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Ideas for Innovation [I4I] project completed!

In the last 3 months I have been a part of a great global research project, Leveraging Ideas for Organizational Innovation (short: I4I), which has been led by Dr Kevin C Desouza. The project has now reached completion, as goals of the project have been reached: six (6) technical reports (over 160 pages of content) have been delivered to project sponsors:

• Baloh, P., Jha, S., Desouza, K.C., Kim, J.Y., Awazu, Y., Dombrowski, C. “Building Partnerships for Innovation,” Technical Report, # I4I-I3M-InnovBusPart-1, Institute for Innovation in Information Management, The Information School, University of Washington, October, 2006, 35 pages.
• Desouza, K.C., and Dombrowski, C. “Six Case Studies on Organizational Innovation,” Technical Report, # I4I-I3M-InnovCases-1, Institute for Innovation in Information Management, The Information School, University of Washington, October, 2006, 30 pages.
• Dombrowski, C., Kim, J.Y., Desouza, K.C., Braganza, A., Papagari, S., Baloh, P., and Jha, S. “Elements of Innovative Cultures,” Technical Report, # I4I-I3M-InnovCult-1, Institute for Innovation in Information Management, The Information School, University of Washington, October, 2006, 20 pages.
• Desouza, K.C., Dombrowski, C., Awazu, Y., Baloh, P., Papagari, S., Kim, J.Y., and Jha, S. “Crafting Organizational Innovation Processes,” Technical Report, #I4I-I3M-InnovProc-1, Institute for Innovation in Information Management, The Information School, University of Washington, August, 2006, 35 pages.
• Desouza, K.C., Awazu, Y., Jha, S., Dombrowski, C., Papagari, S., Baloh, P., and Kim, J.Y. “Customer-Driven Innovation,” Technical Report, #I4I-I3M-CustInnov-1, Institute for Innovation in Information Management, The Information School, University of Washington, August, 2006, 28 pages.
• Awazu, Y., Baloh, P., Desouza, K.C., Wecht, C.H., Kim, J.Y., and Jha, S. “Opening up Innovation through Information-Communication Technologies,” Technical Report, #I4I-I3M-InnovICT-1, Institute for Innovation in Information Management, The Information School, University of Washington, July, 2006, 16 pages.

However, the work in the highly challenging area of Innovation management continues. So far, over 50 executives in over 30 US and European companies have been examined in exploratory manner to uncover the dynamics of their innovative processes. Particularly we were interested in how mature innovative organizations (1) engage external sources (e.g. customers, business partners, academia, and even competitors) in the innovation process, (2) what are the characteristics of organizational culture in regards to innovation, and (3) examining the role and potential of contemporary information technologies in the open innovation process. The critical step of the double loop learning-’reflection to the learning’ is still to be completed: (1)  participating organizations will be provided with actionable insights to better manage their innovation agendas, and (2) critical reviews of our papers by A+ academic community are currently being incorporated into our works, which will hopefully soon be published in journals. The next effort (forthcoming project) will look at linking innovation to business value and also communicating the value of business innovation.

My school has received EQUIS accreditation!

The Faculty of Economics of Ljubljana University on October 11th 2006 achieved one of the most important goals in its history – it was awarded the global EQUIS quality accreditation status!

Years of effort were necessary to acquire this accreditation which is the global quality assurance scheme of the European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD). Receiving the EQUIS Accredited label confirms excellence in all activities: creation of a learning environment, teaching, attention to student development, advising, research, and process organization and in addition, a school must demonstrate a high level of international involvement and connections with the business world.

I am proud of the success which sets my school among the 97 best schools in the world; schools with the highest academic and educational quality, which has been achieved together by all that shape the Faculty of Economics: staff members, students, and business partners.

Make the most of today…

Imagine… There is a bank that credits your account each morning with $86,400. It carries over no balance from day to day.  Every evening deletes whatever part of the balance you failed to use during the day. What would you do?  Draw out ALL OF IT, of course!

Each of us has such a bank. Its name is TIME. Every morning, it credits you with 86,400 seconds. Every night it writes off, as lost, whatever of this you have failed to invest to good purpose. It allows no overdraft. Each day it opens a new account for you. Each night it burns the remains of the day. If you fail to use the day’s deposits, the loss is yours. There is no going back. There is no drawing against the “tomorrow.”

You must live in the present on today’s deposits. Invest it so as to get from it the utmost in health, happiness, and success! The clock is running. Make the most of today.