{"id":786,"date":"2014-04-27T12:51:45","date_gmt":"2014-04-27T17:51:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/flevy.com\/blog\/?p=786"},"modified":"2014-04-28T15:26:02","modified_gmt":"2014-04-28T20:26:02","slug":"we-can-all-play-in-the-innovation-sandbox","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/flevy.com\/blog\/we-can-all-play-in-the-innovation-sandbox\/","title":{"rendered":"We Can All Play in the \u201cInnovation Sandbox\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Editor’s Note:\u00a0This article is excerpted from\u00a0Executive Smarts<\/a>, a collection of 25 concise chapters on management and leadership. For a limited time the e-version is\u00a0free<\/a>. The book\u2019s co-authors, William Casey and Wendi Peck, teach and consult on the topics of organizational behavior management, organizational structure design, strategic communication, and strategic planning & execution. This material is copyrighted and reprinted on Flevy with permission.<\/i><\/em><\/p>\n

* * * *<\/p>\n

\"innovation_sandbox\"<\/a>\u201cInnovation sandbox\u201d is a term coined by the late C.K. Prahalad<\/a>. The gist: For a truly quantum innovation in either goods or services, (1) set a really high bar<\/b> for what \u201cgood\u201d looks like, (2) identify a small<\/i> handful of aggressive constraints<\/b>, and then, within that \u201csandbox\u201d (3) begin a radical re-examination<\/b> of your assumptions and self-imposed limits as you develop your breakthrough design. That combination forces you to, as Apple says, \u201cthink different.\u201d<\/p>\n

Prahalad\u2019s many examples focus on impoverished markets, at the \u201cbase of the pyramid\u201d(BOP), where the average person earns a couple of bucks a day. He describes innovations in cars, hotels, communications, and other areas that achieve world-class quality, yet remain affordable to society\u2019s poorest \u2013 and<\/i> they turn a great profit for the entrepreneurs providing them. Now, that\u2019s<\/i> sustainability! Seth Godin described BOP<\/a> powerfully, as only he can.<\/p>\n

One example Prahalad describes is absolutely world-class cardiac surgery costing $1500 (including profit) that is the equivalent of $45,000 surgery in the US. Oh, and he describes a companion product: innovative health insurance, also profitable, that enables entire villages in India to have access to the surgery, and other medical services, when needed. A high bar<\/b>, aggressive constraints<\/b>, and radical re-examination<\/b> all spur dramatic innovation, again and again.<\/p>\n

But Prahalad\u2019s innovation sandbox isn\u2019t just for wealthy entrepreneurs and multi-nationals serving vast third world markets. Actually, anyone can play\u00a0in the sandbox. We were reminded of this recently in a conversation with our friend, Pamela Giusto-Sorrells, president Pamela\u2019s Products, a producer of popular gluten-free foods.<\/p>\n

Pam loves<\/i> developing products, and she loves a good challenge. One new product she\u2019s feeling good about is her single-serve, gluten-free brownie mix for kids<\/b>, soon to be released on their Amazon store and retail outlets. Watch for the sandbox in this plucky lady\u2019s own words:<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of other bakers think that gluten-free products have to taste like sawdust, and I literally grew up in a health food industry that believed that. But it\u2019s just plain wrong. I\u2019ve spent a lot of time developing gluten-free recipes that taste really great. So here was my latest challenge: you raise your children on a gluten-free diet, and then you send them off to college and their buddies are doing something else, eating pizza, pretzels, cookies, and whatever else other teenagers eat. Unfortunately, a lot of their snacks will make the gluten-intolerant kid sick.<\/p>\n

So my goal was to make something gluten-free that the wheat-eating college kid wants to eat.<\/i> It\u2019s got to be that good. So, first I asked myself, what does everybody like? Chocolate. What\u2019s a great all-American food? Brownies. People love brownies. They\u2019re a perfect late-night snack. But I had to work within constraints. For cooking, college kids probably have only a microwave; but I figured that they can get water from the bathroom, and they can keep a bottle of oil in their dorm rooms. It\u2019s all about making really great food with limited resources.<\/p>\n

So, how do I do it with limited resources? Take our brownie mix, package 100 grams, and mix in two tablespoons of oil and two tablespoons of water. Everybody\u2019s got a spoon. Everybody\u2019s got a bowl or a mug to mix it in. And everybody\u2019s got 60 seconds \u2013 one minute to instant gratification. Because it\u2019s so fast and easy, kids show it to other kids and \u2013 eh voila! \u2013 the wheat-eaters are eating the gluten-free kid\u2019s snacks. Touchdown!\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Other sandboxes: Do you know someone who\u2019s set a high bar<\/b>, imposed tough constraints<\/b>, and then radically re-examined<\/b> assumptions, so they could serve a market that everybody else ignored?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Editor’s Note:\u00a0This article is excerpted from\u00a0Executive Smarts, a collection of 25 concise chapters on management and leadership. For a limited time the e-version is\u00a0free. The book\u2019s co-authors, William Casey and Wendi Peck, teach and consult on the topics of organizational behavior management, organizational structure design, strategic communication, and strategic planning & execution. This material is… We Can All Play in the \u201cInnovation Sandbox\u201d<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[81],"tags":[384,383,2,382,385],"class_list":["post-786","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-strategy","tag-base-of-the-pyramid","tag-c-k-prahalad","tag-innovation","tag-innovation-sandbox","tag-seth-godin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flevy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flevy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flevy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flevy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flevy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=786"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/flevy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/786\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":799,"href":"https:\/\/flevy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/786\/revisions\/799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flevy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flevy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flevy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}