They were not only physically out of control, but mentally liberated from expectations and presumptions. For them there’s absolutely no reason why a frying pan shouldn’t talk about its cooking experiences or why you can’t hold your computer mouse the same way you hold your mobile phone. Their minds are not conditioned like ours and that’s what makes them a genuine source of innovation.

We as adults are generally limited to our past experiences. Any ‘new’ thinking or idea we initiate starts with a set of assumptions that will result in marginal revisions to what we’ve encountered before. Our minds are junkyards of historical observations. Those of us skilled or knowledgeable in a field will certainly be ahead of the game when it comes to decision making or when concepts need to evolve into feasible product. But if you’re a innovation strategist or a designer ideating the future of interaction design, you need to stop thinking about where apple is taking us and instead hang out with a 3 year old.

Seriously! Leave a bunch of 3 year olds with toys and a few colored markers. Do a simple experiment, like having a transparent sheet of plastic in the middle of the room where they can draw on and  play with each other from both sides of the invisible border.

You’ll be surprised!

The opportunity to become an “Innovation Strategist” catches people’s attention.

Since our initial posting for the role in Toronto, we’ve received over 120 resumes from dynamic, brilliant young individuals all interested in joining the Idea Couture team. From the outside looking in, innovation strategy sounds incredibly sexy (and it certainly looks good on a business card). But if you ask a typical applicant what exactly they think an innovation strategist does, what usually follows is blank stares, buzz words, or my favorite, “They strategize innovation”.

None of those are good answers.

There’s nothing worse than expecting one thing and getting another. In preparing to take on two new strategists in the next few weeks, I couldn’t help but reflect on what is becoming an industry title with no common definition. So I figured the least I could do is take a stab at some common tasks to help people know what they are getting in to, what they should consider learning to do, and where their responsibilities should lie.

So here are a few of the tasks, activities, and responsibilities of your typical innovation strategist.

Project Design
Innovation strategist as the planner

• Work with the client to articulate project outcomes
• Help design the structure of what innovation projects look like
• Set up the project’s research activities, and collaborate to select methods
• Build a multidisciplinary team based on available resources

Business Strategy

Innovation strategist as the box builder

• Interview clients to better understand what problems the team is trying to solve
• Help clients / the team state the project vision
• Help the project frame the problems based on client input
• Define what project success criteria looks like
• Draw from existing models or develop new frameworks to direct the solution

Design Research

Innovation strategist as design researcher

• Design and / or participate and / or facilitate research (depending on skills)
• Provide a business or user centered flaw to the other design researchers (depending on core competencies)
• Help researchers synthesize the findings into insights
• Frame the insights of user research insights through deliverables (personas, systems diagrams, customer journey maps, mental models, touchpoint analysis, or something else cool that I don’t even know exists yet.)

Workshop

Innovation strategist as a facilitator

Idea Development & Evaluation

Innovation strategist as an architect

• Help come up with killer ideas
• Help prototype, evaluate and test those ideas
• Make sure the final solution is in line with project briefings or has a damn good reason to break the brief
• Develop prioritization frameworks to evaluate which ideas are strongest
• Evaluate costs and benefits

Design Development

Innovation strategist as a sherpa

While innovation strategists are the center of my universe, being surrounded by a strong team is what makes a project work. An innovation strategist is nothing without the help of true and trained design researchers, skilled industrial and visual designers, project managers, futurists, human factors specialists, content strategists, and support.

But needless to say, when people ask, “What does an average day look like?”, there is no short answer. Being an innovation strategist is definitely a full time job, but even more, it’s a lifestyle decision. Innovation strategists are always working, because the world is where they learn, and their curiosity is not 9-5.

So what would you add? And are you interested in applying? We’re looking in Toronto and New York.

UPDATE: Add San Francisco to the mix. In short, if you think you meed the description, we want to meet you!

However, we are now experiencing another evolution in Industrial Design as it appears to be reaching the end of an evolutionary plateau, with emerging industrial economies such as China and India set to take over  the way things get made (for better or worse).  It is important to note that Industrial manufacturing will continue to exist, yet it must evolve to keep up with emerging needs of society and the new rules of global responsibility.  In a similar way that Industrial processes in Europe became focussed on premium quality rather than mass-quantity, North American manufacturing will need to re-examine and re-evaluate where their strengths are and what long term potential exists based on examining holistic risks and opportunities.

