Everyday practical innovation – with Jerry Fix and Terry Carroll
Chad McAllister, PhD
Product management professor, practitioner, and top-1% podcast host. I help product managers and leaders prepare for the next step in their careers.
To listen to the interview, search for Product Mastery Now on your favorite podcast player.
What product managers need to know about the Targeted Innovation Process
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TLDR
The Targeted Innovation Process is a practical framework that helps product managers drive innovation in their organizations. This approach focuses on understanding customer needs, generating quality ideas, and turning those ideas into real value. The process has five main steps:
Introduction
Innovation is key to product management. It’s what helps create products that customers love and keeps companies successful in the long run. As a product manager, knowing how to use effective innovation processes is crucial to stay competitive in today’s market.
In this episode, Jerry Fix and Terry Carroll explained the Targeted Innovation Process, a practical way for product managers to drive innovation in their companies. They described each step of the process, shared a real-world example, and discussed how to show the value of innovation programs in your company.
A Working Definition of Innovation
Filling the Idea Funnel
Think of innovation in product management as filling a funnel with high-quality ideas. This approach involves coming up with lots of concepts and gradually refining them through different stages of development. The goal is to have a strong innovation process that provides a steady stream of valuable ideas for product managers to work with.
Staying Close to Customers
A big part of successful innovation is keeping a close connection with customers. This involves:
By staying close to customers, product managers can make sure their innovation efforts match real market demands.
Two Ways to Define Innovation
Jerry and Terry shared how they think about innovation:
Terry: Creating a better mousetrap: This means making meaningful improvements to existing products or creating new, viable solutions that add real value for customers.
Jerry: Turning ideas into value: Innovation isn’t just about coming up with ideas. It’s about turning those ideas into tangible benefits for customers and the company.
Understanding the Targeted Innovation Process
The Targeted Innovation Process is a practical approach to innovation that focuses on generating high-quality ideas and efficiently turning them into valuable products. This framework has five key steps:
StepDescription1. Stating the problemClearly defining the challenge or opportunity2. Understanding problem-solving stylesIdentifying appropriate approaches for your organization3. Creating creative pathwaysDeveloping routes to connect ideas with innovation4. Generating ideasUsing various techniques to produce potential solutions5. Evaluating ideasAssessing and selecting promising concepts for development
This process is designed to be more focused and practical than traditional open-ended innovation approaches. It encourages product managers to consider real-world constraints and their organization’s capabilities throughout the innovation journey.
A Closer Look at Each Step of the Targeted Innovation Process
Jerry and Terry explained each step of the Targeted Innovation Process in more detail:
Step 1: Stating the Problem
The first step in the process is to clearly articulate the problem or opportunity you’re addressing. This involves:
By taking the time to thoroughly understand and define the problem, you set a strong foundation for the rest of the innovation process.
Step 2: Understanding Problem-Solving Styles
Different problems require different approaches to solve them. In this step, you’ll:
Understanding these styles helps ensure that your innovation efforts align with your organization’s strengths and the nature of the problem you’re addressing.
Step 3: Creating Creative Pathways
Creative pathways are routes that connect ideas with innovation. This step involves:
By creating these pathways, you establish a framework for guiding your ideation efforts in a focused and productive manner.
Step 4: Generating Ideas
With a clear problem statement, appropriate problem-solving style, and defined creative pathways, you can now focus on generating ideas. This step includes:
The goal is to produce a diverse range of potential solutions that address the stated problem and align with your organization’s capabilities.
Step 5: Evaluating Ideas
The final step in the Targeted Innovation Process is to assess and select the most promising ideas for further development. This involves:
By carefully evaluating ideas, you ensure that only the most promising concepts move forward in the product development process.
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Real-world Example: Innovating a Floor Cleaning System
To show how the Targeted Innovation Process works in practice, Terry shared a real-world example involving the development of an innovative floor cleaning system.
Getting to Know the Customers
The product team started by doing extensive customer research, which included:
This thorough approach to customer research allowed the team to gain deep insights into user needs and pain points.
Key Findings and What Customers Valued
Through their research, the team identified several key things that customers valued in a new floor cleaning system:
These findings guided the development of the new product, ensuring that it addressed the most important customer needs.
Testing and Improving Prototypes
Based on the initial research, the team developed prototypes for further testing:
This step-by-step approach to prototype testing allowed the team to refine their product concept based on real-world usage and feedback.
Unexpected Discoveries and New Ideas
Through the Targeted Innovation Process, the team discovered several unexpected innovations:
These innovations show how powerful the Targeted Innovation Process can be in uncovering valuable product features that might not have been obvious at the start.
Making the Case for Innovation Programs
While innovation is crucial for long-term success, innovation programs are often among the first to be cut when companies need to reduce costs. To justify and protect innovation initiatives, product managers need to show their value using appropriate measurements.
Ways to Measure Innovation Success
Here are some key metrics to consider when justifying innovation programs:
Why Innovation Matters for Future Success
Recent studies highlight how important innovation is for organizational success:
These findings show why it’s important to maintain strong innovation programs, even during challenging economic times.
Conclusion
The Targeted Innovation Process provides a practical framework for product managers to drive innovation within their organizations. By following this approach, product managers can:
Useful links:
Innovation Quotes
“The best way to predict the future is to invent it.” – Alan Kay
“The value of an idea lies in the using of it.” – Thomas Edison
Application Questions
Bio
Jerry Fix is an experienced Marketing and Product Management professional with Digital Transformation experience that has successfully launched new products and transformed teams in retail, distribution and OEM channels across a variety of markets. He has significant experience managing global organizations to develop and support products and brands, build communication strategies, and guide the commercialization of products and technologies. Jerry is also experienced in guiding teams through various digital transformations and agile processes. His areas of expertise include:
Terry Carroll has been working in product management for the past 20+ years.? His background includes cross-functional experience in engineering, finance, pricing strategy, marketing and product leadership.? Terry has always been interested in understanding the interworking of business and how companies decide on what products/services to produce and market.? Working in product management has given him a front roll seat in being part of this process.? Terry has a bachelor’s degree in Finance and an MBA from Belmont University.
Terry has been fortunate to work on some really cool innovative product solutions during my career.? In the 2024 PMDA Innovation Conference in September, Jerry and Terry shared some excerpts from a new Product Management book they are working on and plan to publish in 2025.? The focus of their presentation was on practical innovation, and their book shares best practices in product management and is written from a practitioners’ point of view.
To listen to the interview, search for Product Mastery Now on your favorite podcast player.