Innovation, supply chains and global influences

Hey everyone,

So I know that this may seem like a completely dull topic to blog about but I’m going to try my hardest to make it interesting so just hear me out. After posting my last blog I was worried it seemed a bit too generic so for this one I’m going to be drawing in an example to hopefully make this a lot more interesting!

 My main hobby which takes up about 10 hours a week for me is all-star cheer, to anyone outside the USA you probably do not have a clue what it is, so below are a few pictures summing it up:

 

 Basically it’s competitive gymnastics with elements of cheer involved, no pom poms or chanting before you get that image in your head! Anyone who vagulely follows the sport will have noticed a HUGE change over the past 5/6 years in terms of the music these teams perform to. Early days (1980’s when it first started becoming popular) teams would compete their routine to one song, very basic and simple like pretty much most items or products when they are first released. Fast forward to 2006 when events such as the worlds finals dominated America, being aired on ESPN to an audience of around 20million people worldwide;  every single team competing (all 100+) of them had highly complex mixes to perform their 2 minutes 30 second routine to, including custom voice overs and cost around $800 for the privilege. Why do teams pay that much for a 2:30 mix? You can argue that if you are performing in front of 20million + people, you want to come off as professional as possible, and so paying that little bit extra for the music is worth while.

 Fast forward to present day, the all-star cheer music industry is very much an oligopily dominated by 2 major music producers: Patrick from cheermusicpro.com and Jrizz from xtremetracks.com; both of which charge around $3,000 for a 2:30 mix, and each year will be maxed out with teams asking for their services. But how can they afford to charge these extortionate prices for mixes? The rules are identical to how they were 6 years ago, the time is still exactly the same and the cheer music industry is saturated with mixers trying to get their foot into the door. As we can already see this is an imbalance of power, as seen prominantly within the US auto-manufacturers industry (90% being dominated by 5 industries) FCRM [Online] accessed 12/1/12.

 The supply chain is influenced predominantly by market shifts and product development, and when applying this to the cheer music industry it is clear to see there has been a huge development in these mixes, Patrick has managed to get Ke$ha and Celine Dion to do voice overs for his 2012 mixes whilst Jrizz has hired a bunch of specialist voice-over artists to do raps, a massive change for 6 years ago when many teams mixes only had their team name as a voice over.

If we look at a team in particular, for example Cheer Athletics 'Wildcats' in 2006 had their music produced by Jrizz, and again this year (2012) it is been produced by the exact same producer, but the videos below show the difference in how the music has evolved due to innovation:

And again 2012:

And then proof that Celine Dion and Ke$ha have been used this year:

As we can see, the innovation throughout the past 6 years has created almost two completely different products; from an outsiders view it is evident that there are a lot more voice overs whereas from a more in-depth analysis the whole composition of how the music is made has changed, the transitions, back beats etc have all changed to match the innovation of the voice overs.

 For a company to survive it must grow and expand, the old proverb of not putting all your eggs in one basket is definitely the case for the cheer music industry. Many producers now double up their studios where they mix their music as music studios for bands and other artists  meaning that these producers now have alternate areas to expand into. The global recession has not stopped these companies from increasing their prices; their clinets will continue to use their services as their mixes are "stand-out" mixes; completely unique and original and therefore stick out more for the judges and spectators. This in turn brings in added revenue due to a greater exposure and fan base, and so in one instance it would be fair to say that in fact the mixes are investments for the cheer gyms themselves. Demand for cheer music is on the increase, especially with it's increased popularity within the UK and other countries now, so it seems unlikely Patrick, Jrizz and any of the other music producers will see a decline in orders over the forseeable future; after all when you can offer someone exclusive voice overs from Ke$ha and Celine Dion not many people would turn that down!




Reference List:

Cheermusicpro [Online] found at: www.cheermusicpro.com, accessed 12/1/12

FCRM [online], found at: http://www.fcrm.ir/mads/ebk1051.pdf, accessed: 12/1/12

Xtremetracks [Online], found at: www.xtremetracks.com, accessed 12/1/12

The relationship between creativity and innovation

Hey everyone,

 This blog entry aims to explore whether or not there is a link between creativity and innovation; do organisations that encourage creativity therefore experience greater innovative changes than those organisations that do not encourage creativity?

 First off it makes sense to explore what a “creative” organisation is and what it consists of. If we look at the three domains of creative action as mentioned in Gundry et al (1994):

A creative organisation is one that consists of a combination of education, environment and application. Through education, staff members will, in theory, come up with new creative ways of solving problems, and environment which supports this will lead to the application of these creative ideas, leading to more innovative processes and ideas. The key issue here is that for this model to work, it requires all three key sectors to be implemented within an organisation. Due to the recent economic climate, it would not be unjust to assume that companies are much less willing to risk financial gains for risk taking in the form of creative ideas. The company may comprise of well educated workers who are trained in creative thinking, but if the work environment does not for them to apply their ideas then innovation will never occur.