Since the 1950′s manufacturing expertise in North America has been systematically reduced to ever more efficient assembly lines with ever increasing regulations and manufacturing processes with more emphasis devoted to marketing and advertising.  As a result of this, manufacturers have become increasingly more clever at reducing the number, complexity and cost of manufacturing.  However as we look forward to the next phase of evolution in our emerging world economy, the core Industrial Design skills and manufacturing expertise appears to be set for going open and experiential.

It is this technical know-how that is gradually being re-distributed throughout the Internet and it is allowing new micro-assembly methods for independents, proving a way to bypass traditional investment heavy processes and procedures.  This is proving to be most beneficial for the emerging economies and independents start-ups.  Fisker Automotive and Tesla Automotive are both companies who are touting their independent green credentials, and yet they using the same supplier base from larger OEMs to create their more sharply defined and powerful Premium Electric or Plug-in Hybrids vehciles. Most important to note however, is that these are still early days for these type of innovators.

Already there are other new (smaller scale) business models which are begining to pop up.  As with many innovations, it is not always the originator of an idea who benefits from an idea or technology first.  Sometimes the groundwork that has been laid down by previous business experiments and prototype models leads innovators to other business models with separate and an un-intended technologies and they are able to realize a novel new approach for use in a new type of product.  An interesting example at this end of the spectrum is BPG Motors; an small start-up company born from a highschool science project in which the technology of Segway’s personal transporter was reformatted to fit into a motorcycle style package.  After only a few short years, the company is now experimenting with a fold-up scooter prototype, the UNO III, which can transform itself to save space to be taken indoors and up an elevator.  None of this would have been possible if not for the accessibility of open-source know-how and shared technologies (such as the out-sourced rapid prototyping of aluminum parts).

Are brand names, badges or marques of a manufacturer more important than what the physical product is?  These are questions that I often think about.  I think automotive manufacturers also need to address these kinds question before taking their brands into the realm of experience design.  If a manufacturer of a brand cannot impart a more compelling story beyond what the end customer picks up from their  dealership, then perhaps it is time for an investigation  around what kinds of experiences, journeys and alternative narratives can be provided to consumers.

Industrial Design has often been criticized as one of the most destructive professions due to the resulting industrial waste,  shortened mid-cycle enhancements and associated pollutants with the entire socio-economic, industrial and commercial program.  There are several leading minds in  transportation design and automotive design experts who acknowledge that the only way to improve current and emerging issues related to transportation and mobility is in collaboration with non-automotive sectors.  More importantly there is now an industry awareness and emphasis on designing experiential brands, that take consumers beyond the realm of “yes or no type offerings” or other stand alone products, and instead focuses on delivering a participative experience.  This is the next evolution for Industrial Design as it requires a breadth of knowledge of both product, process and positioning.

So what does all this mean to brand-name manufacturers?    Manufactures can do much more for consumers, and  there are real needs that can be addressed right now beyond simply offering more products.  The short answers could be in developing alternatives to car ownership, and alleviating time wasted for commuters stuck in traffic.  There are many forms this could this take, most obviously transit buses and ride/share programs.  But how could an automotive brand use experiential marketing to provide a premium service?  Would there be anything from a brand to add to the experience beyond simply being an “outstanding, compelling or gotta-have-product”?   Imagine an autonomous limo that picks you and and delivers you your destination, that is piloted by Google, co-branded by Apple and offers passengers an engaging experiences designed by Universal Studios.  Or how about stopping off at Starbucks to recharge your electric hybrid while you enjoy your favorite cup of coffee?

The path forward is not yet clear, and there is still much deliberation about what vehicle architectures, electric infrastructure and vehicle servicing that will be needed in the future.  However, industry already knows about the more immediate and frustrating issues of traffic, pollution and insurance premiums.  If foresight indications are correct, then the R&D groups of large OEM’s need to begin re-evaluating what mobility means, and what role their brands will play in a service oriented economy.   Creative technology environments are generally reserved for work in manufacturing R&D silos, however I know from experience that they can be quite flexible in accommodating new types of design and engineering (see my earlier post here).  In order for OEM brands to gain access to the next evolution economy, the Researching-of and Designing-exercises for consumer experience based offerings, must be opened up beyond the silo of transportation designers.  What is needed now, is a new platform to engage policy makers, urban planners and non-automotive businesses with those in the Automotive Corporate world.

