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INTRODUCTION ONLINE INNOVATION If you would have asked me at the beginning of 2020 whether you could effectively innovate 100 online I would have said NO WAY And now I know I was so wrong Yes you can innovate your organisation 100 online You can devise new products services experiences processes and business models without any doubt Since 2020 we and many others with us have proven this in practice Of course it was quite a struggle to bring our FORTH innovation methodology 100 online after its being employed as a best practice for initiating innovation offline for 15 years We made all the beginner mistakes ourselves We copied the methodology one on one from offline to online with eighthour workshops a day which was utterly boring We experimented with online tools which in those days could not handle 25 people brain dumping their ideas simultaneously on the digital collaboration board Everyone s screen froze and we had to break away from the online brainstorm And most of us were untrained in handling those online tools so each time the plenary session had to be stopped to explain again how to vote for example on the digital collaboration board We had a steep learning curve and managed to work out an inspiring online process for the FORTH innovation method which delivers great results when working remotely For almost all organisations the transition to remote work in 2020 and 2021 was a restrictive work from home one that they hadn t been planning to do They didn t have the communication or collaboration policies the online tools nor a working online culture in place All at a time when innovation was needed more than ever to deal with completely new market circumstances As we saw people struggle making the common mistakes we did too we decided to write this practical book to guide people to become great online innovators ONLINE INNOVATION inspires you with effective online collaboration tools techniques methods and rules to kickstart yourself to innovate your work and your organisation completely online That s why this is a practical HOW INNOVATE ONLINE book After describing ten common pitfalls we share some great tools and techniques that work in practice We discuss the Achilles heel of innovating online and present you ten methodologies you can use for online innovation in a hands on way The Lightning Decision Jam the Design Sprint and the FORTH innovation method will be highlighted and we work out a hybrid version of this methodology At the end of the book you find a systematic description of twenty five tools and ten methods to get a clear overview at a glance to help you pick the right ones for your online innovation journey We hope that this book is a support for you as a consultant coach facilitator manager or student in the field of design thinking and innovation We are sure that innovating online is here to stay We see a huge increase in hybrid innovation projects combining offline and online workshops using all the online advantages while being personally engaged offline Next there are a few people I d like to thank specifically my excellent online skilled co authors Maria Vittoria Colucci Andrew Constable Florian Hameister and Rody Vonk without whom I could never have published this book designer Frederik de Wal for co creating another book with me in a wonderful style text editor John Loughlin and publisher Bionda Dias for her support making ONLINE INNOVATION a reality Let s innovate online Gijs van Wulfen 7 INTRODUCTION

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New communication collaborative tools have changed the way we think about working remotely More and more organisations now embrace working from home or from anywhere and have facilitated their employees doing so For some people it has even become a lifestyle They have become digital working nomads living their dream They work in coffee shops or co working spaces where they rely on their wireless internet devices to do their work when ever they want With the onset of the Covid 19 pandemic at the end of January 2020 working remotely from home became a necessity for all instead of a nice option for few THE RISE OF WORKING ONLINE For almost all organisations the transition to remote work in 2020 was a restrictive one that they hadn t been planning to do So most employees were not ready for it They didn t have the communication the collaboration policies or the tools And a lot of organisations had neither a culture of workingonline in place It was one big improvisation when countries went into lockdown in spring 2020 Companies started to adapt in record time to become productive in their new work online reality And some of them found their teams and businesses benefiting so much from the new remote setup that they started to consider remote work as an opportunity in a growing digital economy Before the Covid 19 pandemic it was predicted that by 2025 an estimated 70 of the workforce would be working remotely at least five days a month 1 That percentage will probably be much higher as organisations embrace working online 10 performance and can work remotely may then be allowed to do so permanently Facebook has already told the vast majority of staff that they can work from home through the end of this year A great example is Facebook As you can read here Mark Zuckerberg wants Facebook to be the most forward leaning company on remote work at their scale in ten years CHART WE ARE GOING TO BE THE MOST FORWARDLEANING COMPANY IN REMOTE WORK Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on May 21st 2020 that the social media giant will start allowing many of its 50 000 employees and recruits to work from home permanently adding to a small but growing number of tech companies that have embraced decentralized work during the coronavirus pandemic We are going to be the most forward leaning company on remote