Our Methods
At winnovation we offer the right tools for every challenge.
Depending on the conditions and goals we will choose just the right method for your project, based on Open Innovation principles.
Our Core Methods
Design thinking
Areas for
innovation analysis
Lead user & Lead expert search
Crowdsourcing
Technology competence leveraging
Our Core Methods
Crowdsourcing
Design Thinking
Technology Leveraging
Lead User
Areas for Innovation
Our Methods in Detail
Co-Creation & Design Thinking
Using the power of a diverse group of people for ideation
-
Innovative new solutions and strategies with broad ownership, often based on strong user centricity
-
Co-creation formats, being digital or taking place on-site, build a strong base for new solutions. Experts and stakeholders from within or outside the organization collaborate to develop innovations. Thereby it is crucial to give direction and use the diversity of contributions in the most productive way.
winnovation offers extensive experience in designing co-creation formats, choosing and preparing collaborators as well as organizing and facilitating successful human-centred interactions, such as workshops.
Crowdsourcing
Obtaining innovation input from a large, highly distributed crowd by using digital technology
-
Broad variety of generated input, be it problems or ideas
-
Crowdsourcing is one of the most popular open innovation methods using digital technologies (e.g. social media) to access new knowledge.
There are two different types: Problem crowdsourcing aims to identify the most important user and costumer needs by aggregating answers from the crowd, whereas idea crowdsourcing (idea contests) generates fresh ideas and solutions for a given challenge.
winnovation is highly experienced in framing challenges, reaching the defined target audience as well as collecting and evaluating responses.
Lead User & Lead Expert Search
Developing truly novel solutions (such as products, services, business models) and innovative strategies for the future
-
Highly innovative solutions for a given problem and advanced, novel strategies
-
In contrast to average users who are often not able to contribute to novel ideas, lead users are an extraordinary source for truly new and fresh solutions. Beside their technical expertise, these hand-picked individuals are highly innovative thinkers intrinsically motivated to solve challenges.
winnovation is an expert in finding and carefully evaluating lead users and lead experts for specific challenges, even across industries, and involving them into idea or strategy development, e.g. via workshops.
Technology Competence Leveraging
Discovering new markets and applications for an existing or planned technology
-
New fields of application in new markets incl. first potential customers
-
A lot of companies possess technologies or products only sold in small niche markets. In order to build on their company strengths and find completely new application fields and target groups, technology competence leveraging (TCL) is a perfect tool. It leads to the discovery of novel application areas with a high technological and strategic fit since the TCL involves a mass-customized, yet targeted search process.
The core of winnovation’s TCL approach lies in a cross-industry search process allowing a user-oriented view at the problem-solving capacities of a technology or product.
Areas for Innovation
Finding starting points for innovation projects and strategic innovation planning by detecting and prioritizing the most promising user problems
-
Specific areas for innovation describing where both users and the broader ecosystem would most need innovation
-
Companies risk to back the wrong horse if they do not look at unmet customer needs and changes in markets before starting with a new product or service innovation project. With the areas for innovation (AFI) analysis, winnovation provides all the strategic information needed to bet on the right horses. This analysis enables innovators to target well-defined pain points in their markets as starting points for their innovation instead of relying on broad and vague guesses.
During an AFI analysis, winnovation interviews users and experts in the specific target markets and aggregates the obtained information with market and technology trends.
Our Methods in Detail
Co-Creation & Design Thinking
Using the power of a diverse group of people for ideation
-
Innovative new solutions and strategies with broad ownership, often based on strong user centricity
-
Co-creation formats, being digital or taking place on-site, build a strong base for new solutions. Experts and stakeholders from within or outside the organization collaborate to develop innovations. Thereby it is crucial to give direction and use the diversity of contributions in the most productive way.
winnovation offers extensive experience in designing co-creation formats, choosing and preparing collaborators as well as organizing and facilitating successful human-centred interactions, such as workshops.
Obtaining innovation input from a large, highly distributed crowd by using digital technology
Crowdsourcing
-
Broad variety of generated input, be it problems or ideas
-
Crowdsourcing is one of the most popular open innovation methods using digital technologies (e.g. social media) to access new knowledge.
There are two different types: Problem crowdsourcing aims to identify the most important user and costumer needs by aggregating answers from the crowd, whereas idea crowdsourcing (idea contests) generates fresh ideas and solutions for a given challenge.
winnovation is highly experienced in framing challenges, reaching the defined target audience as well as collecting and evaluating responses.
Lead User & Lead Expert Search
Developing truly novel solutions (such as products, services, business models) and innovative strategies for the future
-
Highly innovative solutions for a given problem and advanced, novel strategies
-
In contrast to average users who are often not able to contribute to novel ideas, lead users are an extraordinary source for truly new and fresh solutions. Beside their technical expertise, these hand-picked individuals are highly innovative thinkers intrinsically motivated to solve challenges.
winnovation is an expert in finding and carefully evaluating lead users and lead experts for specific challenges, even across industries, and involving them into idea or strategy development, e.g. via workshops.
Discovering new markets and applications for an existing or planned technology
Technology Competence Leveraging
-
New fields of application in new markets incl. first potential customers
-
A lot of companies possess technologies or products only sold in small niche markets. In order to build on their company strengths and find completely new application fields and target groups, technology competence leveraging (TCL) is a perfect tool. It leads to the discovery of novel application areas with a high technological and strategic fit since the TCL involves a mass-customized, yet targeted search process.
The core of winnovation’s TCL approach lies in a cross-industry search process allowing a user-oriented view at the problem-solving capacities of a technology or product.
-
Specific areas for innovation describing where both users and the broader ecosystem would most need innovation
-
Companies risk to back the wrong horse if they do not look at unmet customer needs and changes in markets before starting with a new product or service innovation project. With the areas for innovation (AFI) analysis, winnovation provides all the strategic information needed to bet on the right horses. This analysis enables innovators to target well-defined pain points in their markets as starting points for their innovation instead of relying on broad and vague guesses.
During an AFI analysis, winnovation interviews users and experts in the specific target markets and aggregates the obtained information with market and technology trends.
Finding starting points for innovation projects and strategic innovation planning by detecting and prioritizing the most promising user problems