Idea Couture has its roots in digital innovation. Frog, Adaptive Path, my good friends at Normative Design, and many other leading innovation firms also have amazingly strong foundations in the digital world. Three years ago, I left the interactive industry to pursue innovation consulting, and while I expected a painful transition, what I found was that infusing big problems with the sensibilities of the interactive space, no problem is insurmountable. Now, all of these firms call upon that experience to tackle problems much larger than designing websites.

I believe that interactive people are the world’s best innovators.

While today, the process of innovation is often labeled “design thinking”, people from the interactive space don’t really need to call it anything other than their job. The process of innovation has been intuitively embedded in user experience since people first started thinking about how websites work. What’s even more incredible is that the interactive space has only reached one billionth of its potential. While we draw on foundations of industrial design and architecture, we’re blazing trails in other unexplored territory.

Digital people are inventors

In a typical design process, defining constraints of a project is one of the very earliest steps. In the interactive realm, a constraint is treated like an opportunity to push the boundaries of a medium. As a result, people are more than willing to hack the rules or create new rules to make the optimal solution work. Their analytical yet lateral ability to solve problems is second to none. Interactive people are inventors.

Interactive people understand systems

Anyone who grew up in a web firm lived the life of the ugly stepchild. If you were building websites in the early 2000′s, you knew that your entire existence hinged on an appreciation of multiple service and experience paths. You were building within a larger organizational system and context – you were one piece of a puzzle. Interactive people are systems designers.

Empathy is at the core of innovation

A web design process is inherently user centred. It requires an in depth understanding of a person’s goals, and your job is to help them achieve those goals. That being said, interactive people understand that an end user’s experience is a reflection of both what you design and their own environment on the other side of the screen. We deal with issues of accessibility, issues of screen size, mobile considerations, situated experience, and more. Interactive people understand user centred design.

Digital people communicate

Since the beginning of my web career, I’ve understood design thinking tools. Prototyping, wireframing and storyboarding are all essential processes in the digital space. Apply those same skills to a service design problem, or to a product design problem, and suddenly abstract concepts make complete sense to your clients. Interactive people apply the design thinking toolkit every day.

Digital people understand performance

One of the largest barriers to innovation is the burden of proof. Since the very beginning of the digital era, people have been measuring websites to communicate the success of innovation, and drawing relevant parallels where no previous parallels existed. Digital people balance business and user objectives.

Interactive designs are always iterative

The day after you build something, you switch to optimization mode. There’s an inherent appreciation in digital that solutions can be elegant, but can always be improved. The idea of constant improvements and iterative design are fundamental to digital processes. They’re also core to the beliefs of innovators.

The medium is in its infancy

Ask an industrial designer to talk about the web, and they’ll base most of their thinking in what’s current. Talk to an interactive designer about the web, and they talk about visions for the future. Every day, some new considerations enters our design lexicon. And every day, some new startup is experimenting with these tools to push the boundaries of what is possible. Digital people are adaptable and flexible.

Innovation in product is innovation in digital

To solve product and service design problems, we need to migrate towards platform thinking. A product is no longer just an object – it’s a hub of connected information and interactions. Yes, strong industrial design can create an object of desire, but without inherently and intuitively applying digital sensibilities to that product, it will arguably be less competitive. Industries like music and publishing are transforming before our very eyes, and who are the best people to lead us into this unexplored territory?

Any of these qualities on their own are factors we look for when hiring innovation consultants. But what’s incredible about interactive people is that, more often than not, they have all of these qualities. And I know this is just a starting point in a long list of skills. I’m not trying to discount the capabilities of industrial designers, researchers, or architects who have found their way into the innovation space, but I do truly believe that the inherent understanding of all the qualities outlined above put former interactive practitioners in a unique position to solve big, important problems.

So did I miss any?

