Improving the Economy by Dreaming
with Designers
By Fennemiek Gommer, Partner, Project X, Amsterdam
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| Fennemiek Gommer |
The International Monetary Fund recently announced that the international
average for economic growth this year is approximately 5%. The USA
is performing at about this level, Asia is in the lead, and Europe
is performing well below average. Holland, which once had one of
the strongest economies in Europe, has for the past two years been
in the worst economic shape of all. So of course, improving the
economy is an important theme these days. But how should we accomplish
this? It is not surprising that at the start of the academic year
2004-2005 several universities seized the opportunity to emphasize
the importance of entrepreneurship to help solve the economic problems.
The Dutch State Secretary for Foreign Trade Karien Van Gennip pleaded
for more room for knowledge, creativity, and entrepreneurship in
her opening speech at the Technical University Eindhoven. She quoted
research by the American economist Richard Florida that shows that
cities where many creative people live have a stronger economy than
other cities.
Philips CEO Gerard Kleisterlee took it a step further in his speech
at the University of Tilburg: Entrepreneurship should be a mandatory
subject in everyone’s education. He believes that stimulating
the entrepreneurial spirit is necessary to get The Netherlands back
on its feet economically. More guts, perseverance, and creativity
should lead to more successful innovations and economic growth.
Loek Hermans, Chairman of MKB Nederland, and front man for small
and medium sized enterprises, spoke at the specialized business
University Nyenrode. Entrepreneurs of these smaller businesses traditionally
are an important source of innovation. But small businesses eventually
grow into larger companies and when they do, they often lose touch
with the entrepreneurial roots that made them big in the first place.
Eventually their strategies converge towards industry orthodoxy,
and their marketing managers end up worrying about the lack of innovation
power within their organizations, as was shown in recent Dutch marketing
research.
The solution is evident: To generate necessary growth, larger companies
have to stimulate entrepreneurship and dare to think and act differently.
But how do you bring about such a cultural change?
This cannot be done without a change of mentality at the top of
the company. Not that all CEOs have to become entrepreneurs themselves,
but they do have to instigate some fundamental changes both in terms
of culture and resources. First of all, within larger businesses
an entrepreneurial spirit can only be created when people are stimulated
to take risks—where there is a culture that allows people
to make mistakes, where people dare to be different. This is where
the Dutch traditionally have problems. The Calvinistic Dutch people
embrace the local saying “act normal, that’s crazy enough.”
We have an attitude of “don’t even try”—a
failed business enterprise is something to be ashamed of. Even our
government now acknowledges this fact and the way it hurts the innovation
power of our country, and therefore advocates the “try it
again Sam” attitude of the USA.
But besides culture, resources need to be created as well. All too
often, companies focus on the ‘urgent’ rather than the
‘important’. Most departments are understaffed and have
people working under high pressure just to get their regular work
done. There is no time left to think about the future, or just stare
out of a window. There is no budget left to try out new things.
Again, this can only be changed at the top. Allocating a separate
marketing R&D budget to experiment should create the necessary
room for development. Time needs to be made available for people
to open up their minds and develop new ideas in a different setting
and with multidisciplinary team members, not only with the objective
of developing new products, as is done traditionally, but also to
facilitate organization and marketing innovation at large.
It is imperative that designers should be part of such innovation
teams. Designers have ample experience with idea development within
multidisciplinary teams.
However, developing new ideas is the easy part. Most innovation
projects do not fail because of a lack of good ideas, but because
of a lack of support within the organization. And this is exactly
the area in which designers can tip the balance. As Eleanor Roosevelt
said: “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty
of their dreams.” Designers can portray the dreams of innovation
teams and consequently enhance the chances of realization. This
was confirmed by the research findings of the governmental institute
TNO: Companies that combine innovation efforts with design investments
have a bigger chance of market success. Another good reason to hire
designers!
Fennemiek Gommer is Partner at Project
X, a marketing consultant firm based in Amsterdam. Reactions
can be mailed to her at fennemiek@projectx.nl
This article appeared in the October
2004 eBulletin.
Feedback on DMI Viewpoints and article proposals
are always welcome! Please email jtobin@dmi.org.
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