 However, in reality how realistic is this link between creativity and innovation? And also, just how does it impact on the company’s success? The most obvious example to look at here would be internet search-engine giant “Google”. “At Google, innovation and creativity keeps our projects changing and improving. Our consistency comes from our Googlers – smart, amazing people who foster an environment of collaboration and fun” Googlejobs[online] (accessed 2/1/12). From this it is clear that Google is the epitome of what Gundry et al describes as being a ‘creative organisation’; it combines the three key areas of education, environment and application.

 Looking more in depth at Gundry’s model and applying it to Google, there is an argument in which we can say that it is simply not enough to smart and be in an environment which encourages creativity and the application of that. Motivation and experience also  play a part in this, as Amabelies model (1997) suggests:

Both Gundy and Amabelie agree that creativity and innovation have a positive relationship, however Amabelie argues that education can be broken down into a combination of the employees/teams motivation, expertise and creativity skills and in fact it is a collaboration between three components of the work environment and three components of a team/individual which in turn leads to innovation; all of which are interdependent upon each other.

Uncreative organisations

The fact that is was nearly impossible to find articles on any business that is perceived as being uncreative suggests in itself that without creativity and innovation a company will not survive, especially in today’s tough economic climate. However; I have found one article that pretty much slates “Britain’s uncreative approach to design”, in which the author suggests that, with the exception of a few companies such as Rolls Royce, Britain is lacking in creativity when it comes to designing new products and this is why our biggest export is financial services, we could not be able to survive on the income generated through new products produced within Britain. The read the article click HERE, it only takes a few minutes.

So is there a link between creativity and innovation? Theorists all seem to believe conclusively that there is a positive link between creativity and innovation and personally due to the success witnessed by pretty much every company that encourages a creative and innovative environment I would agree so too. If a company does not succeed within the market, you can just as easily argue that their failure could be down to two issues: not being creative and innovative enough, or, being too creative and innovative. Consumers do not respond well to dramatic changes, products such as Amstrads personal organisers in the 1990s are proof that being creative doesn't always pay off, if you are too creative you will end up with a product or method that people do not respond positively too.

REFERENCES

Amabile, T (1997) Vol. 40, No. 1. By permission of The Regents

Googleblog [online], found at: http://www.google.com/intl/en/jobs/index.html accessed 2/1/12

Gundry, Lisa K.;Kickul, Jill R.;Prather, Charles W.  (1994) Building the Creative Organisation, published by: Apa Psych

Spiked [online], found at: http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/10899/, accessed 2/1/12

Case study 1- Devonshire's Mitsubishi factory

"Many sectors such as the machinery sectors show a positive relationship between innovation and trade performance" Wakelin, K (1997:75)

Hey everyone!

 My other blogs have not gone into the academic side as much as this one (hopefully) will so I hope you still find it interesting, i'll add pictures and diagrams to make it more interesting :)



The picture above shows the team that won the MotorTrader Industry Aftermarket award for innovation in 2011 for their work at the Devonshire Mitsubishi factory. "The Aftermarket Innovation award recognises the best innovations in customer car, marketing and business management to generate sales growth and profitability." Carpages [online] accessed 30/11/11. The award is given to companies that look for "new aftermarket programmes which are taken up by the consumer, to boost revenue streams and show clear signs of innovative thinking", but is it fair to assume that there is a link between innovation and trade performance? Is it the case that if you are more innovativ,e your companies trade performance will increase? The best way to look at it is by examining a few theorists views on this topic.

 The first theory i'll be looking at is called the "self-reinforcing feedback mechanism". Jon Fagerberg in 1994 considered "the relationship between variables such as R&D and their comparative advantage" Wakelin, K (1997:75) and is one theorist who mentions this theory when describing innovation.
 "Innovation should result in greater productivity because a larger quantity or better product is produced. Firms that achieve higher productivity relative to the average of their industry gain a competitive advantage over less productive rivals, thereby increasing their propensity to access distant markets " Fagerberg (1994) as cited in TLAinc [online] accessed 1/12/11.  In theory this makes sense, for example if we look at the graph below:

What it shows is the correlation between the proportion of spending the top 40 Australian clothes manufactuers spent on R&D and their export proportion. Although it may not seem to suggest anything to begin with, if we look at the graph again with a line of best fit drawn in:

we can see a positive correlation between an increase in R&D spending and an increase in exports- in other words the more a company spent on R&D, the greater amount of exports experienced by the company. This data backs up Fagerbergs theory in the case that this R&D has led to innovative processes within the company and thus the self-reinforcing feedback mechanism has been fulfilled. The self-reinforcing feedback mechanism has also been backed up by theorists such as Feldmen, who in 1999 looked into R&D spendings in Silicone valley and concluded that "R&D output spilled over into other areas, increasing performance" Contesttheory [Online] accesed 1/12/11.

