A Case Of Social And Disruptive Innovation

“Social Innovation refers to new ideas that resolve existing social, cultural, economic and environmental challenges for the benefit of people and planet. A true social innovation is systems-changing – it permanently alters the perceptions, behaviors and structures that previously gave rise to these challenges,” (Balestrero & Udo, 2014, p. 84).

"It is a false assumption of mankind to assume the resilience of outdated practices," said western thinker and philosopher Slavoj Žižek. I agree with Žižek in supporting the statement that it is always necessary to find new solutions to problems. Innovation is paramount to our growth as a civilization, and will perish if not used, which can be exemplified through literature, history, and current world affairs.

This is the first case study report for the course ED5317: Strategies for Managing Innovation that is based on the Harvard Business School case titled ‘Design Thinking and Innovation at Apple’. The report consists of the following question:

Throughout the last half-century individuals from the medical field have built up an innovation that performs an accomplishment that is proclaimed by numerous as inexplicable: an implant which makes sound inside the ears of the hard of hearing. Cochlear implant innovation utilizes electrical driving forces to send the vibe of sound waves to the brain by living up to expectations around the harmed cochlea, making an apparent evidence of sound to a hard of hearing or deaf individual (NAD). In the event that you asked a “normal listening” individual that they thought about the innovation of the CI, they would celebrate that there is at long last a cure for the "awfulness of deafness" and would expect that the Deaf group would be energized and excited for a cure to deafness. The reaction to CIs from the Deaf group has not been positive, but instead frowned upon. The center of the development is on the progression of the human condition through innovation. It is important to consider both the potential advantages and pitfalls of rising innovations, including any moral predicaments that may emerge on their cusp.

In this essay I will describe and explain the causes and consequences of disruptive innovation. Firstly I will write about what dualism is, why it is important and how to achieve it. I will continue with describing difficulties, which may occur on a company’s path towards it, namely overshooting and inability to recognize the start of a new industry cycle. Further on, I will go deeper in the reasons, why incumbents fail to recognize the new entrants on the market, specifically “attack from below” and other discontinuous patterns of change. In the end I will describe some of the responses taken by established companies to disruptive technologies.

Using SWOT analysis, it's possible to analyze a case study for identifying points of internal strengths and weaknesses in any given organization, as well as the external opportunities and threats facing this organization (Donohue, Adinolfi and Shrestha, 2009). In this short essay, the SWOT analysis framework is applied to the case about Wendy's International Inc.

In Clayton Christensen’s Disruptive Innovation for Social Change he changes the term “social change disruption” into a catalytic innovation. Disruptive innovations challenge most industries by offering them simpler alternatives to their low-end customers. Catalytic innovation, however, can outdo the status quo by offering an acceptable solution to inadequately addressed social problems. Catalytic innovations are differentiated by its primary focus on social change on a national scale. For example, in the article mentions how Minneapolis health clinic, MinuteClinic is a catalytic innovation.

Specific Purpose Statement: To inform my audience about three of the ways that legendary entrepreneur Elon Musk has and is changing the world.

Diffusion of Innovations seeks to explain how innovations and social changes are taken up in a segmented group of people. An innovation is considered as either an idea, behavior, or object that is perceived as new by the receiving audience. According to author Everett Rogers, Diffusion of Innovations offers three valuable insights into the process of social change which include: what qualities make certain innovations spread rapidly than others, the value of peer-peer conversations and peer networks during social changes, and assessing and understanding the needs of different individuals in a specific population. In the book, Diffusion of Innovations, the focus is not on the people who change, but the innovations themselves. The clip I chose to analyze for this assignment is a short, less than three minute video, regarding the truth about privilege and

Organizations must develop and execute strategic plans to ensure future company growth and success. Assessing the internal and external aspects affecting a business is a key part of the strategic planning process, as it provides a vector for organizations to maintain a competitive advantage within a marketplace that is continuously evolving. Using quantitative data is considered a best practice to begin an assessment by reviewing recent financial performance and objectively determining the company’s current financial condition (Abraham, 2012). Subsequently, innovative organizations like Tesla Motors must apply methodologies to intimately measure subjective aspects such as a company’s competitive strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and potential threats. A SWOT analysis is the operational method used to analyze these aspects (Abraham, 2012). The purpose of the following project is to apply core competencies of the strategic planning curriculum to inspire a culture of strategic innovation within organizational leaders of tomorrow. First, we will take an assessment of Tesla Motors history, the company’s current products, and major competitors affecting the innovative company’s business plan. Then, we can examine the current market situation to determine any potential barriers to organizational success, before applying the principles of a SWOT analysis to determine Tesla’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats that may affect the future of the organization.

A renewable entrepreneurial enterprise must juggle, balance and integrate two phenomena, each requiring radically different values, mindsets, leadership and management approaches. The first is "sustaining innovations," which are basically improvements to a currently-existing business framework, and which milk the current business model and value proposition for all they are worth. The second is "disruptive innovations," which are innovations that threaten the currently existing business framework by fundamentally changing the rules of the game.

Many people question whether the competition on innovation benefits or cripples society. Published on March 1, 2012, Paul Hobcraft’s “The Innovating Era…” argues that innovation has more negative side effects which outweigh the positive outcomes. His first point is that companies are too focused on monopolistic intentions rather than spreading out profits to the community. His second factor suggests that the increase of unemployment and homelessness rates are the result of the contest. The final element he mentions claims that innovation demolishes the utilization worth of merchandise that has already been developed and distributed among the people. Innovation is beneficial due to the fact that it cultivates company strategies, generates employment, and leads into a change in history.

Disruptive change requires new strategies. When conditions change rapidly, organisations find their former approaches which have led to success in the past, are no longer effective. It can be hard to let go of these approaches if they have been a source of competitive advantage. This leads many managers to assume that successful responses to disruptive change are a matter of luck. But it is possible to craft strategies to best exploit opportunities ahead of the competition.

When I first start on this module, I feel really odd about what exactly a social enterprise is. In our daily life, there are tens of thousands businesses among us, but I have never thought about what makes those business exits, what aims they are trying to achieve and what kind of business they are. When thinking of social enterprise, I feel interested in how they run the business in a long term if it is not profit driven, and how they maintain the daily operation with perhaps very little social capital investment. My understanding of this module built upon everyday readings, seminar preparations and workshops, as well as group discussions, Gregson Centre’s visit and learning packs of various social concepts from different groups day by day.

Over the last few decades entrepreneurship has become the way many people have chosen to for their career paths. There are different types of entrepreneurship but there is one in particular that seem to be evolving in the world of business and it is social entrepreneurship. Social entrepreneurship has allowed the opportunity for change, considering the ever changing economy we live in today. Social entrepreneurship focuses on not for profit in order to create social value, encourage socially responsible practices in current businesses and provides social solutions to social problems. Social enterprise is the tool that is used to create social values and meet the social needs. Even though social entrepreneurship sounds like it is charity it is not because it combines social and commercial goals and as a result, solves some of the social problems. Social entrepreneurs take part in a procedure that involves consistent development, adoption and learning. By having these segments, social entrepreneurs are able to work without being confined to assets. Even though most cases of social entrepreneurship start out rather small, their drives have a huge impact on the world’s issues. Some of those examples include access to clean water, unemployment rates, chronic sickness and disease and crime. This paper will address the social entrepreneurship origin, characteristics and the contrast of social entrepreneurship in the United States versus other countries abroad.