Do you know what an insight is?
The insight, that flash of thought that makes us shine the eyes, moment of discovery, innovation and/ or invention of something that comes to thrill, that we can understand as a watershed in understanding a process or phenomenon, and that as a result of this, a change in its yield occurs when it ceases to be incremental, the famous "fine tuning", and a qualitative leap in form and substance occurs, so that we can clearly distinguish the "before" and the "after"see when they invented the combustion engines that were later adopted in automobiles and if we asked someone at the time what they would like as a solution for urban transport, they would probably answer "a faster horse". We can note that in the cited example the invention of this new "something" induces the creation of applications that may not necessarily have an obvious use, and a new behavior is established in the use of this application and "norms" are created to regulate its use.
cutting edge technologies
How VR (Virtual Reality) and AR (Augmented Reality) originated at the time of the Cold War and much of its development was due to investments in the space race that offered us many of the technologies we have in everyday life. It is interesting to note that a new space race is taking place among non-state actors in this almost threshold of the third decade of the 21st century. Artificial Intelligence is a field of knowledge that also has more than half a century of development and that thanks to the great processing capacity of GPUs (graphics processors of video cards) and new techniques that have been developed in the area of neural networks (Deep Learning), it became common to hear in the news that a new record was set by a new supercomputer when solving problems previously considered almost virtually "impossible" of being reached by a series of methodologies and heuristics that enable a computer to "understand" human language and its nuances and to make its simultaneous translation, something that would require until recently specially trained people to perform such functions.
Establishing the Link with insight
The connection I want to try to establish is that insight is not something that usually "nothing" occurs. It is often the result of the incremental work of many people and of several distinct areas that in their efforts contribute to increasing the disruptive "potential" of other people, who being able to gather the "pieces" of information scattered in the infinite of possibilities, end up glimpsing new applications and new ways of doing "something" applications that end up generating behavioral changes in society and having positive or negative externalities depending on the intentions and incentives that are established for their use. When I refer to incentives, I try to bring a concept of Behavioral Economics called "nudge", in which we can establish incentives that stimulate the "positive" use of something, so that a new behavior does not bring negative consequences for its user and people around. There is an interesting phrase from the English physicist Isaac Newton who once said "If I saw further, it was because I was standing on the shoulders of giants."
Sometimes a technology, methodology or invention only has its use contemplated by most people, once its applications are "clear" to its users and bring a perception of its "value" and benefits superior to technologies previously adopted to solve a problem. When I refer to a problem, I speak in the broadest sense, grouping from business models that no longer respond to the challenges imposed by current times, methodologies and established processes that generate negative externalities, as well as behaviors and conventions that have lost their shelf life due to paradigm changes, ways of facing the world and "meaning" in terms of meaning and context, which can be represented in the German expression "Zeitgeist" which means "spirit of time" or epoch” and which, in my understanding, involves the “ethics” and “culture” of an epoch, from Philosophy I would say even more, it involves the “praxis” of a society, the way in which “ethics” is practiced in everyday life and in the environment .
Processes and information flows in companies
The processes that order information flows in companies are often ordered in such a way as to produce "deliverables" that can be measured in a qualitative and quantitative way. Innovation in the corporate context is usually divided into "incremental" and "disruptive". Incremental innovation, also called "Kaizen" is carried out almost on a daily basis, when trying to continuously improve a process for a long period of time, in which the accumulated gains generate large differences in results. Disruptive innovation occurs with changes in mentality, changes in business models and technologies that change the way to meet a consumer demand, for example the emergence of smartphones, with the introduction of the Iphone in 2007. Constant innovation in an organization today can be understood as a mandatory condition for its continuity and profitability. Investment in innovation can be understood as in Research & Development, but should not be restricted only to the Department of Engineering and/ or Product Design.
Professionals who want to excel and find their space should also always seek their own plan for developing skills and potential. I understand that in difficult times, we end up discovering skills that we previously did not know and trying and experimenting, formulating new ways to produce and/ or do "something". Many “innovations” and “inventions” occur “unintentionally” when trying to do something and we end up discovering “something” as a “side effect” of the process, at which point the “flash” of insight into a new application appears. for that ,This is the moment when the “flash” of insight of a new application for that . The need, I have heard countless times, is the mother of invention, but an open mind is necessary to be able to "capture" what the "universe" ends up communicating to us, even if unintentionally. I understand that this process called "lateral thinking", arises precisely from the brain identify a pattern that he recognizes, and when trying to translate this, ends up adapting the solution of a known problem to another reality in another context. Consequently, I understand that the mapping and translation of problems and solutions in some similar way occurs, from one area of knowledge to another.
Process of innovation linked to
I see the innovation process also linked to Knowledge Management, involving the collection, processing, analysis and synthesis of data, with the establishment of hypotheses, tests and measurement of results, in order to map the universe of problems and solutions. Experimentation is the key to many of the methodologies in vogue today, from Scrum to Design Thinking and Service Design. The "mindset" that has become the norm in the most competitive companies in the world is the focus on the user experience and the so-called "User-centered Design". Linked to experimentation, measurement in the form of indicators and data and feedback in an iterative feedback loop that continuously improves the process, so that the analysis and synthesis of findings and the generation of "knowledge" for the company can occur.
Much has been said about open innovation, co-creation and new ways of organizing teams into "squads" in order to enhance the flow of collaboration and information, in order to enhance and leverage results. All this is very valid and relevant, but I also care about the formation of a culture focused on innovation, in the style of the "Lean Startup" culture that led to the creation of what is now Silicon Valley in California. The creation of a culture that supports the innovation process, includes the support of the Board and shareholders of the company on one side and the "empowerment" of those who are at the forefront and know the operation well, being able to together lead the initiatives of the area, and what has been very common in some companies, the leader of an innovation project often ends up being who had the initial idea and teams are formed coming from different areas of the company to support the project. Co-creation I understand that it must be stimulated and enhanced with strategies that allow it to become a gear that ends up perpetuating itself in time, thus ensuring new cycles of collaboration and innovation.
The creation of a culture focused on innovation
One of the pillars of the Digital Transformation process, in my view, must also be centered on data, which will be the "inputs" that will give life and nourish the collaborative processes. The collaborative process should adopt a Data Governance strategy, in order to avoid the formation of "silos" and "variations" in the truth of the data and should make use of a validation process (veracity) and authentication of them, with the continuous feeding of information flows in the company, when possible using a central repository (Data Lake) that avoids rework of data entry and Automatizes what is possible, thus ensuring the best use of employee time to focus on higher value-added activities. The use of Artificial Intelligence in companies will be for repetitive activities that require a "human" robot to perform. We live in times that the greatest human cognitive skills will be more valued, paying attention to the ability to solve complex problems, think in an abstract way with the use of creativity and imagination, collaborate and work in teams and the ability to empathize with others, society and the consumer.
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