 However, just how realiable is this data? Many errors can occur with measuring innovation leading to these results potentially being incorrect. For example, "practical difficulties in disentangling the direct impact of innovation from other effects on a firm’s productivity " is one, how can we be sure that it was innovation that caused the witnessed changes and not another factor? Also, "innovation in practice is incremental, consisting of small, mundane improvements to a product or process that may not produce patents" Cornish, 1997; Kleinknecht, 1990; Porter, 1990.

So there we go, I hope this blog has been somewhat useful or interesting, I think my next blog I'll focus on when innovation does not lead to success as a sort-of part 2 of this blog :)

All the best :)

Reference List:

Carpages [online], found at: http://www.carpages.co.uk/mitsubishi/mitsubishi-dealer-19-07-11.asp, accessed 30/11/11

Contesttheory [Online], found at: http://www.contesttheory.org/viewappendix.php?id=59&ap=1 accessed 1/12/11

TLA Inc [online] found at: http://www.tlainc.com/articlsi9.htm accessed 1/12/11

Wakelin, K  (1997)"Trade and Innovation: Theory and Evidence", published by: Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd

Surgical Robots through to Virtual visits, another routine check up?

Hey everyone,

So I was reading a really interesting article (honest!) the other day about innovation within the health care and where we will likely be in a couple decades time. I'm not going to paraphrase the article because it's pretty much already shortlisted, so click here and you'll be transported to the website, it only takes about 5 minutes to read and some of the forecasts for the future make for great reading!

So what does everyone think about these predictions? How comfortable would you feel being operated on by a robot? Or having your checkup via Skype? Leave a comment below if you want! :)



I'll post a big blog soon, sorry for the lack of updates! 3 part time jobs means I'm getting very little free time right now!



Reference list

Health care of the future [online], found at: http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2010/03/health_care_of_the_future.html accessed 25/11/11

Home delivery: Innovation on your doorstep!

Hey everyone,

So as promised here is my blog all on the innovation of home delivery services within the UK- again i'll try and keep it short and sweet! As Mullin says in 'management and organisational behaviour': "innovation (includes)...new processes and improvements in all major areas of organisational activity" (1996:304)" and one of the most significant improvements in many stores throughout the UK over the past decade is the introduction of home delivery.

 Just looking at a couple of examples, Argos offer "a range of delivery services depending on the type of products you order" in order to coincide with the advent of their online store, the "second largest e-commerce website in the UK", with 21% of their orders being from their online store every week (working out to roughly 440,000 orders) Argos (online) accessed 12/11/11. Comet retailers carry out 1.3 million deliveries annually, equating to "13 home delivery platforms circa 650 employees" Presscomet (online) accessed 12/11/11. With such vast amounts of deliveries being required from these companies, their logistics department has a huge task on co-ordinating all these deliveries to ensure they reach their destination as quick as possible, which in turn does result in some issues. For example, one customer wrote on netmuts "I'm so annoyed with Argos. I was finally given a delivery date (6 weeks after she ordered) and when the delivery men turned up they brought the wrong items". Accessed 12/11/11. However, a majority of the comments on that site were positive and so this shows that scenarios like this are rare at best.

 You can argue that home delivery is still in it's early stages of being used, and we can look forward to more innovative processes to come in terms of home delivery. Already standard home delivery has evolved into customers being able to pick and choose options such as express delivery, standard delivery, next day delivery as well as being able to choose within a 2 hour time scale when they actually want their products to be delivered. With the growing amount of customers who choose to use internet sites to do their shopping, we can expect to see home delivery to evolve even more, giving customers even more flexibility as to when they want their products being received.

 I'm not 100% sure what my next blog will be about, I want to do something with the medical field so keep checking back and i'll be sure to update this soon!


