Creativity and Innovation Worksheet

In the nineties Juicy Fruit was a struggling brand. It was failing to keep the rhythm with sugar-free products that were promising breath freshness, intense mint flavour, a sexier new format and a larger pack. Excel and Dentyne Ice had become market leaders, with always new flavours and by heavily spending on advertisement. Both were growing fast. Juicy Fruit was a boring and old-fashioned sugar stick with a flavour that didn’t last enough. In 1992 it had launched a sugar-free tab with the TV support. In 1998, it had launched the “Value Price Proposition”. It was

Creativity is defined as the ability to produce new and unique ideas that diverge from established customs and norms. Over the years, however, it has diminished greatly in today’s society. From a young age, schools as well as some business force people to learn certain skills in order to please others. For quite some time, colleges based a student’s intelligence on their GPA rather than creative abilities. Those who are creative are restricted in their abilities; it is acceptable for a mathematically inclined person to lack artistic skills, but heaven forbid a creative student find a science based class challenging. Currently, Academy School District 20 has not implemented a creative thinking class in Liberty High School. I believe we should include such a program, seeing that creativity in students continues to weaken nationwide. By requiring students to think creatively, we can encourage students to innovate, grow, and learn.

The company's products, to me, appear to fall in the areo of Product Maturity. Basically because the products that are made and sold are not new; however, because the items are already baked and packaged, they offer convenience to customers who do not have the time to mix ingredients and bake it themselves. Also, for thos who have no cooking skills, it offers and easy way to acquire the snacks.

Cracker Jack is one of the most recognized consumer food brands in the United States. The brand possesses virtually universal awareness, holding steady at 97 percent among persons between the ages of 15 and 60. It also has an enviable 95 percent brand name awareness among heavy users of caramel popcorn. In spite of this gold mine, it is still regarded as traditional, stale, old fashioned, a product from a bygone era and less hip and less contemporary than its major rival, Crunch ‘n Munch. To add to this dilemma, the product diversification strategy that led to the development of several other versions such as Cracker Jack Fat Free, Butter Toffee, and Nutty Deluxe, in the hopes of

Innovation is a term I’ve frequently heard in the realm of business and technology implying new and or different methods leading to

For most companies, identifying what a learning organization should be and actually becoming one is tricky at best, impossible at worst. One way that manager's and companies can promote the concept of being a learning organization is to assess whether the company is in need of a short-term fix or whether it is more focused on long-term results. Organizational learning is a long-term activity that will build competitive advantage over time and requires sustained management attention, commitment, and effort. Learning organizations maximize their competitive positions during strong economic times and they prudently train their employees and prepare for change even in turbulent times. As a result, learning organizations and learning

A learning organization is an organization that can change quickly, adapting to the new rules that the market environment has created. Businesses that know how to learn and develop quickly and effectively will thrive; those that don’t will not survive. It is easy to think of newer companies like Apple and Google as being the best learning organizations. Yet, some of the best examples of organizational learning practices are found in more mature organizations, such as the U.S. military. Throughout our lives we collect tidbits of information, knowledge through what we experience, we try to apply the lesson from these experience as we grow, we are curious by nature, adventurous we are learners and for many of us the process of learning never stops.

Innovation comes from a variety of sources. For example when there are development teams within a company the use innovative ideas to enhance existing products or produce new ones. Innovations are brought about through the creative thoughts of employees, customers, and competitors.

Frito-Lay first toyed with multigrain snack chips in the 1970s, when research indicated a need for a snack in this category. Prontos, released in 1974 and distributed for four years, weren’t incredibly well received. While a lack of success is attributed to a confusing name, poor manufacturing and too narrow a market, Dwight Riskey, VP of Marketing Research and New Business, admits that he is “not sure there were dramatic things wrong with the product design [...]. It may have been invented and introduced before its time.” This sentiment was reflected in the Harvest Project in the early 1980s, when Frito-Lay developed several multigrain products to attempt and have a possible healthy alternative to saltier snack foods for the baby-boomer generation. Lackluster response caused the project to stall into the mid 80s as focus was put on developing new flavors and healthier alternatives in other brands.

Brand building, consumer health and wellness, and advertising and promotions were all critical to success in the industry. Kraft’s ability to compete with lower priced snacks showed its ability to differentiate itself from other lower priced competitors.

Describe a firm you think has been highly innovative. Which of the four types of innovation—radical, incremental, disruptive, or architectural—did it use? Did the firm use different types over time?

Tidd et al (2000) states, “the innovation is a business process of revolving opportunity into new ideas and of putting these into widely used practice. In term of the nature, there are five major types of innovations: novelty, competence shifting, complexity, robust design and continuous improvement. While in term of the extent of change, innovations can be divided into incremental, radical and

Organizations that strive to excel in aspects of innovation, competitiveness, and performance must have clearly defined core values that are executed by specific learning disciplines (Senge, 2010). Giesecke and McNeil (2004) stated, "A learning organization is an organization skilled at creating, acquiring, and transferring knowledge and at modifying its behavior to reflect new knowledge and insights" (p. 55). In the pursuit of defining specific practices that would produce an ideal learning organization, Senge (2008) proposes five disciplines that include, "...systems thinking, mental models, personal mastery, shared vision, and dialogue" (p. 1). In this application paper I will analyze each of the five disciplines discussed by Senge (2008) and discuss how they can be applied in an organization such as the high school where I am currently teaching to address specific areas in need of improvement.

Change, creativity and innovation are essential elements for survival and growth of an organization. Creativity is vital for the birth of fresh and beneficial ideas. Creative thinking allows groups and individuals to solve problems or stimulate to think differently in order to bring forth fruitful ideas. The above mentioned creative thinking enabled our team of six different personalities to come together and implement a plan to solve a complex problem in a hospital. Our assigned task was to recommend a plan in order to alleviate hospital readmission among elderly population within thirty days of discharge. In this paper the author is narrating the team dynamics, functionalities and personal competencies in the process of recommending a change in the system. As a member in the innovation leadership team the author is also reflecting on the assessment, capacity for innovation in the organization which is the hospital where the team is assigned.

Peter Senge argues that not only we humans learn, but organizations also. However, learning itself may not be enough for the organization to survive in this ever-challenging era. In his book, The Fifth Discipline, Senge introduced five ‘disciplines’, namely systems thinking, personal mastery, mental models, building shared vision, and team learning, that characterizes an organization as a learning organization.