Get definitions for some of the most common innovation terms in this list below.
A holistic approach integrates all aspects of a problem or system for comprehensive solutions and outcomes.
High Tech: Products or services at the forefront of technology, often involving sophisticated electronics and advanced engineering.
Growth strategies are methods businesses use to expand market share, revenues, and competitive standing through organic or inorganic means.
High risk refers to the potential for significant loss or failure in pursuit of innovation or business objectives.
Growth opportunities are avenues through which businesses can expand their market presence, revenue, or product offerings, fueling progress.
Growth differentiation: Strategy to distinguish a product or service by unique features to drive business expansion.
Growth Culture: An organizational ethos that prioritizes learning, adaptability, and sustainable expansion to drive ongoing improvement.
Grand Challenges are large-scale problems demanding innovative solutions to transform society or industries on a global scale.
Ground rules are agreed-upon principles that set the framework for behavior and interactions within a group, ensuring a productive environment.
Green Energy: Sustainable power from renewable resources causing minimal environmental impact.
Goal setting is the process of identifying desired outcomes and establishing measurable objectives to guide progress.
Government Innovation: The process and outcome of public agencies implementing new, effective solutions to meet societal needs and enhance services.
Globalization: The integration of economies, cultures, and governments driven by trade, investment, technology, and flow of information.
Global Innovation: The cross-border creation of novel solutions addressing worldwide needs and challenges.
Global challenges are complex, transnational issues requiring collective action, like climate change, pandemics, and inequality.
Geoffrey Moore: An author and consultant renowned for his work on the technology adoption life cycle and the chasm theory in marketing.
Generation Brainstorming: A creative group method for rapidly generating a diverse set of ideas around a particular challenge.
Gathering: The act of collecting information or individuals to spark ideas and foster collaborative innovation.
Gartner is a leading research and advisory company providing actionable insights for tech-related business decisions.
A GANTT Chart is a visual project management tool outlining tasks or events in time sequence on a horizontal bar chart.
Game Theory is the study of strategic decision making among interdependent players to predict outcomes and optimize payoffs.
Game-changing refers to innovations that create a new market or disrupt existing ones, significantly altering the competitive landscape.
Gamification: Applying game principles in non-game contexts to boost engagement and problem-solving.
Future Trends: Predicted developments guiding tomorrow's business, technology, and societal advancements.
Fuzzy Front-End refers to the early, ambiguous phase of innovation where opportunities are identified and concepts are developed.
Future Leaders are visionary individuals poised to navigate and shape tomorrow's organizational and societal transformations.
A funnel represents the journey potential customers go through, from first contact to final purchase, narrowing at each conversion phase.
Frontline employees are workers directly interacting with customers, pivotal in driving operational success and gathering insights.
Framing is the process of shaping perceptions and decisions by presenting information in a particular way to influence innovation.
Fragmentation: The process of a market or industry splitting into smaller segments, often leading to increased specialization.
A framework is a structured approach to address complex issues, guiding analysis and actions within innovation processes.
The Fourth Industrial Revolution merges physical, digital, and biological spheres, led by AI, IoT, and biotechnology advancements.
Forecasting is the process of predicting future trends, demand, or events using historical data and analysis.
Follow Up: The act of engaging further after an initial interaction to advance a task or relationship towards a desired outcome.
Focus groups are moderated discussions with selected individuals to gain insights on products or services.
Flow Framework: A model managing product development by tracking flow of features, reducing waste to improve delivery and team performance.
Five Whys is a root cause analysis method that asks 'Why?' five times to explore the underlying problem behind a failure or issue.
The Five Stages of Innovation: Ideation, Screening, Experimenting, Commercializing, and Scaling.
Filtering in innovation: Process of narrowing down ideas based on criteria for potential success and feasibility.
First Principles: Fundamental concepts or assumptions used as the foundation for problem-solving, devoid of assumptions or analogies.
Failure: An expected outcome where a process or idea falls short of its goals, providing valuable learning opportunities for future innovation.
Feasibility: The practicality and viability of a proposed idea or solution to be successfully implemented.
Fail fast encourages rapid experimentation to test hypotheses, quickly discard unsuccessful paths, and pivot to successive iterations.
Facilitation: Guiding groups in processes and discussions to achieve defined objectives and enhance collaboration and outcomes.
Factors are elements or conditions that influence the outcome of processes or the performance of businesses and innovations.
Face-to-face refers to direct interaction between individuals in the same physical space.
Experience Design is the practice of creating meaningful and memorable interactions that engage users at every touchpoint with a brand or service.
Extreme Creativity: Out-of-the-box thinking that disrupts norms with radical ideas, fostering breakthrough innovations.
External stakeholders are individuals or groups outside a company that are impacted by its activities and decision-making processes.
