Innovisioneering

How is innovation different from invention, or development? Is it different or are those things subsets of innovation?
Important to understanding innovation and its impact on society, is also understanding the context under which it is introduced. This can be done only by casting a vision, which ultimately makes innovation relevant to its audience and to others it affects. Vision-casting is an art form; as such, not everyone can do it well. It seems to require people who are naturally gifted as either leaders or orators, or both. The ability to cast vision provides the energy – the thrust to drive an innovation into reality.

If vision-casting is the fuel for thrusting innovation forward, then engineering is its skeletal frame – which gives it structural integrity to survive the propulsion from vision to innovation. Engineering, the cold, hard reality-maker, is key to the long-term survival of innovation. Engineering vets an innovation, and either kills it in its infancy or gives it impenetrable armor, depending on its practical viability. (The question of whether a buildable innovation makes it to the world then becomes a question for a marketer: “Will there be sufficient demand for the innovation at some achievable price, to make introducing the innovation worth the cost, at this time?”)

Combining the three non-marketing terms into one may seem a bit obvious, but they are all terms that are part of the same drive; hence Innovisioneering. The terms are one because the act of success-driven forward motion with this concept is to be able to do all three things, essentially at once. Innovation alone can be done by one person. Doing all of the necessary elements of Innovisioneering is not often found within the skill set of one person. Thus, the effort implies a team, and it requires the right players to see it through to reality.


Application to the A&D Industry
In recognition of the requirements of Innovisioneering, Xtreme Alternative Defense Systems and AirBuoyant are focused on developing innovative solutions to current market needs in the Defense and Aerospace Sectors. The main focus areas for XADS are Directed Energy Solutions. We have systems that fire literal, visible lightning bolts at targets. The first iterations of this technology created a sort of wireless stun gun with a non-lethal bolt of lightning (high voltage, low amperage) that stunned a person (or several people) without doing permanent harm. Later iterations focused on counter-materiel objectives, primarily IEDs. It turns out that a lightning bolt will penetrate the ground and destroy a roadside bomb pretty rapidly. Additionally, we have demonstrated what we call StunStrike technology – stopping a moving vehicle by disrupting its electronics.

We also sell a line of Dazzling Lasers – Threat Assessment Laser Illuminators or TALI where the systems range from lightweight handheld devices, all the way up to multi-watt laser rifles. Applications include law enforcement, military, and maritime security.

Those capabilities are all designed to save lives: nothing we make is designed or intended to do permanent harm to personnel on either side of the equation.

AirBuoyant was formed to take human transportation to the third dimension: personal, vertical flight. Our VertiPod craft is designed to carry people safely and easily over any terrain or water, ultimately using only electrical power, generated by the vehicle itself. By doing this, we will create a greener environment, minimize the need for continued infrastructural development of roads, etc., and penetrate the third world with development-opening transport that will revolutionize the way the world gets around.

Big goals for small companies, but the elements of what we are attempting to do as small businesses revolve around the truths embedded in Innovisioneering. Using these companies as examples, I can see where we stand in the short term, and where we are heading.

We have already invented and patented the main technologies we need to get through the first part of Innovisioneering, i.e. the Innovation stage. Vision-casting is our primary focus right now, even as we have engineers doing the work of making the technology mass-manufacturable in parallel. The innovation stage was educated by the engineering component in all our technologies, so we built prototypes that would require very little change in order to mass-produce them. Though the engineering stage is not finished, because it was considered during Innovation, the to-market cycle is significantly shortened.

But back to Vision-casting. This is the tough nut to crack. This is the challenge that I believe everyone faces in introducing any new ideas to their respective markets. Mind-share is a term that seems to apply most broadly. How does one create mind-share, and the required buzz to spread an idea?

First, we go back to the low orbit of Innovation. The core idea needs to be something that:

• People need;
• People can afford;
• Changes the way people view the problem the idea solves in a positive light; and
• Brings a smile to people’s faces – inspiring epiphany at first blush.

The idea itself, if compelling enough, will bring in needed mind-share. The job then is to get the word out. Sometimes, the best ideas actually need to work first in order for people to believe that things are real. In a world of Photoshop and manipulated video, it is easy to fake an idea, and so people are wary. But when you build and engineer a prototype or prove a demonstrable product of the idea you have something that people can experience or at least dream of experiencing. Therein lies the challenge of communicating the vision for the future one is trying to create.

The challenge is made easier by having something real. Once something works, and is tested, it is a lot easier for it to get mind-share. Once the idea gets out there (assuming you have protected the intellectual property), it can go viral or create a ripple effect where everyone in your target audience wants what you have created. That is the ideal world.


Small and Big Business
The power of small business is its ability to be nimble, to adjust course and to stay with the market shifts. It has the ability to innovate, and in many cases, to do the engineering that takes an idea to the point of introduction to the marketplace. A rarely-found quality in small business is an ability to get sufficient attention to focus on its ability to vision-cast.

Vision-casting is a skill that depends on the individual, more often than not. A skilled vision-caster has the ability to present ideas, get in front of people, and to get people excited about the vision. Often, a small business may have the right person, but not the access to the venue necessary to create the recognition, the buzz.

A larger business may not be as nimble or flexible, but it does have the ability to create new ideas and innovations. This happens all the time in Fortune 500 companies, and there are teams of inventors on the payrolls of these companies. But so often, they are pipelined into what becomes mere development – doing things slightly better rather than radically better – because they build boxes around themselves within their reduced spheres of innovation.

Once large companies have an innovation, they nearly always have the ability to engineer it. Indeed, most big-company innovations originate in their engineering departments, so the engineering is built right into the innovation or idea itself – especially if it is incremental.

On the vision-casting side, big business can communicate to a broad audience, with mass-media, advertising, lobbying, and other tools in their everyday toolkit, much more effectively than small business can. One looks at companies like Apple, which started small, but has become a master at creating buzz, from the first Mac to the new i-Pad. The success of Apple in doing Innovisioneering right is obvious, and they are being rewarded.

Can small business work with big business to team and create real Innovisioneering of new ideas? Can the future be bright for this brave new world economy through alliances that do just that?

Right now, XADS and AirBuoyant, are leading an effort to build a Flying Jeep in a team which includes small and big businesses, along with universities. It is a big effort, with a potentially world-changing product as the outcome. We are convinced that this is possible with current technology, and so we are moving forward, and will find out soon enough if the teaming of small and big businesses, even with a small business in the leadership role, can do things to Innovisioneer the future.

No matter what you are developing, thinking of, or starting to Innovisioneer, the potential is there for your success so long as you innovate, effectively cast your vision, and engineer your idea to meet the demands of your target audience. Teaming and expanding a Sphere of Allies is key to developing successful Innovisioneering ideas. You can not do it all alone, nor should you try. Finding partners whose strengths maximize every element of Innovisioneering is the answer.

Xtreme Alternative Defense Systems
Anderson, IN
xtremeads.com

AirBuoyant
Anderson, IN
airbuoyant.com