Reference list:

Argos [online] found at: http://www.argos.co.uk/static/StaticDisplay/includeName/OrderingForHomeDelivery.htm#combo Accessed 12/11/11

Netmums [online] http://www.netmums.com/coffeehouse/house-garden-194/kitchen-household-14/376844-argos-home-delivery.html accessed 12/11/11

Mullins, L (1996)"Management and Organisational Behaviour"London: Prentice Hall

Comet [online]. found at: http://press.comet.co.uk/facts-and-figures accessed 12/11/11


Bibliography

Argos [online] found at: http://www.argos.co.uk/static/StaticDisplay/includeName/OrderingForHomeDelivery.htm#combo Accessed 12/11/11

Netmums [online] http://www.netmums.com/coffeehouse/house-garden-194/kitchen-household-14/376844-argos-home-delivery.html accessed 12/11/11

Mullins, L (1996)"Management and Organisational Behaviour"London: Prentice Hall

Comet [online]. found at: http://press.comet.co.uk/facts-and-figures accessed 12/11/11

More tricks, treats and innovation

Hey everyone,



So as you can see I went to Alton Towers yesterday and it gave me a good idea for a blog! Linking in from last weeks blog on Halloween innovation, I thought I would link both Halloween, innovation and the theme park industry together. Over the past few years, major theme park chains within the UK have seen the impact on profits when it comes to hosting events themed around popular holidays. For example, Alton Towers hold an annual "scarefest", which offers " tons of terrific rides, blockbusting attractions, amazing live shows, and weird and wonderful costume characters". (Scarefest online accessed 07/10/11). This years event was arguably the most innovative they have had, with a larger selection of halloween-based attractions and shows, plus an increase in the number of days the event ran on. However, it was not just the increase in attractions and dates that made this year more innovative, the attractions themselves were, thanks in part due to the increased pressure on designers to produce attractions similiar to the ones Universal Studios or Disneyland have on offer. Therefore, the attractions themselves had much more elaborate set designs and even more innovative methods in scaring guests (hiding the actors in with the sets, hidden compartments).

 However, halloween aside, Alton Towers has become more innovative in a number of different ways recently. They have introduced a system called "fast track", to combat queue time problems. By inserting your card into a machine near the ride, you are given an alloted time to return to the ride to skip the queue, reducing both queue times and the amount the park have to pay on refurnishing the queue lines due to bored guests graffiting them. As well as this, they have become more innovative in terms of reducing the costs of running their attractions. Recent rides such as Oblivion have been sponsored by major companies (Oblivion by Fanta, Duel by Kodak) and so this reduces the costs of running the attractions as these companies have agreed to subsidise the costs of this as long as they get their product promoted around the park.

Sorry for making this bried, like I mentioned earlier I've already posted one blog about halloween so didn't want this blog to become too "same-y". Next blog I'll be talking about innovation with home delivery services offered by major companies within the UK!


For the link to the scarefest website, click here.
Also, check out my friends innovation blog! Click here to view it!



Reference List

Alton Towers [online] http://www.altontowers.com/ accessed 7/11/11

Tricks, treats and innovation!

Image from - ulsterweaversblog (online), accessed 31/10/11


Hey everyone,

So with halloween today I thought it would be apt to make a blog post all about halloween and innovation surrounding it. An article in The Sun newspaper on Thursday 27th October stated that this year alone we will be spending "a record £315 million this year on spooky costumes, party gear and sweets for trick-or-treaters — 26 times as much as ten years ago. " But what is with this dramatic increase in spending in an economic climate where families are on tight budgets? And how does innovation link into all of this? As cliche as it sounds, the answer is all around us! 10 years ago you would not have found items such as halloween costumes for pets through to halloween lawn decorations, but these have bombarded the shelves in shops and supermarkets throughout the country as we try to keep up with our American counterparts with this age-old tradition.



Image from- trendhunter (online) accessed 31/10/11


Even companies are exploiting this holiday to sell more of a product, releasing a plethora of marketing campaigns to advertise their products, again something unseen 10 years ago. But how does innovation link into all of this? As mentioned in the previous blog, innovation is one of two things, firstly it can be " the process of creating a new product or service ", so in this case we have the addition of halloween lawn decoration, halloween cake decorations and spooky window treatments (a solution you rub onto your windows to make them seem bloodstained), but also innovation can be "improving a product or service", in which case we have the improvements of better quality and more complex costumes at a cheaper price due innovation in the manufacturing world (i'll post a blog about this next week) and also the improvements in terms of a wider selection of sweets being designed especially for halloween (Haribo "horror mix" being one example).


Overall, it is fair to say that Halloween has become less of a public holiday and more of a marketing campaign, with innovative products being released especially for this time of the year and companies exploiting it to see an increase in revenue and profits. I'll post a blog soon as well about the innovation of halloween within the theme park market, there was too much to talk about to just add it to the bottom of this blog!


Refence list:


Trend hunter [online] found at: http://www.trendhunter.com/slideshow/halloween-marketing#26 accessed 31/10/11
The Sun [online] found at: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/features/3897219/Hallow-earn.html accessed 31/10/11
Ulster Weaver Blog [online], found at: http://www.ulsterweaversblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/halloween-pumpkin.jpg accessed 31/10/11