Innovation take various forms

The first time I remember hearing about innovation was when I started my CEGEP back in 2006. I was 17 year old and fresh out of high school. Innovation seemed to be some magic people do to create stuff like Microsoft or Google. It seem that you also need a garage.

At first, innovation was mysterious. I knew it was the basic ingredient to new product. But, what form it would take in real life was a mystery. At this point, I knew that:

Innovation is part of new products

Companies innovate

Innovation was still a magic reserved to super intelligent people

If you start to Google about innovation, you will find endless articles on the subject. Even with all of that, I was still clueless on what innovation look like when you are doing it. What do you need to do to innovate? Where is the starting point? Can I do it without garage or millions of money?

In 2013, I got my first job as a software developer. Unfortunately, this company closed door only 2 years after I was hired. This experience make me think a lot and I found, what I believe, my answer to innovation.

I don’t want to talk about the innovation team within a large company. I want to talk what we can do to innovate, as a developer and a non-decision maker.

Starting point

Have you ever heard someone say “client doesn't know what he want”? It took me some time, but this was the starting point. OK, clients doesn’t know what he want. This is where YOU start to innovate. You need to fill the gap, create the sweet UI that he never taught he would need. Create, this duper 1 button report generator. All of these new feature should be integrated within a machine learning build system and then we will be the next Facebook for sure. </sarcasm>

Stop, nothing of this work. It is just nice day dreaming (we all need that at some point). You can’t simply add features to your software hoping to change your world. You missed the main ingredient.

The real starting point

It may be boring, but the real first step is to understand what your client need. And I mean, REALLY understand. You need to get inside his head and see how he see things.

Your client asked for some “stuff” and your first goal is to really understand why he need that, where he will use it, who will use it. You need the big picture. This is what we learn in the requirement course, but that also VERY important for innovation.

After you did all that you can go back to the “client doesn’t know what he want”. Well he knew, but wasn’t able to explain it. In his head, it an image, an idea generated by his needs. But, now you understand the needs, you get the picture.

From this point, you should have an idea where you can innovate. You understand all the needs, you get the big picture of what client want. Now it is your job, as a simple developer, to make this happen. Now its time to innovate.

Last word

When I think about that too day, I am “meh” I knew all of this. But, no, I never did it when it was the time. I was instead focusing on technical stuff. I should have focus on client, who he is, what he want. I could ask management more questions, ask clients more questions.

This is small scale innovation. But I think even large and dedicated innovation team do the same, but with larger budget, larger study and larger analysis. But you can do it too, it is actually your job first.