Innovation Management

Government and Public Sector

Navigating IT budget challenges

Cost reduction: Strategy or battle?

Cost reduction, a fight with Badr Hari?

I got a question the other day about cost-cutting in IT. The question was actually what I thought about that and how I would do it. Before I could even begin to tell a story, I was given a prerequisite: the IT budget must be reduced, so no "flight to the front" with higher IT costs and possible benefits in the business. The latter is about saving with IT rather than saving on IT. This precondition immediately gave me the feeling of having to fight Badr Hari in handcuffs with my arms behind my back. Yet, I do see opportunities.

Ruud Boot

Netherlands

Digital

Building the Product Management capability to drive business results in the digital age

Product-led impact

product-led-impact

There is little doubt that few businesses function, let alone flourish, without digital technology supporting them. The positive impact of fintech on profitability in the banking sector is well-established[1]. The automotive industry has been rocked by Tesla’s “over-the-air updates”. The energy sector is trying to keep up with the demands placed on its capabilities to support a wide array of EV charging solutions. The pharmaceutical industry has launched its own version of Industry 4.0 with its vision for Pharma 4.0. No surprise - digitalization tops the list of transformation priorities everywhere.

Koen Harbers

Martin Andreev

Matthijs Breeuwsma

Organizational

Financial Services

Igniting a culture of innovation with the COIN Framework

From ideas to continuous innovation

from-ideas-to-continuous-innovation

A little over a year ago Achmea Schade Bedrijven, the Business-to-Business arm of the biggest Dutch insurance company, decided to structure their innovation processes using the <a href="https://continuousinnovation.net/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Continuous Innovation (COIN) Framework</a>. The trigger was the large number of innovation projects and initiatives but a lack of concrete outcomes and results, combined with a company-wide sentiment of “simply not getting around to it”. We sat down with Innovation Manager Nicole Stroeken to reflect on the results and learnings, as well as to discover the current challenges and next steps for innovation within Achmea Schade bedrijven.

Liz Derks

3 critical success factors derived from the COIN Framework

Unlocking corporate innovation

unlocking-corporate-innovation

Change is happening faster than ever. From Schumpeter (1942) identifying “gales of creative destruction” lasting fifteen years to Clay Christensen (1995) describing disruptive innovation cycles of five to seven years; we are currently in an era where any innovation could impact existing markets in as little as a year. Needless to say, this leaves a rather small window of opportunity to get in on the action, especially for large, risk-averse corporations. In preparation for my new role as consultant at BlinkLane Consulting, now known as Highberg, I recently participated in its <a href="https://continuousinnovation.net/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Continuous Innovation</a> (COIN) training. Having supported startups and small businesses in their innovation efforts over the past years the jargon, rituals and mechanisms were far from unfamiliar to me. Having these placed in a comprehensive framework, designed to create a continuous flow of idea development in a corporate setting, however, was eye-opening. Find below some of my key take-aways.

Guiding organizational growth and innovation with proven portfolio techniques

Innovate smartly: Portfolio power

innovate-smartly-portfolio-power

Do you prioritize ongoing innovation initiatives to ensure a focus on the chosen strategy? Is your organization working on innovations that actually have the highest priority? Strong portfolio management helps you in making sure this is the case.

Bronte Verhoeven

Exploring unseen answers, igniting innovation

Unveiling hidden solutions

Design-thinking-Unveiling-hidden-solutions

Design Thinking has sadly been boxed (by most) into the category of consumer goods or user experience. True, Design Thinking is a consumer-focused problem-solving method, so it’s easy to fall into that trap, but, at the end of the day, everyone has a direct consumer of their work. What Design Thinking does is it asks the “why” behind the reason that the person might need the program. Design Thinking can be used to see if there is a better way of doing something to address the underlying need of a consumer, and it does so quickly and cheaply. In the example that you will see later, our client needed to create a new product based on data services and we used Design Thinking to figure that out.

Daniel van Zuydam

Strategies for IT Challenges

Dilemma: Save or Invest?

It is already a while behind us, but a few weeks ago the government presented the Budget Memorandum 2021 on Prinsjesdag. The budget of the State of the Netherlands faces many challenges, including growing unemployment, an increasing budget deficit and a rising national debt that exceeds the European agreed maximum of 60%. Partly through a €20 billion investment fund, the Netherlands is trying to invest its way out of the crisis. But what about this for your organization? Do you need to make savings? Can you invest in IT solutions? In short, how does your ICT organization contribute to the challenges of keeping the products and services provided by your organization affordable?  
The economy will shrink by 5% in 2020 according to the Central Planning Bureau, at the same time they expect growth of 3.5% for next year. All in all, we will then see a contraction in two years, but it is manageable. This contraction will be larger if the second Corona wave lasts longer and involves heavy measures. In turn, the extent to which this will affect your organization will depend on the industry in which you operate. We see and hear that the government is not directly slashing IT budgets next year, but if you are in the travel or retail industry you may face major challenges. Not counting exceptions, such as web shops, for example. If your organization faces the challenge of bringing costs down, there are roughly two ways to get through and out of the crisis:

Joost van Lier

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arent-van-t-spijker

Partner

Arent van 't Spijker is partner at Highberg and has over 20 years of experience in information management in a wide variety of organizations and industries. He has a strong focus on information as an enabler for innovation and on the monetization of information as an asset. Arent acts as a trusted advisor to business operations and senior management. Arent is a creative and inspiring speaker. He is solution-oriented and builds on his extensive knowledge of (and experience in) structured and unstructured data management and -reporting. His areas of expertise include innovation, data driven strategy, business model innovation, big data and Lean and Agile working.
Want to know more? Connect with Arent on <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/arentvantspijker/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">LinkedIn</a>.

<title>Arent van 't Spijker | Highberg</title>

Arent van 't Spijker

Arent van 't Spijker

Partner

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