work at our scale with a thoughtful and responsible plan for how to do this Zuckerberg said in an interview We re going to do it in a measured way over time Within the next five to ten years Zuckerberg anticipates that about 50 of Facebook s workforce will work remotely That would mean a significant shift in the concentration of personnel that could radically alter how the company operates as well as have an impact on the San Francisco Bay Area That process will start with aggressively opening up remote hiring first in the United States then elsewhere beyond the urban hubs where Facebook has offices It doesn t seem that good to constrain hiring to people who live around offices Zuckerberg said Facebook will also let existing employees apply to work remotely Those who have demonstrated good ONLINE INNOVATION Source https www nbcnews com tech tech news mark zuckerberg half facebook may work remotely 2030 n1212081 THE MINDSET OF PEOPLE ON WORKING ONLINE CHANGED Working online has been seen by some people as advantageous over commuting to the office every day A report from 2019 among 2 500 remote workers reveals the most significant benefits remote workers see in working online 2 Having a flexible schedule and being able to work from any location are by far the main benefits Another study surveyed more than 4 000 people working remotely during the pandemic to determine what they think of working at home 3 It reveals that both productivity and the work life balance improved during the pandemic Fifty one per cent of survey respondents indicate that they have been more productive working from home during Covid 19 and 95 of respondents say productivity has been higher or the same while working remotely And though there are many reasons why performance has improved despite the stresses of the pandemic some of the top reasons respondents gave for their increased productivity include 11 Fewer interruptions 68 More focused time 63 Quieter work environment 68 More comfortable workplace 66 Avoiding office politics 55 According to the researchers this improved productivity may help explain why 61 of workers review remote work more positively and why 50 also say their employer views remote work favourably now However 37 of respondents said that they miss nothing about the office and only 4 would prefer to return to the traditional office full time Isn t that amazing Only 4 prefer the traditional office full time People s mindset changed as you can also conclude from the quotes of other research presented here by Remoters net 4 What about you Did you change your mindset on working remotely during the pandemic CHART HOW DO EMPLOYEES EXPERIENCE THE SWITCH TO REMOTE WORK Keith E commerce and SEO specialist says Overall the switch to remote work has been fantastic for me The freedom has been great The biggest challenge for me is more pandemic related I need to grab lunch or a coffee with a friend once in a while That was the only uniquely positive aspect of being in an office David Iwanow Search and Traffic Lead at Danone says Went from one to two days a week remote to 5 days a week remote I haven t been into the office in ten months but have found my productivity has improved as I m able to focus on bigger projects and am less distracted The reduced time lost to travel to from work has allowed more family time with discussions with my manager post Covid sic it will return to one to two days a week in the office but that might be April May based on current infection numbers and vaccine rollout plans ONLINE INNOVATION IS MORE RELEVANT THAN EVER

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Reji Yates Founder at B DigitalUK says The switch was good Obviously I had to work out a set up for me to work properly but so far amazing It definitely has changed my remote working perception I think it s brilliant now I would only consider remote working now I absolutely will keep it after Covid THE MINDSET OF COMPANIES ON WORKING ONLINE CHANGED TOO Of course it s not all good news Despite a booming favourable mindset on working remotely people still struggle with some aspects of it When asked What s your biggest struggle with working remotely to 2 500 remote workers they said that unplugging after work loneliness and collaborating and or communication were their biggest dislikes about working online There has been much debate among organisations about working from home and whether or not it s a productivity boost or productivity drain Study after study into remote work has made clear that remote workers are more productive than their office bound counterparts A nearly two year study in 2015 by Stanford professor Nicholas Bloom at Ctrip China s largest travel agency with 16 000 employees showed an amazing productivity boost among the remote workers equivalent to a full day s work 5 There were several reasons for this productivity boost First they were not late for the office Second they were not leaving early multiple times a week And third they found working remotely less distracting and were able to concentrate more easily at home We experienced that asynchronous communication was an essential factor in team productivity when we did our first experiments bringing the proven FORTH innovation method 6 100 online The offline synchronous way of working with lots of meetings with many people makes it difficult to make meaningful progress because you are tied up in meetings all the time with everyone together Working online asynchronously has the great advantage that you can work on something 24 7 on moments you chose yourself while not being distracted Not only did the mindset of employees or independent professionals like us change concerning working remotely No also the mindset of employers and their CEOs altered positively Have a look at the eight quotes of CEOs from a PwC survey of 669 CEOs worldwide during the summer of 2020 that show how they drastically