About Innovation, Open Innovation, Global Vision and The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid

I share some reflections:

Innovation.“We must innovate, all of us, and IN EVERYTHING.”

The message is expressed (and listened) by all kind of people and everywhere. It seems, moreover, that we all of us agree.

Open Innovation.

When I hear that we must develop Open Innovation, I see that speakers always refer to not “closing ourselves”, and realize that innovation sources are not only in the company and its workers, and to “open ourselves” to realize that also consumers, suppliers, clients and everybody in general is a potential source of innovation, that all of them can guide and enrich the improvement of our products and services.

It is a message about “opening the MEANS”, but what about the FINAL PURPOSE, the FOR WHAT we develop our activity and our innovation?

It seems that we all agree that we must innovate in EVERYTHING, but there are huge resistances to innovate in the FINAL PURPOSE FOR WHAT WE DO THINGS and to open it so that “more people are included there, more organizations, more cultures, more quantity of world”.

Companies with Global Vision.

Frequently I listen that entrepreneurs and companies must have global vision. And when I ask to people what they mean with that, the answer normally is “We must assume that we live in a global world, and that our market is the world. Companies must open to sell in any part of the world”.

One question: an entrepreneur from Vitoria, that sells all over the world and that is not sensitive to what is happening in the world beyond his/her family, his/her company, or his/her city, does have global vision? An entrepreneur from Vitoria that sells only in Vitoria, and who is sensitive to what is happening in the world and who integrates the world in his/her decisions and actions, does not have global vision?

I think that to develop a global vision is a learning process, of personal growth, of developing a nincreasingly sensitivity and coherent action, in a neverending process, that is more related to “the quantity of world we integrate in our feeling and our action” than to “the quantity of world to whom we sell our products”.

The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid.

I enjoyed the lecture of C.K. Prahalad’s book, “The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid”, and I like a lot that his message is getting closer to our companies, thanks to initiatives like Laboratorio Base de la Pirámide and Social Innovation area from Innobasque. But I feel that in the message that is being sent (at least the one I perceive) a crucial aspect is not being atended. The attention of the message is being focused in “the income potential growth that the bottom of the pyramid offers to our companies”. The subtitle of Prahalad’s book is “Eradicating Poverty through Profits”, and the message I am listening is “Generating Profits through Poverty”. And, although it seems to be the same, the thing changes quite a lot. And it is related with the AIMS-PURPOSES and the MEANS. And with if we innovate the FINAL PURPOSE, or we limit the Open Innovation to the MEANS oriented to the same aim of always, antique, limited, locked.

I think that something that the situation we are living nowadays is crying out to us is “to open our sensitivity”, “innovate in the for what and for who we generate wealth”. And that that “openness” can moreover “generate wealth”, for “more-than-us”, and for us also.

It seemed that we all agreed that we should innovate in EVERYTHING. But I see that from all parts it is strained (or we strain) the need to innovate ourselves, our capacity to feel more, to see more, to embrace more, to innovate and open our sight, our intention, the final purpose of our actions.