“If staying on the cutting edge is critical to your business, here you’ll find insights for generating and implementing radical ideas that will make your company an industry leader.”

In the latest issue of Design Management Review, I co-authored an article with John Stone on building innovation into organizations. Now, in the first of a four part series I’m posting that article here.

Innovation, anyone? The Tipping Point. Inside the Tornado. The New, New Thing. You’ve probably read one of these books, or heard that you should. You’re not alone. Over the past 10 years, nearly everyone has boarded the innovation plane—at least in theory.

With all this talk about increasing value for customers and shareholders through innovation, why aren’t there more companies actually doing it, like Apple, or Google, or Virgin? The problem is not a lack of revolutionary ideas—it’s an inability to pick, package, and ship the revolution.

When a big idea strikes, people have serious difficulties making it happen. You can read all the curb-jumping, paradigm-shifting, out-of-the-box innovation books you can order, but it won’t make any difference until you take on the true challenge: bringing that new idea to market.

Why are big, valuable ideas so often hard to realize? In part, because they’re perceived as risky. That’s not surprising, considering that generations of business leaders have been taught to strive for predictability and reliability. Today, most businesses are built for stability, not innovation.

Let’s be clear: Reliability and predictability are good for business. They can generate value, profit, and professional success. But when they alone become the drumbeat for an organization, they can stifle the next big business idea. Would-be innovators who see opportunity for new, unproven ideas may not pursue them for fear of their corporate reputations, their advancement potential, and even the loss of their jobs.

We believe that ideas normally considered out of bounds are more likely to succeed if they are paired with a deliberative process that exposes their true risks and rewards. We call it the Get Fired hypothesis. This method adds credibility to an innovator’s idea while mitigating risk for those that decide what to pursue.

Why call it “Get Fired”? It’s the metaphoric benchmark for what it may take to convince an organization to support an unproven concept that could potentially fail. No one is advocating that anyone actually lose his or her employment—rather, it’s a way to prepare yourself to say and do those things you thought too outlandish before.

There are companies that time and again successfully explore and implement risky ideas—ideas that might otherwise put managers and executives at risk. How do those companies “de-risk” unproven concepts, mitigate the anxiety of failure, and ultimately create the biggest possible value?

Design is a core value for many companies that succeed in realizing radical ideas. Consequently, to test our Get Fired hypothesis we went to two organizations known for their design prowess—Saffron Consultants and Steelcase—to understand how they consistently generate valuable new ideas and successfully take them to market.

NEXT: Part 2 – Case study of Saffron Consultants.

Of all the years of academic research spent understanding tribal affiliation, inclusion, identity and shared cohesion, it’s only recently that business has taken notice. That’s not to say commerce based tribes haven’t been around forever—they have—but until now they’ve formed organically, without the considered attempts of brand managers to leverage this platform.

THE HUNGRY TRIBE
Author and entrepreneur, Seth Godin has published extensively on the importance of leadership in forming strong tribal communities and brand guru, Marty Neumeier explains it this way: “Selling is pushing products at people, but brands pull people into tribes.”

Traditional marketing and brand managers have finally started to take note, but it appears to be no more than a latent response to a smarter, more educated consumer who is looking for more. Not more advertising…not more spam…not more widgets…and not more clutter. Consumers today are hungry for more meaning.

DON’T SHOOT THE CUSTOMER
Like firing a shotgun into a flock of geese, many marketers still assume that if they interrupt enough people enough times, at least some of them will pay attention. That may work but only until another product comes along that is better, sleeker or less expensive. When that happens (and it will), to regain the high ground you must launch another costly ad campaign. When companies compete on features, functions or price, they might as well just say it: “We don’t care enough to spend the time to understand what you find meaningful.” This near-term mindset is the status quo for organizations that believe indefensible products, inevitable commoditization and low levels of consumer engagement are the only market reality.

However, organizations that create value for the future customer first create a much more formidable barrier to competition. In this instance we’re talking about a considered effort to create platforms and artifacts that connect communities and facilitate the creation of a tribe. The marketing role needs to be fundamentally re-thought, to create a shift away from thinking like traditional brand managers, into a world where marketers become brand advocates and evangelists.
A BUSINESS IS BORN
What started as a small Summer ritual amongst a tight-knit community of artists on a Northern California beach has slowly grown into a full-fledged pop-up community and multi-million dollar festival. Burning Man now attracts nearly 50,000 people ranging from geeked-out yuppies to middle-aged hippies and every future primitive technophile in between. This diverse group of eclectic revelers share a desire to travel to Black Rock City, CA every August to contribute to the creation of a temporary city for radical self-expression and communal bonding.

This once informal bon-fire on the Beach in San Francisco not only built a social platform that brings people together over a common interest, but created a business platform that generates millions of dollars annually. Today Burning Man charges $200 a head and earned over $10 million in 2008 alone. Burning Man didn’t start as a business, but slow and steady cultivation of this Tribe has certainly made it one.

MORE THAN JUST A CAUSE
Yellow Livestrong bracelets can be seen on everybody from neighborhood kids to pro athletes. Even the President of the United States has worn one. What is it about this $1 dollar rubber band that generates brand awareness and unprecedented amounts of money for cancer research and Nike in such a short period of time?

Livestrong bracelets are more than just a receipt for your dollar. These bracelets have become a way for people to identify themselves as part of the club. They are a low stakes way to tell the world “I support Lance Armstrong in his fight against Cancer, because I too am an athlete who understands the importance of staying active.”

Lance, in partnership with NIKE, created a platform using these bracelets as a way of connecting people, with the ultimate goal of raising not only cancer awareness, but also money, and lots of it. Whether for profit or non-profit, to succeed in today’s marketplace, organizations need to create tribes—not for the money (though that’ll come), but for a purpose.

SELLING A LIFESTYLE
From the first Beetle, to the most recent GTI, Volkswagen has successfully built and sold great cars, but more impressive is it’s consistent ability to build tribal lifestyles through behavior. A recent viral video sponsored by VW received almost 4 million hits on YouTube in only one week. The video shows people will change their behavior if a truly fun option is available. (In this instance alost everyone choose not to take the escalator when a group of artists turns a steep flight of stairs into a larger-than-life piano.)

The ad has absolutely nothing to do with cars, yet contributes to their ability to sell more of them by accessing an emotional value held vehemently by the VW tribe: fun can make the world better. Volkswagen sells a lifestyle, and their tribe happily sees it’s value.

CONCLUSION
In a world where consumers own the brand, brand managers need to think more like brand advocates. They must take the initiative and become leaders by creating platforms and artifacts for communities to connect with one another, not just managing wordmarks. People are obsessed with connecting to others over shared interests, values and meaningful experiences— these people will find each other with or without your product or service, why not help?