changed their mindset on working remotely resulting in great enthusiasm 7 12 ONLINE INNOVATION Areej AbuAli Founder Tech SEO Women and In House SEO Manager says It was better than expected I hired on boarded and trained team members fully remotely and it worked really well On a personal basis it s given me so much time back and helped me save lots of money Chris Green Head of Marketing Innovation at Footprint Digital says The switch was relatively easy We already worked 100 on the cloud and had Slack Meet When went from WFH lite to full remote overnight Nine plus months later I m missing an office setup Wherever you are don t underestimate the importance of being comfortable when working Source https remoters net remote work trends future insights Working remotely has forced us to embrace techno logy That technology has taught us that we can be as efficient as and in some cases more efficient than before and has provided us with the opportunity to consider adding team members who may not be local to our business Asset and wealth management CEO Canada CHART HOW DO EMPLOYERS EXPERIENCE THE SWITCH TO REMOTE WORK We have changed the ways we work from styles we thought were inviolate to radically different structures and processes This is supported through the greater use of digital and technological solutions and adopting a more flexible and trusting mentality Engineering and construction CEO UK We will spend less time and effort in travelling and introduce dual pricing Pricing based on remote delivery is a better value for customers and gives staff a better quality of life We will honour city salaries and allow people to work from wherever they want The in person presence will only be required on an infrequent basis Business services CEO Ireland The pandemic has radically improved customer and employee interest in and adoption of digital tools Communications CEO US The organisation has had to pivot very quickly to working digitally and we fully intend to build on that to transform how we work in the future Technology CEO UK People are moving towards business process digitisation and becoming comfortable with online payments and online transactions There is a great opportunity for companies and governments to take advantage of digitisation Technology CEO Sri Lanka The new normal of being able to conduct trade without travelling without personal meetings and to engage with stakeholders just as effectively has opened a new avenue for massive cost reductions and higher productivity The need to strengthen the supply chain locally and be self dependent is also an opportunity to differentiate Consumer goods CEO India 13 Trust in our employees is at an all time high Working from home will become the norm not the exception and now we trust our employees to perform without constant supervision Oil and gas CEO Canada Source https www pwc com gx en ceo agenda ceo panel surveyemerge stronger pdf REMOTE COLLABORATION IS HERE TO STAY The same PwC survey of 669 CEOs shows that 78 agree that remote collaboration will remain 8 This is confirmed by a Gartner survey of company leaders also summer 2020 in which 80 of the CEOs plan to allow employees to work remotely at least part of the time after the pandemic and 47 will enable employees to work from home full time 9 ONLINE INNOVATION IS MORE RELEVANT THAN EVER

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As both employees and companies are optimistic about working remotely there s only one conclusion possible remote colla boration is here to stay MORE ONLINE TOOLS ARE AVAILABLE AND THEY ARE GETTING BETTER The present remote working mega boost would not have been possible without the rapid development of information and communication technologies that have changed our methods of communicating and sharing information Traditional departments and teams now frequently give way to virtual teams working intensely with online working tools These new digital tools have made interactions between geographically dispersed people so much easier Collaboration is an essential ingredient for creating This applies to any discipline of professionals ranging from engineers to marketers designers artists researchers and developers Whether you re working in your office studio or home you need efficient and effective online tools for discovering new insights sharing ideas testing them and transforming concepts in reality More and more online tools spring up every year while existing ones continually improve their features and functionality There are now thousands of digital tools available to effectively work 100 online in teams They vary from online collaboration platforms like Miro and Mural video conferencing tools like Zoom or Butter tools for workshop preparation and instruction among which are SessionLab or Loon tools for prototyping and testing like Marvel and Toonly and tools to make your online workshops more interactive like Mentimeter and Tscheck in In Appendix 1 you find 25 online tools to innovate remotely 14 and very expensive Zoom offered customers a 3 in 1 package of video conferencing mobility and web meetings all for 9 99 Zoom was also the first platform that offered mobile screen sharing within video conferences Zoom even gave users free 40 minute meetings for up to 100 people That offer is how we often start using it And a great asset of the platform is that it also works with slow saturated internet During the pandemic Zoom boomed with more than 300 million daily meeting participants It was the perfect product for meeting virtually with co workers classmates friends and loved ones during a pandemic People needed a platform to reach out to each other and there was one that stood out Zoom Also we professional online innovation facilitators love Zoom Without a great videoconferencing platform our online innovation projects would be impossible and this book would have never been written The