Description

Open innovation has become the latest management buzzword. We would have to look long and hard to find an executive who does not agree
with the basic premise of open innovation – that success in coming up with creative new value to offer to the marketplace depends upon
connecting effectively with other companies. We simply can’t do it alone. Virtually all executives now buy into the wisdom of Bill Joy’s observation
that “there are always more smart people outside your company than within.”

But here’s the paradox: despite such broad acceptance of the basic premise of open innovation, why are there so few examples of companies
that systematically and successfully practice this approach? Any discussion of open innovation will offer inspiring stories from Procter &
Gamble, Cisco and Eli Lilly, but they are the same stories told over and over again. Why do so few companies actually succeed in the broad
based implementation of this important management principle?