Seminar: Acquiring Competitive Advantages and Reducing Costs: A Process for Innovating and Seizing Opportunities (February 7-8, 2012)

The Issues and Challenges

•       Only 12% of projects are completed on time and within the budget.
•       About 30% of projects are interrupted before completion.
•       Many innovations do not deliver the expected results.
•       Rewarding innovations are overlooked because they are not presented well or are not well understood

This translates into obvious waste of precious resources or missed opportunities. Allocating and managing resources are nevertheless at the core of any manager’s duties.

 

In addition to the challenge of deciding which projects should receive the (limited) available resources decision-makers must deal with more challenges, including:

•       Increasing the agility of the organization to handle increased uncertainty and competition
•       Promoting innovation and the acquisition of competitive advantages
•       Managing the process of innovation without losing focus from core objectives
•       Engaging employees to become effective change agents committed to strategic objectives

 

The Solution

The novel IpOp Model is the first process that addresses these issues by:

•       Clarifying which clear universal decision tree should be used to select or eliminate projects;
•       Introducing a simple and low cost tool that helps management better evaluate at a very early stage the actual chances of success of any initiative presented to them
•       Reducing the cost and probability of failure of any project or initiative (thanks to a better selection)
•       Increasing the agility of both people and organizations
•       Turning employees into proactive change agents
•       Promoting and stimulating innovation at all levels in the organization
•       Leading employees to identify and seize opportunities that support the corporate strategy and objectives
•       Stimulating the acquisition of competitive advantages, including those exploiting non-tech innovation
•       Showing how innovators can convince decision-makers to support their project

The novel “IpOp Model provides managers and decision makers with a framework for validating the feasibility and real potential of any project presented to them, regardless of their nature. It allows comparing different project in a structured manner, allowing more effective allocation of resources and project selection.

 

The IpOp Model is considered by the organisations that have implemented it as a best practice to support resource allocation and the acquisition of competitive advantages. It is not only relevant for R&D or technology based innovation, but also for any new project (marketing, non-tech innovation, HR, etc.). It helps select new IT solutions, new equipment, new processes, etc.

 

 

Benefits

Introducing the IpOp Model in organizations usually brings the following benefits:

•       Giving decision-makers more control (but less work!)
•       Reducing the cost of project failure
•       Acquiring new competitive advantages (including non-tech initiatives)
•       Stimulating emerging innovation (bottom-up initiatives)
•       Using a clear and cost effective process for evaluating projects and ideas at the pre-project stage
•       Using a structured and transparent methodology for evaluating the feasibility of innovations and initiatives for the whole organization (from cost or process improvement to new services innovation)
•       Eliminating weak projects at an earlier stage, thus saving resources
•       Promoting a result oriented culture of innovation and change
•       Introducing a step-by-step roadmap that helps employees identify and turn an opportunity into a feasible plan of action, or realize that it is not worth pursuing; it particularly helps those who unfortunately:

                    o   are not convinced that their idea is robust enough (lack of confidence),

                    o   have not been taught how to validate their idea to verify actual feasibility,

                    o   do not know how to present their idea in a convincing manner to their management,

                    o   do not know what criteria management uses for selecting projects,

•       Boosting employees’ motivation, engagement and retention
•       Increasing customer orientation
•       Decreasing the resistance to change
•       Sharing a common vocabulary and methodology to handle innovation
•       Deploying an effective innovation knowledge management supporting a learning organization 
•       Improving the “stage-gate” process for managing innovation
• Complementing the “six sigma” methodology by expanding the scope of innovation

 

The Workshop

The IpOp Model toolbox is taught in an entertaining, compact and interactive workshop combining humor, thought provoking concepts and challenges. Several traditional views and common beliefs will be challenged.

 

Through group work on real projects participants quickly learn each step of the IpOp Model to the point where they are capable of independently using it at a later stage.

 

During the workshop, participants also realize that in, addition to technology, non-tech innovation can also bring phenomenal competitive advantages.

 

Lecturer: Raphaël Cohen

Raphael is an internationally recognized authority in innovation. He has conceived the IpOp Model, which helps entrepreneurs as well as intrapreneurs to identify, analyze and seize opportunities that bring competitive advantages to their company. Several organizations are already using the IpOp model. They include Nestlé, Microsoft, Sanofi-aventis, ST Microelectronics, Cap Gemini, Orange, P.A.R.C., Serono as well as banks, public administrations, startups and non-profit organizations. This illustrates the generic use of the model. It can also be customized for specific industries.

 

As serial entrepreneur, active CEO and business angel, Raphael brings his hands-on experience to his lecturing and consulting activities providing training, mentoring and management services to senior executives, bankers, directors and entrepreneurs. Raphael serves on the board of directors of several companies, including one Swiss bank, and is a regular contributor to several business publications.

 

He is currently the Academic Director of the Entrepreneurship and Business Development specialization Executive MBA of the University of Geneva. He has also been the MBA European Academic Program Director of the Thunderbird School of Global Management (Phoenix, Arizona), where he holds the title of clinical professor.

 

The Seminar

Acquiring competitive advantages and reducing costs:

a Process for Innovating and Seizing opportunities

will take place on

7-8 February 2012,

at the "Le Meridien Vilnius" hotel

Training is conducted in English.

The fee for the training is 1950 litas per person. The number of participants is limited.  Registration  until February 1st. You are welcome to register by email to info@bmi.lt or online.

For further information please call us at (5) 2487248 or (5) 2487254.

 

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