killer feature for us is the break out rooms for collaboration in smaller teams CHART THE INCREDIBLE STORY OF ZOOM As you know so well Zoom is a video conferencing platform that allows people to meet face to face virtually Originally it was meant for enterprises and universities Now Zoom connects everybody Zoom is a big story in the technology world with over 300 million daily meeting participants connecting during the pandemic Zoom was founded by Eric Yuan He is a former corporate vice president for Cisco Webex He had a vision from his college days that technology would one day allow mobile easy to use video calls for people to stay connected And this became his obsession He left Cisco in April 2011 And he took with him 40 engineers to start his new company In September 2012 Zoom launched a beta version that could host conferences with up to 15 video participants And after two years of Beta testing and fixing issues the Zoom videoconferencing platform was launched in January 2013 Zoom grew very fast It reached a million users within a few months of its launch ten million in a year and 40 million by February 2015 In 2017 four years after the platform s launch Zoom was valued at 1 billion making it what is called a unicorn company The fast growth ease of use and Zoom s reliability were contributing to this significant achievement Why did Zoom become a success among users Traditionally video conferencing platforms were mainly targeted at the business to business market ONLINE INNOVATION Sources https www forbes com sites jonmarkman 2020 10 26 zoom enters perilous new growth phase sh 36022c75e1e0 https en wikipedia org wiki Zoom_Video_Communications https www theaugust com featured zoom sucess story eric yuan immigrantbillionaire THE PANDEMIC HAS A HUGE IMPACT ON THE WORLD ECONOMY The IMF estimated that the global economy shrunk by 4 4 in 2020 10 This makes the great lockdown the worst recession since the great depression of 1930 and far worse than the global financial crisis of 2009 The Covid 19 pandemic caused a crisis like no other with a significant impact on people s lives livelihoods and the economic perspective for companies and organisations The pandemic created a clear distinction between economic winners and losers as you can see here 11 We will pick out a few sectors to give you some examples The housing market was hot in 2020 as people were looking for larger spaces for at home work and schooling As we all were at home the video game industry boomed too because it allowed players to pass the time alone while still interacting with their friends Gaming consoles were sold out and gaming platforms like Facebook Gaming and Twitch experienced record growth Amazon and other online retailers worldwide were among the biggest winners because people got very cautious about leaving their homes The big technology companies are also amongst the winners like Apple Alphabet Amazon Microsoft Netflix and Zoom since staying at home caused us to connect 100 online We all needed hardware as digital services Online creators benefitted too as views on digital platforms like YouTube accelerated as we stayed home watching videos on meditation cooking and working out There are a lot of losers too unfortunately Going on vacation wasn t an option anymore during the pandemic making the travel and hospitality market collapse When video conference calls are working just fine for so many of us in business the question is if business travel will ever recover Shopping malls and non food retailers also got in big trouble many had 15 ONLINE INNOVATION IS MORE RELEVANT THAN EVER

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Winners and Losers of the Covid 19 pandemic Winners Losers Housing Cannabis Solar Bitcoin Videogames Big Retail Big Tech Creators Streaming Travel and hospitality Oil Banks Airlines Malls Automakers Manufacturing Movie Theatres RESILIENCE AND INNOVATION ARE MORE RELEVANT THAN EVER NOW to close as people turned massively to online shopping Aircraft manufacturers like Boeing and Airbus were hit by the downturn in air travel as their customers delayed or cancelled aircraft purchases Airports had a dramatic year because global air passenger traffic dropped by 60 in 2020 12 And UNESCO reports that In the film industry it is estimated that ten million jobs will be lost in 2020 while one third of art galleries are estimated to have reduced their staff by half during the crisis A six month closure could cost the music industry more than 10 billion in lost sponsorships while the global publishing market is expected to shrink by 7 5 due to the crisis caused by the pandemic 13 Both from a personal and a business perspective the world was turned upside down during the pandemic After the initial crisis management the question became how people organisations and companies might create a great future again Resilience is the ability to recover quickly from difficulties That s the mantra today for many organisations and companies be resilient to play to win again They will need to rethink and innovate with great scrutiny in order to create a successful future because doing more of the same with fewer people often is not an option Operational excellence doing better things or doing the same things in a better way won t help businesses like airports hotels theatres cruise companies or high street retailers will it In this worldwide digitalisation boom innovation is now more relevant than ever for all organisations Do you have to re invent your business too Before moving on let s clarify what we mean by innovation since the term has been defined in so many ways over the past several decades In our view An innovation is a feasible valuable offering such as a product service process or experience with a viable business model that is perceived as new and is adopted by customers Let me exemplify the keywords in this definition Feasible Feasibility is