, re-plan and announce improved round #2 right away.

3. Lots of people come, some have an axe to grind - The first time (expect this more than once) that a casual stranger in the community slags the host or panel will be… uh uncomfortable. Our advice there, trust that the crowd is up for open mic night. The host and panelists should comment back with their perspective. Don’t worry about getting everyone agreeing - that’s dull really - and members joined to see differing ideas and debate.

4. People crash the party for the free food - if members are eligible for participation rewards when they contribute - submit, vote or comment - even when entry is a blind draw there’s a chance that lurkers who aren’t really doing the heavy lifting will steal the loot. Just like at the airport when the most impatient guys worms his way into getting the best last seat on the plane. Online life mirrors offline. It’s not the Holodeck but trust that hackers worldwide are unlikely to organize a commando effort for a free iphone. What’s more technology lets you track gaming and collusion - you can solve and manage the anomalies. And you can always special prize an overlooked contributor.

5. There’s a power failure - this is part of what Chaordix is paid to worry about. As much as technology is based on logic and math, there’s still an element or pure chance in making it work non-stop. I say this even knowing that we perform at least quarterly audits of our system stability, security and impenetrability of our code to risk. Beyond great redundancy plans, the main thing to remember if this does occur is to not be Tiger Woods. Act fast and honestly admit something’s up, say you’re sorry, solve it quick and invite everyone warmly back after the hiccup is fixed. If you have any sense of humour at that point, look at the spike in traffic you’ll see as the critics all lend you new member leads as they heckle your site.

6. It’s a bit of a dud convention - lots of people show, but you don’t feel like they are smart or saying much interesting. Good that we rip off the Band-Aid here and tell you this is HIGHLY likely to happen. The thing about inviting in unfiltered members of the public is they will bring along widely varied ideas. Some you won’t want to spend time on. Some will have you thinking for days. The whole value of crowdsourcing versus just a suggestion box is the crowd helps to filter the quality from the quantity. And prepare for a few surprises in where that quality will come from. We’ve all had a friend’s visiting cousin turn out to be the most interesting and entertaining guy at our party.

PWC’s Canada’s Digital Compass project is sure to raise the profile of Canada’s opportunity to lead on a global stage in technology. It demonstrates that PWC is willing to take risks to bring its clients innovative thinking that will help them best compete. It will hopefully get some Canadians connected and talking that would otherwise not have met. It is also sure to demand a little courage. We salute PWC and all of our clients who take risks to catalyze new possibilities.

Located not far from Vancouver, with a live feed of the Olympic into our office (you nailed it CTV!), we’ve felt real comradery with team Canada this last week. Our team’s thighs much less muscular than bobsleighers or even female figure skaters, so why do we feel this kinship with Team Canada? It’s more than our passports (or most of them - we’re not all true north), it’s a bit of a love affair with an abnormal, competitive life.

10 Ways team Chaordix is just like team Canada:

1. Daily people tell you you’re insane and obsessed
2. You’re scored on a performance of minutes and seconds. No one asks if your product was having an off day.
3. You hope for fair judging. As if the market were a meritocracy!
4. You see people around town wearing your shirts
5. When camera’s turn on you are all driven, all dedicated, but humbly grateful too
6. Whoever picks your outfit on race day (VC pitch), you worry it makes you look like you’re trying to hard.
7. To make it to the finish line, you consider taking cash from people you’ve rallied against- competitors or uh…McDonalds
8. Some days you crash and consider quitting but you don’t. So do your team mates.
9. You care A LOT about gear and about what’s for lunch
10. When retired you’ll do one of two things - coach the next up and comers - or go “odd” maybe herding sheep on an island
11. (For bonus points - of course you go for those) You miss seeing your family more, but are profoundly motivated to make them proud.

GO CANADA GO!

We’re cheering for us.

Team Chaordix

Ok, so mobile is just one of the many moving parts at play in how Chaordix’s views future of crowdsourcing, but we share Google’s belief that over the next few years mobile will be bigger than desktop. I had the chance to attend Mobile World Congress in Barcelona and as always, had my crowdsourcing hat on the whole week. Here are two trends in mobile and my thoughts on how we might see them intersect with crowdsourcing:

Interconnectivity - the biggest word of the conference. Everything working together, to help mobile users minimize their efforts. The idea is to have all of your groups and social networks all aggregated to one place - so when I’m on my mobile and look someone up, I see all of their information in one place. On the flip side, I can pull information about one thing, from several different sources. Think of it as RSS for all of the different modes of communication and communities. How this helps crowdsourcing: If a crowdsourcer is juiced on an area, they have the opportunity to broaden their footprint, without a significant increase in time spent. For example, a developer can join several crowdsourcing sites and get information on projects he is interested in - all in one place.

Apps - At Mobile World Congress, one hall was dedicated entirely to apps. While there are still plenty of fun (possibly useless) apps, developers are focusing on apps that make lives easier. For example, apps aggregating real time data and spitting out practical info for people - like Traffic information. Waze is a social mobile application providing free turn-by-turn navigation based on the live conditions of the road and it’s 100% powered by users. How this helps crowdsourcing: Mass adoption. Crowdsourcing apps that people can use everyday and almost become invaluable (I’m heavily reliant on Yelp.com when travelling, for example) really help define what crowdsourcing is. While most people understand the idea of crowdsourcing through examples of American Idol and iStockPhoto, the more they use it on a daily basis, the more likely they are to embrace the value of it.

Figuring out how crowdsourcing fits in to trends in different industries is a good way to understand how we can continue innovating. It is hard work, but we’re excited about all of the ways we can enrich the user experience for people using the Chaordix platform.

A while back, I had the chance to sit in on a phone call with Karin von Hippel and two members of her team, Justine and Guy about what role crowdsourcing and mobile can play in the development of post-conflict reconstruction projects. The concepts and ideas they talk about are pretty mind-blowing. Obviously, I’m a novice and really can only tell you that I know there’s a lot I don’t know, but here’s what got me excited about how crowdsourcing might be able to help post-conflict development:

Personalize it. The idea of living in a conflict zone doesn’t seem real to us (or at least, not me!). With crowdsourcing, there’s the opportunity to make it very personal. If people sent out pictures and told their stories, it would help us understand what it is like. It also engages the community there to try and protect their victims and to empower their heroes.

Understand the real requirements of the community. One of the problems with the current aid system is that by the time a proposal is submitted, funding is approved and aid is sent, it is often a couple of years late. A possible solution to this is getting real time data on what challenges aid should be addressing. Where’s the money supposed to get to and are those needs shifting? Another solution is to cut through the noise. Are the people talking the loudest not representative of what the average person needs?

Verify the information we currently have. Aggregate security information or potentially get information on suicide bomb attacks from bystanders. On a practical level, crowdsourcing and mobile can be used for gathering information as basic as, “How many sick people do you have?” or “How much food do you have for the coming year?” Imagine how this would change the look of foreign aid as we work with people to address specific needs.

This is a new frontier for crowdsourcing in many ways. Courageous discovery is required to bring value to open development. It is important to realize that we’ll need to try things and then slowly adjust as we figure out what’s working and what isn’t. We know the current system needs to be fixed and while we don’t have all of the answers, we can take steps in the right direction. It would be great to hear thoughts on how to improve strategies from a variety of people – in true crowdsourcing fashion.

Photo by: The US Army …on Flickr!