Ask the Innovation Expert: Ted Frank

The back end of innovation is the make or
break point for ideas in the innovation process. It's where
great ideas will either flourish or die. This is your reality
check. What you take to market and how you execute on innovation
determines your ROI and growth.

This year, The Back End of
Innovation Conference unites cross-industry leaders sharing
challenges, lessons learned and best practices on commercializing new
ideas and profitably executing your go to market innovation
strategy. Move beyond incremental product and service improvements
and discover the lessons of ground breaking innovation ' meaningful
disruption across categories, value chains and markets.

That's why we recently sat down with BEI 2015 speaker and
Story Strategist at Backstories Studio Ted Frank. He talked to us about
best practices to support successful innovation execution and the challenges
that come along with it.

Here's what Frank had
to say:

'The two biggest roadblocks I see with innovation teams are
lack of confidence when they present to executives and not documenting their
process. Because innovation and design become very personal, it can feel like
going before a judge, and they forget that they are there as contributors to
the company's strategy, and therefore, as valuable as anyone.'

Frank also shared some best practices for innovation teams
when it comes to crafting the story of a project:

'Get the objectives for the project written so you can
reference them later. That helps them use the words that management uses, a
technique that will help them resonate with the executive at their presentation.'

'Document the process by shooting video of the innovators in
action: as you research, as you brainstorm, as you sketch, as you create. These
will later make the innovators look heroic.'

'Get an outside person or team to craft the narrative. The
team is usually way too close to it and, therefore, keeping it simple becomes
very difficult.'

'Always, always, always, present visually, and if you can, experientially.
If you can get the execs to feel the problem from the customer's point of view
and the journey as you explain it, they'll be so much more present and ideas
will make so much more sense.'

Want to hear more
from Frank? Attend BEI 2015 in San Jose, CA
this fall. To learn more about the event or to register, click here: http://bit.ly/1ICwiu1