a precondition for a new product service process or experience to be launched If it s not feasible it s just a dream Although dreams are a great source of inspiration they will not provide continuity to your organisation Valuable Your customers have to change their present behaviour They will only adopt your innovation when it brings value to them Most often it s a solution for a customer pain point In other cases your innovation might even be 16 ONLINE INNOVATION Source https edition cnn com 2020 12 30 business winnerslosers 2020 business index html fulfilling a long cherished wish It has to be relevant to them The other perspective here is that your innovation should have value for your organisation It might be financial like generating additional revenues and EBITDA earnings before interest and taxes It might also be strategical by being a way to step into a new market or target a new customer group Innovation has to add significant value for you and your customers otherwise it s not worth the effort right Adopted Innovation is only successful when adopted by customers users clients or whatever you may call them Adoption distinguishes the tops from the flops and is one of the biggest challenges for every innovator So add clear value so it will be adopted Offering We like to see innovation in broader terms than mere product innovation That s why we use the word offering which was coined by Larry Keeley in his book Ten Types of Innovation An offering can be any form of a product service process or experience As early as 1934 the famous economist Schumpeter proposed a broad definition of innovation as he distinguished among new products new methods of production new markets new supply sources and new ways of organizing enterprises 14 Viable Business Model Every organisation needs to secure its future especially now That s why innovation should provide a viable business model which contributes to the goals of the organisation This applies to companies non profit organisations and even governmental organisations Perceived as new Innovation comes from the Latin word innovat which means to renew or alter The combination of in and novare suggests to come up with something entirely new 15 The question is new for whom New for you New for your company New for your market New for the world These days everybody tends to label everything as NEW In our view it s only new when the customer perceives a product service process or experience as new Not innovating is no longer an option for an organisation that wants to be in good shape after the Covid 19 pandemic In practice we see organisations approach innovation in two different ways those who want to innovate and those who need to innovate We call those who want to innovate the active innovators and the ones who need to innovate the passive innovators As you can see in the chart their roles are defined by the moments they innovate their business Every company business unit or product has its lifecycle of introduction growth maturity and decline Active innovators who want to innovate give innovation priority at the end of the growth stage Before they reach maturity they want to innovate often for several reasons simultaneously To keep their revenue stream growing To maintain an innovative mindset To boost internal entrepreneurship intrapreneurship To address changing needs and wants of customers To lead in technology To expand their business by new business models distribution channels and customer groups To stay an attractive employer on the market for talent To anticipate new governmental regulations or market liberalization 17 PICKING THE RIGHT MOMENT TO INNOVATE NOW ONLINE INNOVATION IS MORE RELEVANT THAN 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CHART TWO INNOVATION SWEET SPOTS Revenues INTRODUCTION at the company business unit or product level TWO INNOVATION SWEET SPOTS GROWTH MATURITY ACTIVE INNOVATORS REACTIVE INNOVATORS MOMENT YOU MOMENT YOU WANT NEED TO INNOVATE TO INNOVATE TIME 18 DECLINE ONLINE INNOVATION Reactive innovators on the contrary wait They wait until they get hit by a crisis their markets saturate or get disrupted by new technologies and or business models The Covid 19 pandemic crisis hit all of us overnight It required an immediate response to save companies from going under They reorganized their work went digital and laid off people in the short term Reactive innovators need to prioritise innovation to stop revenues and profits from falling and to build a new future for their organisation INNOVATING 100 ONLINE INSTEAD OF OFFLINE Both types of innovators have their challenges The good news for active innovators is that there are plenty of resources available when the company is doing well Their challenge is to cope with a lack of urgency at the operational level of the organisation Why should we innovate We re damn busy and doing great We guess that most of the winners in the pandemic crisis belong to this category The primary goal of ZOOM was to handle their growth though of course being in tech they cannot neglect to stay innovative at all times The good news for the reactive innovators is that there is currently a great urgency at the operational level of the organisation to solve problems because there have often been collective layoffs due to the business slow down or even business stop Their challenge is compounded by both a lack of resources and a lack of time since they will have to move quickly with significant impact Are you an active innovator or a reactive one And what about your organisation The central question is not if you should innovate It s HOW you can start and lead innovation the best way That s why we have written this book because the Covid 19 pandemic has also drastically changed the way we can innovate and has created new digital opportunities which we will explore with you One day in March 2020 overnight all our offline workshops