How can you use external IT innovation sources?

1 Open innovation

Open innovation is a strategy that involves collaborating with external partners, such as customers, suppliers, universities, startups, or competitors, to share ideas, resources, and risks. By opening up your innovation process, you can access diverse perspectives, skills, and technologies that can help you solve problems, create new products, or improve existing ones. For example, you can use open innovation platforms, such as Innocentive or IdeaConnection, to crowdsource solutions from a global network of experts and innovators. Or you can join or create open innovation ecosystems, such as the Linux Foundation or the OpenAI initiative, to co-create and co-develop open-source software or AI solutions.

3 IT outsourcing

IT outsourcing is a practice of contracting out some or all of your IT functions or projects to external providers, such as consultants, freelancers, or agencies. IT outsourcing can help you reduce costs, improve quality, and increase flexibility and scalability of your IT operations. For example, you can use IT outsourcing to access specialized IT skills or expertise that you don't have in-house or that are not core to your business. Or you can use IT outsourcing to handle routine or non-strategic IT tasks, such as maintenance, support, or testing, that can free up your internal IT resources and time for more innovative activities.

5 IT education

IT education is a process of learning from or teaching external IT sources, such as courses, books, podcasts, blogs, or events. IT education can help you enhance your IT skills, knowledge, and awareness and keep up with the fast-paced and dynamic IT landscape. For example, you can use IT education to enroll in online or offline IT courses, such as Coursera, Udemy, or edX, that can teach you the latest IT trends, tools, or frameworks. Or you can use IT education to attend or host IT events, such as webinars, workshops, or conferences, that can expose you to new IT ideas, best practices, or experts.

As you can see, there are many ways you can use external IT innovation sources to improve your IT management and performance. However, you also need to be aware of the potential risks and challenges that come with using external IT innovation sources, such as intellectual property, security, quality, or cultural issues. Therefore, you need to carefully select, evaluate, and manage your external IT innovation sources and align them with your internal IT strategy and goals.