Mix these all up and what do you get? An global event demonstrating what immense creativity, collaboration, innovation, and an aggressive time crunch can produce — Global Service Jam 2011! Participants from San Paulo, Rotterdam, Oslo, Berlin, Stuttgart, Shanghai, Seoul, Sydney, Barcelona, and of course, Idea Couture office locations, Toronto and San Francisco, were given a theme, (Super) Heroes, and 48 hours to produce service design concepts. The weekend was about pushing the boundaries, pure imagination, and applying the design process to the creation of new service concepts. Post-its flew, coffee was consumed, connections were made, and great fun was had by all.

We at Idea Couture sponsored the San Francisco jam, where 16 participants, mostly strangers, met at the California College of the Arts last Friday to kick off the event. There is no doubt that service design is a growing discipline that corporations around the world must employ to build the most innovative and meaningful experiences for their clients, and we put these tools to practice for our clients every day. Seeing the energy and enthusiasm for this type of work is inspiring for everyone, and we’re pleased to have played a part in encouraging the practice and adoption of service design.

Check out the final service design concepts here, submitted by teams all around the world: http://planet.globalservicejam.org/projects. Bet you can’t stop at just one.

To learn more, follow #gsj11 on Twitter or check out the official Global Service Jam page. May the power of service design continue to proliferate through the world!

Needless to say, the process of preparing and presenting to the internal IC team had me pretty primed to talk about what Design Thinking is and what it means in the context of Idea Couture, business, and innovation. So I was pretty happy when I went on Quora last night and came across this great question:

Part of the challenge in answering that question is that there is no single definition of Design Thinking. From what I’ve seen and what I practice, there are four points of view on what Design Thinking really is. Each have a different connection to innovation.

1. Design thinking is a person is a person who is capable of forming ideas through abductive reasoning. Abductive reasoning implies knowing throughout intuition (no formal proof), which is effectively a new thought. Innovation through new ways of thinking.
2. Design thinking is a human centered way of viewing the world. By trying to solve problems through gaining insights around people’s needs, you’re creating new perspectives which lead to new opportunities for innovation. Innovation through new perspectives.
3. Design thinking is a series of methods allow designers better communicate ideas. Completely new concepts are difficult for most people to grasp, so using a designer’s lens on communications improves understanding. The communication of innovation.
4. Design thinking is a series of steps to guide the innovation process. It’s the meta name given to the activities involved in creating a new idea. Design thinking is innovation.

So what do you think? Agree? Disagree? Just tired of hearing the term “Design Thinking”? Let me know.

Also, here’s a copy of the internal presentation if you’re interested.

It’s hard to dispute that voting platforms have quickly become one of the most popular tools in the cause marketing playbook. As with any new marketing method, these platforms have been a lightning rod for criticism. This week alone, I’ve had several healthy debates with thought leaders in the CSR and Social Innovation space about their value for communities:

“They waste precious, limited charity resources”,

“They tick off the donor list”,

“They celebrate popularity, not good ideas”,

“etc…”

Yesterday morning, I was up at 5AM to attend the Year 2 Aviva Community Fund winner’s event. After another year overseeing Canada’s most successful social media and cause marketing platform, I felt inspired to share a bit more of an insiders view of how these competitions work, and why they are an extremely good thing for causes when used strategically. I have no doubt, there’ll be plenty of disagreement regarding my point of view, as I already hear it on a daily basis. I look forward to some healthy discussion.

“only a few ideas win, everyone else loses”

As someone who curates competitions and sits on the board of a charity, I’ll be the first to say that the allure of a big pot of money is seductive. You’ll be hard pressed to find an organization or school that’s overfunded, so inevitably some organizations are disappointed or angry  when they don’t win.

But to look at these competitions with the singular view that the prize is the only outcome is extremely short sighted. Well designed cause marketing platforms are marketing assets that can leveraged by both sides of the equation. Some organizations are disappointed by the outcome, while others recognize the opportunity that is presented to them the whole way through.

These programs are about marketing, and that marketing is symbiotic. Yes, brands like Aviva and Pepsi win by associating themselves with causes. But charities also win trough promoting their needs through national platforms. Having spoken to many, many, many organizations who have participated in these types of programs, far more ideas get funded than the ones announced. Smart causes use these marketing platforms as a way to bring their needs to national attention. They organize themselves to “win”, whether they get funding through the program or not, by using these programs to educate interested individuals about their needs.

Most importantly, they build a new and expanded audience, which in and of itself is an asset asset.

