A manager has found some ideas for new products or services, and would like to use them to develop actual products or services. Their first step is to identify those ideas that their organisation could potentially develop and supply successfully, and this blog post will discuss their characteristics that can be used for identification. A flowchart will be presented, which the manager can use to identify a potentially successful idea by answering a series of questions about the idea and organisation. The flowchart will be applied to ideas for innovation by an up-market hotel in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
 
Organisational strategy for innovation
An idea should suggest a product or service that is consistent with any innovation strategy that the organisation has. An innovation strategy is a set of organisational policies that apply to all the organisation’s innovation activities. For example, an innovation strategy may state the industrial subsector in which the organisation should innovate, and an idea that proposes a product or service outside that subsector is not potentially successful. As another example, an innovation strategy may state that the organisation should only look for small changes in its products, and an idea that proposes large changes is not potentially successful.
 
Ability to develop and supply the product or service
An idea should suggest a product or service that the organisation has the ability to develop and supply to customers or clients. There are several major requirements here. One is that the organisation’s employees and management have sufficient skills for development and supply of the proposed product or service, or can get them. For example, an organisation’s employees may have skills in customer service, but no skills in computing, so an idea that proposes the development of a new internal computing system is not potentially successful unless the organisation is willing to hire external expertise or buy an existing system.
Another major requirement for an idea is that the organisation has sufficient equipment and material for the development and supply of the proposed product or service, or can get them. Equipment is any asset that is used but not consumed in the development and supply, and material is any asset that is both used and consumed. For example, if an organisation has no manufacturing facilities, an idea that proposes that the organisation develops and builds a new physical product is not potentially successful.
A further major requirement for an idea is that the organisation has sufficient finance, or can get it. Finance pays employees, and it buys and pays for the maintenance of equipment and material. For example, an organisation may have limited finance, so an idea that proposes an expensive development process is not potentially successful.
These three requirements are individually necessary. An idea is not potentially successful if the organisation does not have all of sufficient skills, sufficient equipment and material, and sufficient finance to develop and supply the proposed product or service.
 
Value creation
An idea should propose a product or service that will create value for the organisation. Creation of value means that the value of the product or service is higher than the cost of its production. For a company, creation of value would mean that the product or service makes a profit, while for not-for-profit organisations, creation of value would mean that the product or service is an effective way of serving its clients. If the manager wanted to calculate the exact value that the product or service would create, they would have to do some numerical estimation, but for an initial evaluation of ideas, that isn’t necessary. Instead, a few requirements of the proposed product or service can indicate creation of value.
The first requirement is that many people want the proposed product or service. If most people don’t want the product or service, its value to the organisation is likely to be low. The second requirement is that few or no other organisations will provide the same product or service. Sometimes the organisation can take measures to prevent such competition, by keeping its production methods secret, or by forming a strong brand on the product or service, or taking out a patent. If the organisation has many competitors, the value of the product or service to the organisation is again likely to be low. The third requirement is that the organisation can develop and supply the product or service cheaply.
An idea is not potentially successful if most people don’t want the proposed product or service, if many other organisations will provide it, and if it is expensive to develop or supply. If one or two of these statements is true, there is uncertainty about its potential.
 
Flowchart for identification of potentially successful ideas
Figure 1 presents a flowchart summarising the discussion. It gives a series of questions about an idea that are answered in order, with the answers determining whether the idea is potentially successful, not potentially successful, or has uncertain potential. The flowchart is also available as a pdf download at the end of the post.
Once the manager has assessed the ideas, they may keep the ideas that are potentially successful, discard the ideas that are not potentially successful, and decide whether to keep any of the ideas that have uncertain potential success. If there any many ideas that are potentially successful, the manager may discard all ideas of uncertain potential success.

Figure 1: Questions to identify potentially successful ideas

Example: Identification of potentially successful ideas for an up-market hotel in Kinshasa
The following example identifies potentially successful ideas for innovation by an anonymous up-market hotel in Kinshasa, using the flowchart in figure 1. Information about the hotel and its market is taken from its website and from www.hotels.com. The set of initial ideas examined is taken from my last blog post:  a fitness centre open 24 hours each day, a garden, a free area shuttle, free childcare, free supervised activities for children, a playground, greater staff efficiency, reduced noise, improved room service, improved reservation service, improved reception service, and better value discounts on rooms. I’ll examine the first idea in detail, and summarise the results for the other ideas.
 
Idea 1: a fitness centre open 24 hours each day
  Idea is consistent with strategy?
Yes. The management company’s stated strategy for the hotel includes 24-hour service.
 