External Innovation: Leveraging ideas, practices, and solutions developed outside an organization to enhance its innovation pipeline.
External factors are elements outside a company that can influence its performance and strategies, such as market trends and regulations.
Exponential growth: The rapid increase of a quantity where its rate becomes ever more swift relative to its current size.
Experiential Learning is hands-on skill acquisition through reflection on doing.
Expectations Management is the strategic alignment of stakeholder anticipations with project outcomes to ensure satisfaction and support.
Exchange: A process where parties trade goods, services, or ideas, fostering innovation and value creation in business ecosystems.
Execution: The act of implementing plans and strategies to achieve defined goals with efficiency and effectiveness in a business context.
Expansion: A strategic growth phase where businesses scale operations, enter new markets, or diversify product lines for increased reach.
Everett Rogers: Sociologist known for the Diffusion of Innovations theory, which explains how new ideas spread through cultures.
Excellence: Persistent pursuit of high-quality outcomes in all actions and creations.
Examples of Innovation are instances where novel ideas are transformed into practical solutions or products enhancing value or impact.
Evolution is the gradual development of ideas, products, or organizations through iterative improvements and adaptive change.
Examples are specific illustrations that embody or clarify a concept, method, or phenomenon, serving as practical references for application.
Evidence-Based Innovation refers to using empirical data to guide and validate the innovation process.
Evaluation: Assessing a project or idea's value, impact, and effectiveness to inform decisions and improve outcomes.
Established Companies: Mature businesses with proven market presence, stable revenue streams, and established organizational structures.
Equity: Ownership interest in a business, signifying a claim on assets and earnings.
Environments in innovation refer to settings fostering creativity, knowledge exchange, and development of new products, services, or processes.
Environmental Scanning is the ongoing tracking of trends and occurrences in an organization's internal and external environment.
Environmental impact refers to the effects of products and activities on ecosystems, biodiversity, and resources.
Entrepreneurial Culture: A workplace ethos promoting innovation, risk-taking, and proactive problem-solving.
Enterprise software is a scalable solution designed to support the complex operations and processes of large organizations.
Enterprise Innovation refers to a company's initiatives to foster, implement, and integrate novel ideas to improve business outcomes.
Enterprise Portfolio: A strategic overview of a company's projects, investments, and initiatives aligned with business objectives.
Engagement refers to the active participation and emotional investment of individuals in a particular context or activity.
End-users are the final consumers who use the product or service in its intended environment.
End-to-End refers to solutions that cover an entire process from start to finish, integrating all stages for seamless functionality.
Emerging needs are new customer or market demands that arise due to technological advancements, societal shifts, or cultural changes.
Employee Suggestion: Internal ideas submitted by staff to enhance company processes, products, or culture.
Edward de Bono: Maltese physician, author, and inventor of lateral thinking who enhanced creative problem-solving in business.
Emerging markets are nations with economies progressing toward becoming advanced, characterized by rapid growth and industrialization.
Disruptive Innovation: A novel product/service that upends markets by displacing established leaders and reshaping industry dynamics.
Edison refers to prolific inventor Thomas Edison, symbolic of breakthrough innovation and persistent experimentation in tech development.
Early Stage refers to the initial phase of a startup or project where concept, market fit, and feasibility are being developed.
Ecosystem Innovation: The creation of novel value by leveraging interconnected networks of diverse organizations and stakeholders.
Early Adopters are the second group, after Innovators, to use new products, influencing its market acceptance and further diffusion.
Due Diligence: A thorough assessment of a business or asset pre-transaction to evaluate risks and opportunities.
Division Technique: A method breaking a product into independent components to innovate and address specific functions.
Diversity refers to the inclusion of varied identities, perspectives, and experiences in a group or organization.
Divergent thinking is the process of generating creative ideas by exploring many possible solutions in a spontaneous, free-flowing manner.
Disruptive Technologies are inventions that radically alter industries by displacing established solutions or business models.
Disruption: A profound change that alters a market by displacing established norms with novel solutions, often creating new industries.
Disengagement: A decline in interest or involvement in an initiative or task, often leading to decreased productivity and innovation.
Discovery: The process of uncovering novel insights or ideas with potential value in an innovation context.
Diffusion of Innovation is the process by which a new idea, product, or practice spreads within a society or from one society to another.
A digital platform is an online framework that enables the creation, exchange, and management of value between users and providers.
Digitalization is the integration of digital technologies into everyday workflow to enhance processes, culture, and customer experiences.
Differentiation: Creating unique product/service features to stand out in the market.
Different Perspectives: Diverse angles and viewpoints that individuals bring to understand and solve problems creatively.
A systematic series of actions that creates a new product or improves an existing one, from ideation to market launch.
Developing countries are nations with lower GDP, industrial activity, and human development index than developed countries.
