This is Your Knee Calling
I spent a lot of time at the Medical Device and Manufacturing show back in the winter. One of the neatest machines I learned about was a new x-y-z printer that made prototypes out of stainless steel. One of the prototypes on display was a new hip joint that had been made entirely using the x-y-z process. It wasn't smooth like you'd expect - they had built in micro-ridges on the polished surfaces to retain lubricating fluids so the joint would last longer and feel better. When I saw the Capell (When Body Parts Call the Doctor) article, I couldn't help but think of the MDM show.
When a new joint is starting to wear out, it hurts. If you could program the new part to whine - via, say, WiFi to your Doctor's office - when things aren't going correctly that failing joint could be replaced before it advance to the pain stage.
These stories are the fun of medical device innovation. Manufacture better. Build in technology. The x-y-z printer cost $600,000 if I remember correctly, not a simple expense if you are trying to upgrade your prototyping facility. The electronics in that joint might force you to go through a whole new application process to the FDA. The negatives could out-weight the positives, unless you consider a few things. There will be lots of innovations in your processes over the next year. If you choose to consider carefully which ones to invest in, you are farther down the way. You will reject some new innovations; others will get the green light. How do you choose?
Corning says have an innovation team, not in your silo but at the corporate level. Include lots of folks on the team. Force them to deliberate - quickly. Then, once they like an idea, keep the idea before the committee. Force them to track progress. Demand reports back. And, this is important, allow efforts to succeed by giving them assets repetitively, not just once or twice. The x-y-z printer spent the money to buy machinery that they weren't sure a market existed for. The Corning folks invested in a new glass (new in that, while it was created initially in 1963 as an auto glass, then never touched for decades) by allowing expensive ($300,000 a pot) test batches, not once but a series of times. And yes, they pushed production of the lines to get the test batches. The team said it was worth doing, ran the numbers, and continued to follow up. If the CEO was the only advocate, he would've forgotten about it by the time came around for the second test batch.
Allow the ideas to percolate up. Prioritize them. Follow-up. Sounds too simple, but it works.
Reference
Capell, Kerry. When Body Parts Call the Doctor. Bloomberg Businessweek. 12 April 2010. 54. http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_15/b4173054256568.htm
Holstein, William J. Five Gates to Innovation. Strategy+Business. 1 March 2010. http://www.strategy-business.com/article/00021?pg=all