  Employees have enough skills?
Yes. If the centre is staffed, the daytime employees can be offered night shifts too, or other people can be hired and trained if necessary.
 
  Organisation has enough equipment?
Yes. The current centre has all required equipment.
 
  Organisation has enough finance?
Yes. The organisation invests in much larger projects than this, and its expenditures and income far exceed the likely spending on this innovation.
 
  Many people want the product?
No. It seems likely that there would be few holidaymakers or businesspeople who would want to work out in the middle of the night.
 
  Little or no competition?
Yes. There are few other upmarket hotels, and only one offers a 24-hour fitness centre, according to the reports on www.hotels.com. It is possible that independent fitness centres are open 24 hours a day, but they are not strong competitors, as hotel guests would have to travel late at night to get to them.
 
Figure 2 shows the responses to the questions, and the path down the flowchart. The potential success of the idea is uncertain.

Figure 2: Assessment of the idea “a fitness centre open 24 hours each day”

The flowchart was applied to the other ideas as well, and their potential success is shown in table 1. The assessment used my limited knowledge of the hotel, and a hotel manager’s assessment may be different.
 
Table 1: Innovation ideas for the up-market hotel in Kinshasa, classified by their potential success

The ideas that are not potentially successful can be discarded, and a manager can decide whether to discard any of the ideas with uncertain potential success.

Let’s say that a manager wants to better serve their organisation’s customers or clients, but they are not quite sure how to do it; they need ideas. They know that customers or clients, competitors, and other sources can provide valuable information that the manager could use to generate ideas. They face a problem, though, which is how to collect relevant information from these sources.
This blog post shows how information can be collected quite easily. There is a simple form at the end of the blog post to help collect information, summarising the post’s content. The content is applied to information collection by an up-market hotel in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo, to illustrate how it works in practice.
 
What type of information should be collected?
A manager wants ideas for their innovation, and one way of getting them is just to directly ask people what ideas they have. People can be very creative and their ideas can point to a large range of possible innovation. The ideas are immediately available after collection, and the manager doesn’t have to do any other work to get them.
There is another way of getting ideas, which is to collect information on products and services, and then use them to generate ideas for future innovations. Products and services are often well-known, particularly those that have been sold in a market, so it is easy to collect information about them, for example from sales websites with customer reviews. As the products and services have already been introduced, they show what innovations are possible, and suggest what may be possible for future innovations. They can also be used to identify trends in innovations, and areas where no innovations have been produced.
Table 1 in the form at the end of the blog post shows the two types of information with reasons for selecting them. If a manager thinks the reasons justify their use, they can tick the box below the information type. A manager may want to use both information types.
 
What collection method should be used?
A manager can collect information by interviewing people who have it. The interviewer can explain their questions to the people interviewed, so that they understand what they are answering, and can give a fuller answer to the intended questions. The interviewer can also adapt or extend the questions if the interviewed people give interesting answers.
A manager can also collect information in writing. The manager may send written questions to people, or collect previously written information. Collection of written information can be easier and less time consuming than interviews. Another advantage of collection of written information is that people’s responses are not affected by the presence of an interviewer. Their presence may make interviewed people more likely to give responses to please the interviewer.
Table 2 in the form at the end of the blog post shows the two methods of information collection, by interview and in writing. The reasons for choosing them are shown too. A manager may think that the reasons are relevant for their own work, and tick the box for the collection method. A manager may choose to use both collection methods.
 
Questions to ask
A manager can find ideas more quickly and easily if they chose well the questions they ask. The most suitable questions depend on the type of information collected, either innovation ideas or information about products and services.
If the manager wants to collect innovation ideas, the manager can ask people what products or services they would like to see sold or provided in the organisation’s industry, and then ask people what products or services they would like the organisation to sell or provide. The two answers together help to show what people want and what people think the organisation can provide.
If the manager instead wants to collect information about products and services, the manager can also ask (or find out) what products and services are available in the organisation’s industrial sector, and what their main features are. The aim is to get sufficient information so that the manager can see if a new innovation could be a valuable novelty. The manager can also ask people what they like and don’t like about the organisation’s current products and services, and then ask what they like about the current products and services of the organisation’s competitors. This information can show possible future innovations that add more liked things and that remove or correct disliked things from current products and services.
Table 3 in the form at the end of this blog post lists the questions for each type of information.
 
