The power of collective intelligence: generating innovation through ideas exchange

Can you name a company that is not talking about innovation, and artificial intelligence in particular, these days? I don't think you can. But if you want to claim yourself as an innovator, you have to tick all the boxes:

1. Innovation is what guides all your strategic and tactical decisions
2. Everyone within your organisation is on the same page when it comes to having an innovation mindset: from senior management to your operational teams
3. You understand the business environment in which you operate, therefore you create actual value for your customers (and their end customers) with your innovation

Simply put, there is a big difference between ‘talking’ and ‘walking the talk’. I can proudly say that at MotorK we started investing in the research around AI before it was THE buzzword of the moment.

And yet, we are still facing many challenges related to building and nurturing a culture of innovation within our company. It’s not a one-off task, but rather an ongoing process.

Out-of-the-box R&D

To explore new ways of bringing innovation into our business, we’ve recently launched MotorK’s Tech LABS, a European innovation hub to develop automotive-first AI solutions to improve the customer experience in digital automotive retail. We’ve never been shy when it comes to investing in R&D: in 2022 only, we repurposed 37% of our revenues to research activities and we currently employ over 100 people across Europe in this department.

But we like to think big and this is our way of imagining the future of automotive distribution without putting any limits to creativity.?

In the same spirit, at the beginning of the month we hosted our first AI hackathon, 'Minds on the Move', to promote the circulation of ideas within the company, particularly for roles involved in product design and development: eight teams of SparKers were challenged to create innovative solutions to enhance the digital automotive experience on the one hand and add value to the work of OEMs and dealers on the other. To me, this is collective intelligence at its best.

You only get what you give

MotorK is also committed to contributing to the growth of tech communities. By hosting tech events such as Working Software or WordCamp Italia, we encourage talents to share ideas and co-create, thus contributing to their own professional growth, to MotorK’s development and, ultimately, to the advancement of the entire tech community.?

Ideas exchange should be a priority for us entrepreneurs, too: you can’t really innovate unless you look outside of your industry and are open to share best practices as well as the lessons learnt from our own mistakes. This is what I have the privilege to experience as part of the Endeavor global entrepreneurial network.

Putting words into action

In theory, what I’ve said so far should be the key to innovation, right? Not quite. You can have the best ideas but these are worthless if there is no market fit for them and if your customers don’t recognise their value. Paying regular visits to our clients and ensuring that our customer-facing roles adopt an active listening mindset is therefore an essential part in our growth strategy.?

And believe me, sometimes you will fail… maybe big time! But in the process you will have gained valuable insights and surely uncovered unexpected potential somewhere. You will not make the same mistake twice.

So what is innovation in the end?

To sum up, innovation is as much about empowering your internal resources as it is about looking beyond yourself and opening up to external influences. The collaborative approach always wins in the long run.

Does this mean that we shouldn’t invest in research and in the pursuit of excellence? Quite the contrary. Achieving tech leadership requires significant resources but in today’s business scenario, a competitive advantage doesn’t last long; rather than obsessively looking for ‘the next big thing’, companies should instead focus on steady growth and create real innovation with customer benefits in mind.