A Webinar Business Overview

Business Innovation Risks and Benefits of Enterprises Creating a culture of innovation Innovation in emerging Countries Government's involvement in innovation 2008 Hot Trends Value of Video Risks and Benefits of Enterprises Categorize some of the risks and benefits for each: small medium enterprises One of the prime advantages of small and medium enterprises is that it caters to small markets and thus is able to improvise and know exactly the requirements and demands of the customers. His gives them expertise and makes most of them specialists.

Another advantage of a small and medium enterprise is that being small, such firms are able to adjust quickly to changes in the market place. There is very little red tapism and hierarchies are not present this enhances the decision making process. This form of enterprises also allows for job flexibilities for employees as they do not have roles that are cast-in-stone (Kuratko & Hodgetts, 2004). These being small generally have good team spirits as they work closely together ad compliments each other.

Being operational in a small market, these firms can work closely with the community and community involvement is possible. These firms are more closely associated with the communities and hence know what the potential customers want and demands. Being small in size, most these small and medium sized firms most often have direct interactions with he customers. This is also because that every customer is important to such firms and thus regular interaction between the customer and the management team most often takes place regularly.

Administration of such small firms is also easy as far as legalities are concerned. The regular financial reporting that large companies are mandated to do is not required in case of smaller and medium sized enterprises. Linear growth is possible in MSME enterprises with requirement for less investment. However often this investment becomes a problem as it becomes difficult for smaller companies to get credits for sudden business requirements. ii. Innovation-driven enterprises For firms and enterprises that are Innovation-Based the market for them are very large.

It can be said that since these enterprises depend on innovation and quick adaptation to find out mew ways and means to produce goods and services that give them a competitive edge over the competitors. Thus such enterprises are able to reach out to a wider market and even the global market. Thus such enterprises are also export oriented apart from catering to the demands and wants of the local market. This makes these enterprises eligible for the benefits accorded out to export companies.

Mostly it has been observed that such companies that are based in innovation and has innovation at its core objectives remain sustainable as they manage to change and cater to the changing market conditions. Moreover these enterprises create a niche for themselves by innovating and create products and services that make them competitive. Since such enterprises are driven by innovation, it proves to be advantageous. However developing such a tendency or culture for innovation takes time and enterprises have to go through a lot of changes.

Sometimes it is difficult to manage these changes and creating innovation environments can sometimes result in negative outcomes. Another problem in innovation-based enterprises is that such enterprises are expensive to run as the changes that are required to be financed are large. 2. Creating a culture of innovation a. Elaborate on how companies can create a culture of innovation: i. According to Aulet According to Aulet, innovation is a result of invention along with exploitation of situations and chances.

Aulet says that enterprises first need to create a situation and an atmosphere where one develops a tendency to invent new things. Together with this one also has to look for situations where this can be done. Thus creating an culture for innovation is a combination of invention and exploitation of situations (YouTube, 2016). According to Aulet, one would be required to question whether the invention work in relation to the purpose it is being invented.

However the idea also has to be translatable into reality and enterprises have to question themselves whether it can be produced. While it can be produced, one then also has to decide about whether this invention or innovation is needed and how it would be able to help the company and fit the market size and whether it would be accepted by the market.

The culture of innovation can be created by infusing the tendency to do things differently and anticipating the future demands and wants of the market for example, Apple is one company in the technology field that is innovation based and creates products that are mostly ahead of their times and are accepted widely by the market. ii. According to Peters Innovations are something that creates value for business and hence it is something that everyone and every business wants.

However, according to Peters, innovation is something that cannot be simply demanded from employees and workers. Innovation requires a lot of investments even though it can come for some as a flash moment of genius. For business one command innovation but has to be achieved through devotion and investment of time, concentrated effort and the creation of a culture in the business with the effort to flourish innovation. Tom Peters says that in many businesses managers and companies do not want to take risk of innovation process.

The creation of a culture for innovation requires enterprises and companies to conduct an internal innovation audit to understand whether the firm is ready for innovation. It needs to be ascertained whether the company is ready to include innovation as a systematic and perpetual process and whether that can be included in the culture of the company (Peters, 2010). Next one needs to look at the company culture to see whether it suits an atmosphere of innovation and break the culture in need be to incorporate a new culture of innovation.

Companies should be sure to ensure that the employees are behind the idea of innovation and ready accept the changes that might come in the organization and he culture due to innovation. It is also important, according to Peters that innovating enterprises should also identify the innovators and who should be given the freedom to invent and innovate. The staff for innovation should be so chosen that the wide ranging experience and opinions are obtained.

Therefore innovative enterprises, according to Peters, should also hire employees according to the innovation needs so that the objectives are achieved (YouTube, 2016). iii. According to Execution Plan video. The video describes innovation as a combination of invention and commercialization. This means that firms that intend to innovate should invent new things in such a way that it has commercial applicability. The video cites examples of companies which have developed a culture of innovation 0 for example, Apple Inc. Innovation should create values for companies.

To create a culture of innovation, entrepreneurs should understand the system that it functions in and adopt a disciplined, holistic and long-term approach. It is also advised that one could get educated about the entire process of development of culture and about how to bring in innovative culture in an enterprise. It is also important to design an organization chart that fosters innovation and conduct measurement and evaluation of the success while experimenting and reacting to market situations. iv.

Is there a common denominator in terms of creating a culture of innovation? Perhaps more than one? Explain The most common denominator in the above three presentation about innovation and innovative culture is that the aspect of invention that needs to be present in every enterprise that desires to be innovative. All three agree that the process of creating a culture of innovation is complex and lengthy and which cannot be achieved over night. 3. Innovation in emerging Countries a.

According to Aulet, how have women in Africa been empowered? In addition to Africa, identify three other emerging countries or continents that are becoming innovative. Women in Africa have been empowered through innovation where the regular chores that they do is transformed and innovated so that they become commercially viable and are able to generate income for the low income groups in Africa. The primary focus is on innovation in of daily work in a manner that corresponds to the demand made in the market.

The other three emerging countries that are becoming innovative are Korea Romania and Turkey 4. Government's involvement in innovation According to Aulet, the government can play a very important role in innovation. Since innovation is essentially inventing new things therefore it requires to be protected. Innovation can serve as a differentiator only if it is not replicated by competitors. In this sense, every invention requires to be patented to prevent duplication. The government can facilitate this process.

Innovation is also fostered in a free market and here government policies can aid more innovative enterprises. Innovative firms require financing and other incentives which can be facilitated by the government. I do agree with what Aulet describes as the involvement of the government in the process of innovation. Considering the above mentioned roles of the government as facilitators, the process of innovation can be expedited and secured. Companies and enterprises would become more encouraged to innovate if it is facilitated and secured.

According to Aulet, one of the best ways to get financing for innovators is to look for venture capital funding. While this form of funding.