Where should the information come from?
Managers should use sources that have good information about the organisation’s industry. Even a well-informed source won’t know everything about the industry, so a variety of sources should be used who together are familiar with the different parts of the industry.
 
How much information should be collected?
It would be good not to miss any ideas for innovation. In practice, the manager hasn’t got enough time or money to find every good idea, so they have to decide when they have enough information. One way is to stop collecting information when most newly collected information is the same as previously collected information.
 
Example: An up-market hotel in Kinshasa
The following discussion gives an example of idea collection using the form at the end of this article. The ideas are for innovation by an up-market hotel in Kinshasa. The hotel is kept anonymous.
 
What type of information should be collected?
I want to collect the information easily, and I also want to know what innovations can be successful in the market. Table 1 says that I should collect information about products and services.
 
What collection method should be used?
As just noted, I want to collect responses easily. It would be nice to get more detail on interesting answers, but a wide range of information is more important. Table 2 says that I should collect information in writing.
 
Questions to ask
I’m collecting information about products and services, and table 3 suggests questions to ask: what products and services are available in the organisation’s industrial sector? What are their important features? What do people like about our products and services? What do people dislike about our products and services? What do people like about our competitor’s products and services?
 
Where should the information come from?
The sources should together have good information about the parts of the organisation’s industry, which is up-market hotels in Kinshasa. I’ll use from the website hotels.com, which publishes details of the hotels and includes many reviews by visitors. It has a good range of information, and lets me answer all the questions. I’ll use the details to answer “what products and services are available in the organisation’s industrial sector?” and “what are their important features?”. I’ll use the reviews to answer “what do people like about our products and services?”, “what do people dislike about our products and services?”, and “what do people like about our competitor’s products and services?”.
 
How much information should be collected?
The information should be collected until most newly collected information is the same as previously collected information. I’ll follow that recommendation.
 
Answers to the questions
  What products and services are available in the organisation’s industrial sector?
There are a number of up-market hotels (3, 4, and 5 stars) in Kinshasa that operate in the same industrial sector as the hotel. There are also furnished apartments close to the city centre, although they are less expensive and have some very different features.
 
  What are their important features?
The hotel and the other up-market hotels share certain features: daily housekeeping, breakfast, restaurants and bar, an outdoor pool, tennis courts, free cradles, childcare, bath and shower, business facilities, and premium TV channels.
There are certain features that the hotel does not have, but one or more of the other hotels do. These features are a fitness centre open 24 hours each day, a garden, and a free area shuttle (although the hotel offers limousines). Some additional childcare services are offered by other hotels: free childcare (rather than purchased separately, which is done at the hotel), free supervised activities, and a playground.
These features suggest ideas for innovation: the hotel could introduce some of these features. The hotel still has to evaluate the merits of the ideas.
 
  What do people like about our products and services?
People say that staff are friendly and helpful, and rooms are comfortable and clean. The hotel is relaxing and safe, with excellent covid safety measures. Room and bathroom facilities are good. Food is delicious and copious, there is good Internet by regional standards, and the gym is also good.
 
  What do people dislike about our products and services?
People say that staff response is slow: in general, at check-in, in the restaurant, by the concierge, and in response to a fault in the rooms. People also say that the staff lack skills, including in speaking English (although French and Lingala are always spoken). People find that some of the procedures do not work well: support for payment cards, recording of reservations, supply of towels, and room inspection prior to client arrival.
These dislikes suggest ideas for innovation: improvements to staff response and training, and improvements to the operation of the procedures.
 
  What do people like about our competitor’s products and services?
The following list summarises what people like about various other up-market hotels in Kinshasa. People like clean and safe hotels in a convenient location. People like friendly, polite, helpful, and efficient staff, and they like clean, comfortable, quiet, cool, and spacious rooms. People like rooms to have hot showers with good water pressure, air conditioning, comfortable beds, and a kettle to make coffee. They also like good room service. They like a 24-hour gym, and they like reservations that work well, and reception service that is good. They like good value when the rooms are discounted.
The things that people like about other hotels can be compared with the things that people like about the hotel. Anything that is liked about other hotels but not about the hotel suggests an idea for innovation. These ideas are: greater staff efficiency, reduced noise, a 24-hour gym, improved room service, improvement in the reservation service, improvement in the reception service, and better value discounts on rooms.

Form: Collecting information to generate ideas for innovation
Table 1: What type of information should be collected?

Where should the information come from?
Together, the sources should together have good information about the parts of the organisation’s industry.
 
How much information should be collected?
Information should be collected until most newly collected information is the same as previously collected information.