“they’re just a popularity contest”

Voting, and especially social media voting in a cause marketing platform, is a popularity contest. That popularity brings people to a branded site which creates exposure to the contest organizer. The formula is pretty standard there. Ultimately, a degree of any competition has to do with the ability to rally support – be it a student council vote, or voting in the AMEX Member’s Project. Inherently there’s a hope that a democratic process like voting yields a valid outcome.

The way that I view the Aviva Community Fund is in two phases – the marketing phase, and the cause phase. The marketing phase (up to selecting the finalists) is 100% participant chosen, and 100% the result of an idea’s ability to rally voters. The cause side (judging) narrows the finalist ideas to the winners using detailed criteria designed to identify the most deserving projects with the biggest impact. I reiterate, we find the best idea from a sub-set selected based on popularity. The most deserving ideas get funding.

One final thing to remember. If there’s issue with the popularity contest, we can’t forget that the dollars for programs like this come directly from the marketing budget and not a CSR budget. The result is money (which would normally go to advertising) being directed to causes.

I sure can tolerate a popularity contest if it means $1,000,000 goes to deserving ideas.

“they take a lot of work to enter”

The rationale that these competitions are a distraction is an uninformed rationale for why these platforms are bad.

First, from a pure mechanics perspective, user experience practitioners design these competitions to be as easy to use as possible. For example, in designing our idea submission forms, we deliberately made our forms as simple as possible with the recognition that good ideas come from anywhere. That means our submission process needs to be as easy for a major not for profit to complete as it is for a grade 2 student. To enter the first round of our competition, we’re talking maybe 15 minutes. Add in voting, creating a few images, and shooting a video, maybe 2 hours? The mechanics alone are a negligible distraction.

In the case of the community fund, we also built in a philosophy of progressive disclosure into our submission process, which basically means that the further you progress into the competition, the more we ask you. We needed to balance the needed for judges to evaluate an idea with the amount of effort required to enter the competition, and we didn’t want people to go through the effort of developing complex budgets until they saw the light at the end of the tunnel.

“they’re a distraction to the focus”

Aside from the mechanics, what people are probably really upset about is the effort it takeout to collect come up with ideas, market the idea, and collect votes.

On the ideas creation, I would say it’s the role of charities and community leaders to come up with new and innovative projects to help people. If anything (and I’ve been told this), we’re giving organizations a reason to think about how they can help serve their communities better. I think that’s a pretty positive outcome.

On the marketing side, perhaps one of the best outcomes of these programs is their ability to act as an educational tool. On one hand, we embed marketing education in all of our program design to help causes capture as large an audience as possible. On the other hand, idea creators and supporters are learning about how to market their charities in the age of digital media. I know from first hand conversations that participation in the Aviva Community Fund, for example, has taught a number of organizations about how to use social media.

On the votes point, see my next section.

“we’re draining our database”

If you have issues with these programs creating a distraction, perhaps you should reframe your thinking a little. Maybe a distraction is exactly what these organizations need in order to realize the level of commitment, passion, and interest out there by people who don’t have the means or desire to respond to the one tired message in the marketplace, “Donate now”.

While some people struggle with the burden of the vote, I actually think it’s refreshing to hear charities ask for help in a way other than from my pocket. Voting competitions allow charities to tell a different story, and to get people to act in a different way. Since there is less commitment in giving a vote than a dollar, I think (and have heard) that these voting platforms allow smart organizations to collect new donors as opposed to disenfranchise them. And meanwhile, any smart marketer knows to segment their database.

Voting platforms are an opportunity, and an option

Maximizing the potential of voting-based cause marketing platforms is hard work. I doubt anyone, including this year’s amazing Aviva Community Fund winners, would disagree. But to criticize them without assessing why they exist or what their potential is can be a really short sighted perspective. While it’s easy to make sweeping generalizations, if you actually take the time to analyze how some communities take advantage of these opportunities, you’ll see that they benefit as much as the brand putting on the competition.

And of course, if I still haven’t convinced you, just don’t enter. But I promise you, you’re missing out on a huge opportunity.

There are 365 days in the year and our travel luggage spends most of that time buried away in the closet.  When luggage is not being used, it takes away valuable space, and adds to the frustration of clutter creating awkward surfaces that are difficult integrate with other items.

