Walter has been involved in a lot of interesting and innovative work over the years, including work with the Design Exchange, and he currently teaches innovation and entrepreneurship at University of Toronto.
I was talking to Walter recently, and we agreed that most of the formal training in business strategy that people get in business school is really most useful when looking at the very largest organizations. Sadly, few of us are CEO of GE and its cousins. Much more often, we are working with strategy farther down the food chain, and the models are not all that helpful.
Entrepreneurs do things quite differently, according to Mr. Derzko. If you want a crash course and some good tools to spur innovation, this might be the place to get you started.
he describes the Idea Clinic as a "systematic rigorous
process for anticipating, spotting or designing Opportunity Scenarios before
your competition does."
- The most common types of unknowns that most businesses face (ie, ambiguity, uncertainty, complexity etc) and how to effectively deal with each one
- Which innovation and creativity methods work best, why and under which circumstances
- The six types of change in the business environment that all businesses face and how to turn “change” into opportunity scenarios
- The most effective opportunity windows for startups, that they don’t talk about in business schools
- Strategies to kickstart innovation efforts in businesses that don’t feel they need to be innovative or in copycat businesses that in the past have been content to be quick followers.
Email walter.derzko@utoronto.ca to register. If you can't make tomorrow's session (great price at $250), let him know you want to be in on the next one.
