What product managers need to know about the Targeted Innovation Process

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TLDR

The Targeted Innovation Process is a practical framework that helps product managers drive innovation in their organizations. This approach focuses on understanding customer needs, generating quality ideas, and turning those ideas into real value. The process has five main steps:

• Stating the problem


• Understanding problem-solving styles


• Creating creative pathways


• Generating ideas


• Evaluating ideas

Introduction

Innovation is key to product management. It’s what helps create products that customers love and keeps companies successful in the long run. As a product manager, knowing how to use effective innovation processes is crucial to stay competitive in today’s market.

In this episode, Jerry Fix and Terry Carroll explained the Targeted Innovation Process, a practical way for product managers to drive innovation in their companies. They described each step of the process, shared a real-world example, and discussed how to show the value of innovation programs in your company.

A Working Definition of Innovation

Filling the Idea Funnel

Think of innovation in product management as filling a funnel with high-quality ideas. This approach involves coming up with lots of concepts and gradually refining them through different stages of development. The goal is to have a strong innovation process that provides a steady stream of valuable ideas for product managers to work with.

Staying Close to Customers

A big part of successful innovation is keeping a close connection with customers. This involves:

• Understanding their challenges and needs


• Observing their work environments


• Gaining insights beyond what customers directly tell you

By staying close to customers, product managers can make sure their innovation efforts match real market demands.

Two Ways to Define Innovation

Jerry and Terry shared how they think about innovation:

Terry: Creating a better mousetrap: This means making meaningful improvements to existing products or creating new, viable solutions that add real value for customers.

Jerry: Turning ideas into value: Innovation isn’t just about coming up with ideas. It’s about turning those ideas into tangible benefits for customers and the company.

Understanding the Targeted Innovation Process

The Targeted Innovation Process is a practical approach to innovation that focuses on generating high-quality ideas and efficiently turning them into valuable products. This framework has five key steps:

This process is designed to be more focused and practical than traditional open-ended innovation approaches. It encourages product managers to consider real-world constraints and their organization’s capabilities throughout the innovation journey.

A Closer Look at Each Step of the Targeted Innovation Process

Jerry and Terry explained each step of the Targeted Innovation Process in more detail:

Step 1: Stating the Problem

The first step in the process is to clearly articulate the problem or opportunity you’re addressing. This involves:

• Creating an open-ended problem statement


• Gathering input from various stakeholders


• Avoiding the temptation to jump straight to solutions

By taking the time to thoroughly understand and define the problem, you set a strong foundation for the rest of the innovation process.

Step 2: Understanding Problem-Solving Styles

Different problems require different approaches to solve them. In this step, you’ll:

• Identify the most appropriate problem-solving style for the challenge at hand


• Consider both incremental and breakthrough approaches


• Match the chosen style with your organization’s capabilities and culture

Understanding these styles helps ensure that your innovation efforts align with your organization’s strengths and the nature of the problem you’re addressing.

Step 3: Creating Creative Pathways

Creative pathways are routes that connect ideas with innovation. This step involves:

• Exploring different types of pathways (direct, supplemental, modification, tangential)


• Considering practical constraints such as time, budget, and acceptable risk


• Identifying the most promising routes for your specific situation

By creating these pathways, you establish a framework for guiding your ideation efforts in a focused and productive manner.

Step 4: Generating Ideas

With a clear problem statement, appropriate problem-solving style, and defined creative pathways, you can now focus on generating ideas. This step includes:

• Using various ideation techniques and tools


• Encouraging a high volume of ideas while maintaining quality


• Considering the chosen problem-solving style to guide ideation

The goal is to produce a diverse range of potential solutions that address the stated problem and align with your organization’s capabilities.

Step 5: Evaluating Ideas

The final step in the Targeted Innovation Process is to assess and select the most promising ideas for further development. This involves:

• Screening ideas against predefined criteria


• Combining multiple ideas to create stronger concepts


• Selecting the most viable ideas for prototyping and testing

By carefully evaluating ideas, you ensure that only the most promising concepts move forward in the product development process.

Real-world Example: Innovating a Floor Cleaning System

To show how the Targeted Innovation Process works in practice, Terry shared a real-world example involving the development of an innovative floor cleaning system.

Getting to Know the Customers

The product team started by doing extensive customer research, which included:

• Interviewing 30 different customers from various parts of the industry


• Conducting 90-minute one-on-one sessions with each customer


• Using discussion guides and video recording to capture insights


• Using competitive samples and 3D printed prototypes to help discussions

This thorough approach to customer research allowed the team to gain deep insights into user needs and pain points.

Key Findings and What Customers Valued

Through their research, the team identified several key things that customers valued in a new floor cleaning system:

1. Tool durability


2. Ease of use


3. Risk reduction (fewer slip and fall accidents)


4. Simpler cleaning process


5. Appearance

These findings guided the development of the new product, ensuring that it addressed the most important customer needs.

Testing and Improving Prototypes

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