Innovation

Everyone can innovate. Innovation means coming up with new ways of doing things. Bringing innovation into your business can help you save time and money, and give you the competitive advantage to grow and adapt your business in the marketplace.

What is innovation?

Innovation generally refers to changing processes or creating more effective processes, products and ideas.

For businesses, this could mean implementing new ideas, creating dynamic products or improving your existing services. Innovation can be a catalyst for the growth and success of your business, and help you to adapt and grow in the marketplace.

Being innovative does not only mean inventing. Innovation can mean changing your business model and adapting to changes in your environment to deliver better products or services. Successful innovation should be an in-built part of your business strategy, where you create a culture of innovation and lead the way in innovative thinking and creative problem solving.

Innovation can increase the likelihood of your business succeeding. Businesses that innovate create more efficient work processes and have better productivity and performance.

Key steps towards business innovation

Find areas and ways to innovate in your business through research and planning:

  1. Conduct an analysis of the trends in the market environment, your customers’ wants and needs and your competitors.
  2. Consult with customers and employees for ideas on improving processes, products and services both internally and externally. Find out more about connecting with customers for ideas.
  3. Seek advice. Use available resources such as business advisors, grants and assistance to drive innovation in your business. This may include seeking Intellectual Property (IP) protection to commercialise your ideas. Learn more about local collaboration and international collaboration with researchers.
  4. Be open to new ideas and adaptive to change.
  5. Develop a strategic, responsive plan, which promotes innovation as a key business process across the entire business. Learn about creating an innovative business culture and developing a strategy for innovation.
  6. Train and empower your employees to think innovatively from the top down.

Remember, innovation is the key to competitive advantage for your business.

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