Speaking of Innovation and Risk-Taking: Business Week magazine released its annual list of the
50 most innovative companies in the world. Check it out -- along with the package of stories about innovation in today's economy.
There's an
interview with Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos that could be of interest to news organizations looking for new niches and business models. Here's an excerpt:
Q: Every company claims to be customer-focused. Why do you think so few are able to pull it off?A:
Companies get skills-focused, instead of customer-needs focused. When
[companies] think about extending their business into some new area,
the first question is "why should we do that—we don't have any skills
in that area." That approach puts a finite lifetime on a company,
because the world changes, and what used to be cutting-edge skills have
turned into something your customers may not need anymore. A much more
stable strategy is to start with "what do my customers need?" Then do
an inventory of the gaps in your skills.
Kindle is a great example. If
we set our strategy by what our skills happen to be rather than by what
our customers need, we never would have done it. We had to go out and
hire people who know how to build hardware devices and create a whole
new competency for the company.
There's also a
feature on Pure Digital,
the company that produces the Flip camera I use to shoot interviews for
SuperVision. It's an example of disruptive technology - a no-frills
challenger to sophisticated cameras that's succeeding because it serves
a specific consumer need: easy to shoot, web-friendly video capture.
Not the highest quality video or audio. Just good enough to do the job.
Conversations about "just good enough" are critical in newsrooms right
now, so there's a clear understanding of how to preserve credibility
while under pressure to cut costs.
Another Form of Innovation?
Last year, I wrote a column
“Re-Thinking the Chopper Wars” - after a
fatal accident in Phoenix involving TV news helicopters. I suggested stations start pooling choppers.
Well, the economy, as well as safety, may grant my wish. Two Philadelphia stations, WCAU and WTXF, are now trying it out, according to this story from
philly.com:
The arrangement, acknowledging the economics facing media as well as
the redundancies in some coverage, is a test to "see if we can
cooperate on some newsgathering in the field," according to a memo
circulated Monday to NBC10 staff by news director Chris Blackman.
The cooperation, which both stations will assess at the end of a week,
extends to events such as news conferences and other planned events
that both stations would cover anyway, Blackman said in his memo,
adding that "helicopter resources" also would be shared.
What else could be pooled? How about the extraordinarily expensive doppler radar systems stations buy independently of each other – but could easily pool?