After 100 years in the travel luggage and all the changes that the industry has been through, it is ultimately the consumers who have changed most. With a decrease in leisure travel, and an expansion of alternative means to carrying luggage from the onset as a result of increased air travel restrictions, luggage manufactures have witnessed a near perfect storm.  Retailers in particular have felt the pinch of the great recession and some brands are facing severe economic uncertainties. Research indicates that changes in air travel behavior are here to stay, and while some luggage manufacturers are forecasting expansion into overseas market development in the hopes of luring customers similar to those found in North America, the luggage manufacturers will need to take a more serious look at where they are heading toward and what they are planning to do about their business in terms of strategy and innovation.

What hope is there for the North American luggage industry to survive into the next decade?  What else can this industry do with their manufacturing expertise and brand equity?  How can they to tap some new value streams for consumers? What are some other ways to reframe the context of luggage and how it gets used?  What are some alternative functions or features that could be used in the home and the urban environment?

The following explorations pertain to ideas and opinions expressed over innovation for travel luggage industry.  The directions, departures and themes illustrated here are meant to serve as a starting point around a discussion of innovation, and do necessarily reflect the actual brand names that have been referenced.

One direction could see the extension of luggage docking familiar to travellers brought into the home environment.  This habit formed “Loading and Unloading Zone” serves as a system that can be installed by the DIY homeowner.  Key features would be stowed away storage bins, vanity mirror/wall organizer and an innovative dust trap/deodorizer for the front hallway.

A step down from the built environment could be realized as a mobile cart with integrated lighting and storage systems.  The carry-on luggage would be stationed as temporary shelving unit capable of offering up usable space in a chaotic environment.  Ambient lighting on both floor and ceiling with combined use of mirror would open up even the narrowest of passageways.

Another extension of mobility, this idea focuses on individual docking of carry-on luggage and the interplay of visibility and usable space.  Additional features would include ambient ceiling light, air-scrubbing plants (such as Bamboo Palms) and aromatic fragrances through co-branded vendors.

In this last example, here is an exploration around a stationary unit, meant to be compatible with other electronics and entertainment style furniture.  Featuring a duality of faces through the use of a swivel base, this unit allows the user to display or conceal the luggage depending on scenario of use.  Other conveniences such as magazine rack, shoe organizer and lower cupboard space invite the user to display this station which is made from the same materials and construction as the luggage itself.

]]> http://www.ideacouture.com/blog/2011/01/03/pack-the-bags-for-a-new-direction/feed/ 0 http://www.ideacouture.com/blog/2010/05/20/bygone-nostalgic-design-vs-the-emerging-world-part-2/ http://www.ideacouture.com/blog/2010/05/20/bygone-nostalgic-design-vs-the-emerging-world-part-2/#comments Fri, 21 May 2010 03:03:33 +0000 Jesse Diephuis http://www.ideacouture.com/blog/?p=4428 To address better ways of integrating Transportation in Urban environments requires a very wide-angle perspective lens in order to view the whole scenario of life in an urban environment as well as those in and around the  emerging world.

It requires that we put ourselves on the same streets of the people we would like to offer new services or products to.  We cannot simply sit behind a desk and target potential consumers with ideas which are created in a vacuum.

Corporations are more comfortable when they are able to absorb information that is presented in un-ambiguous volumes of information such as with infographics, data plots, matrix charts and/or clear examples that illustrate the archetypical consumers mated to a given technology.  See Ford’s Antonella, a Computer Generated personas used in development.

However here is where the problem arises, because most companies are too focused on their day-to-day production to really see any greater potential for other adjacent services, similar markets or entirely new opportunities thus limiting their capability to even begin thinking about taking a ‘calculated risk’.  Identifying and developing an entirely new product, experience or service requires a Re-Think, Re-imagining and Reset of business as usual.

Most companies already know who they want to target and what they are willing to spend, but what they don’t know and don’t have, are all the cultural points of reference, the interviews, the video-diaries,  the deep insights that come from knowing and understanding their ‘target market’ intimately.  Companies can literally get stuck when it comes to identifying new social classes that are yet to exist 10 years (even 15 years +) from now into the future.  Experimenting with branding techniques and products that aren’t really connected or based with anything that is current quickly loses relevance, authenticity and meaning.   Internal Design studies and Innovation work really start to break-down because no one actually knows who these future consumers really are.  Again, this is not an Engineering issue, it is an Anthropology study, also a Futurist’ scenario and a Qualitative research issue.

