How often do you confuse 'Jugaad' with Innovation?

Jugaad is a form of Frugal Innovation, it's creative, it emotional, it is an opportunity to experiment but its not Innovation. Countries on path of skilling their workforce for the future need to create avenues for youth to experiment and innovate by offering them the right skills to innovate and not be the next 'jugaadu'.

'Jugaad' a famous hinterland phenomenon is usually a result of resource scarcity. It is widely celebrated in our part of the world because it is a symbol of indomitable human spirit. It is firmly based on human ability to find solutions to problems. It is a first step to innovation / invention but not the innovation or invention itself.

Jugaad needs to be celebrated carefully. Innovation requires careful planning, research and development, prototyping and testing such that the solutions can be replicated at scale. Isolated inventions/innovations are of no public use / good. Innovation is result of excellence. Jugaad is result of lack of resources and therefore often temporary and short lived.

A famous HBR article in 2011 triggered this debate about lack of resources squeezing out the creativity and leading to innovation (read here : https://hbr.org/2011/01/the-number-one-key-to-innovati). It said, "by deliberately imposing scarcity of one kind or another on their problem-solving, inventors became demonstrably more creative, and the ideas generated under such conditions enjoyed greater success in the marketplace and society than ideas invented in more “blue sky” modes." However, in today's, post COVID times, societies need faster and better innovation across fields. Constraints can be a stimulus for innovation a beginning but not the end.

In popular media, innovation is often understood/communicated as Jugaad which is a fancy feel good but a dangerous confusion especially for those planning to build the human capital. All countries wants its people to be trained to fix problems and innovate. They want people with 'real skills' and knowledge that can find solutions to complex issues and be replicated, scaled and improved.

Has COVID19 changed your perceptions about the need for quick solution Jugaad vs Innovation?

Views expressed by the Author are her own and do not represent the views of the Organisation/s she is associated with.