This is why a consultancy such as Idea Couture make sense for companies who wish to understand, utilize and implement foresight strategy that take responsibility for identifying, examining and creating innovative solutions for future target markets.

This issue is often referred to as a ‘wicked problem’, which is to say that the solutions are not obvious, nor are they transparent or easily recognizable upon initial inspection. The real answers are not known only until after someone has solved it.

Furthermore, if any attempt is made to solve a particular issue as an individual part of a wicked-problem, then it could potentially do more harm than good.  To ignore the over-lapping of adjoining issues for products and services is like to going into a field of land mines blind-folded.  You need innovation that that allow you to navigate the most effective  way through using the right tools and taking the right steps.

The opportunities to solve these issues cohesively, requires groups of different and complimentary minds (that do not have a conflict of interest in developing solutions) to work together as a team to create points of cultural reference, identify weak signals, map out scenarios and if need be engage even more raw ideas from un-biased participants.  This synergy-approach eludes most corporations primarily because each node of expertise comes from completely different and diverse set of backgrounds, which is normally not associated with human resources that are  available within an established organization.  What ultimately facilitates desired outcomes for Idea Couture clients is essentially our diversity and key competencies within our respective areas of expertise.

However, striking this balance in the modern world, and more importantly the emerging world must take on a different meaning.  As the old notions of luxury are challenged, they must make way for a new set of user dynamics and offer solutions to the people who live in the growing Megacities (cities with populations over 10 million).

In 2000, there were 18 megacities – conurbations such as Mumbai, Tokyo, New York City, and Mexico City had populations in excess of 10 million inhabitants. Greater Tokyo already has 35 million, which is greater than the entire population of Canada.  (source: Wikipedia)  2015 and beyond will also  see cities like Shanghai, Beijing, Seoul, added to this list to name a few.

Transportation on the whole is beginning to splinter into many different value streams such as delivery-on-demand, hub-to-hub services and deliveries, international condo cruisers, executive coaches, virtual garages, post-materialistic neighborhood eco-cars, shared-public vehicles, super-budget-sub $3000, and also new derivatives of personal mobility leading to even more avenues.

As Mega-cities become the norm, consumer attitudes will shift further away from the traditional aspiration of commuter vehicle ownership.  The costs associated with owning, insuring, driving, navigating, re-fueling, re-charging and parking will begin to unravel the notion of investing in one single mode of transport.  In its place, we will see more services based types of transportation.  All it will take are a few entrepreneurs who can splice together on-demand services with real-time users who consumers who are looking for more than just a taxi.

We must search out new ways of mobility, in terms of prestige, convenience, adaptability, affordability, dependability, the “raison d’etre” …… and we must find them quickly.  For consumers, they must be offered some form of tangible incentive, be it joy from the sheer act of being mobile, entertainment, price or convenience.

In terms of Engineering and Design, there are studies currently taking place around the use of robotics in the transportation industry; GM EN-V is one example of a technology demonstrator, and is now on display now at the Shanghai World Expo. The EN-V operates on technology borrowed from Segway, and the entire vehicle is half the size of a Smart car, fully electronic, has a top speed of 25 mph, and is capable of making turns 360 degrees in-place.Another example is the T.25 concept from Gordon Murray (Designer of the famous supercar; McLaren F1), which demonstrates foresight for government regulations, and fuel economy mandates, which are expected by the year 2020.

Transportation technologies have the ability to facilitate change, but ultimately adoption of this will rely completely on the behavior of how humans move about.  Metropolitan cities are more fashion conscious, and urban dwellers are more interested spending money on others things rather than to automobiles.  These people have other desires for items; shoes, purses, headphones, jackets etc…  But human behavior is not an engineering subject and neither is fashion. Therefore, the future scenarios of personal mobility will be less about pure Engineering, more about Ethnography and Designing towards consumer tastes and their unique interests.

Soon, consumers will not care so much about who manufactured their product, but instead they will be more interested in what Designer, Stylist, Co-creator or Theme Artist customized their mobility.  As this scenario evolves it will begin to see an over-lapping of transport services that combines with fashion design, product design, and experience design.