helping organisations innovate their portfolios were cancelled and postponed until further notice For us doing nothing was also not an option We as innovators had to innovate too And that s precisely what we did We are all facilitators of the FORTH innovation methodology a framework that has been used worldwide to jumpstart innovation for nearly two decades www forth innovation com FORTH is a scientifically proven method to ideate new products services processes experiences and business models It combines business thinking and design thinking Based on a structured roadmap appealing new concepts are developed worked out in business cases and ultimately accepted by all involved in five steps An in person FORTH innovation journey contains 15 workshops with a multidisciplinary team of 10 to 15 people in 15 weeks We digitalised our innovation methodology in April and May 2020 experimenting ourselves with different online communication practices and collaboration platforms in collaboration with 25 innovation facilitators from all over the world And we made all the beginner s mistakes ourselves which we describe in the next chapter We had a steep learning curve even though as it is for so many experts we had a considerable knowledge base We still remember so well how when we were all online for our brainstorming session ready to share all our out side the box ideas with 20 or more people suddenly Mural stopped functioning correctly which was the unexpected end of our session at what should have been the most creative moment of our online journey It was all learning by doing Since then we experimented 100 online with a lot of innovation methods techniques and tools and our major discovery is that online innovation works a little 19 ONLINE INNOVATION IS MORE RELEVANT THAN EVER

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differently than offline innovation The devil is in the details as they say Based on our practical experience we guide you on your online innovation journey in this book We share practical information on the best online innovation tools in chapter 3 10 online innovation techniques in chapter 4 10 rules for innovation in chapter 6 and 10 online innovation methods in chapters 7 10 In chapter 5 will present the Achilles heel of working online and share tips on how to compensate for this In chapter 11 we share with you our vision on hybrid innovation and discuss the best of both worlds In the two appendices at the end you will find overviews of 25 online tools for innovation and 10 innovation methods summarised in two pages each Before we go into the details let s define online innovation first and discuss why we should consider starting innovation online anyway SEVEN ARGUMENTS TO START INNOVATING ONLINE Online innovation is an innovation process that is facilitated 100 online It has become relevant for when you have to work remotely as during Covid 19 restrictions To facilitate workshops 100 online to innovate is the only option Organising offline workshops during a pandemic runs the risk of being postponed and postponed An online innovation process during which everybody works from home or frankly anywhere is not vulnerable to these risks and is a certain to proceed toward the progress you need for your organisation or your client 20 Besides this obvious reason we experienced in our online work at least seven other arguments for why you should consider starting to use online methods techniques and tools to innovate 1 EASY TO APPLY When you work together with others from all over the country continent or even across the world innovating 100 online is an easy way to create together 2 SAVING TIME AND MONEY Working online saves everyone both travel time and costs as people can stay home or anywhere else with a good internet connection 3 ALWAYS OPEN 24 7 Online innovation gives you the advantage of working asynchronously which means that everyone can work online at their preferred moment as the online workshop collaboration boards are open 24 7 4 EVERYONE GETS A FAIR CHANCE When you innovate online in a structured way with for example the together alone technique or silent voting procedures introverts have an equal chance to co create valuable content both with influencing opinions and decisions as do extroverts 5 EASY TO SHARE Sharing inspiration and information in digital formats like videos jpegs or documents during innovation projects is very easy on online whiteboard collaboration platforms like Miro Mural or Trello 6 ONLINE INNOVATION 21 7 YOU BENEFIT AS AN EMPLOYER The freedom offered to employees to work wherever they want with flexible hours is an excellent motivation for people who can t stand regular office life A new generation is growing up as digital nomads IT WORKS Argument one through six would be worthless if innovating online wasn t effective But it is our practice delineates this We put the proven offline FORTH innovation method online After some initial growing pains it proved to be as effective as offline workshops in most aspects which we will cover later Ultimately the mindset of people and the organisation about working online changed and the tools to work remote got better And now you too can innovate online very effectively So innovate online and take advantage of these seven benefits In the next chapter we will start with ten common mistakes when starting innovation online which we also made ourselves Let s innovate 100 ONLINE 1 https www vox com recode 2019 10 9 20885699 remote work fromanywhere change coworking office real estate 2 https buffer com state of remote work 2019 3 https www flexjobs com blog post survey productivity balance improveduring pandemic remote work 4 https remoters net remote work trends future insights 5 https www inc com scott mautz a 2 year stanford study shows astonishing productivity boostof working from home html 6 https www forth innovation com 7 https www pwc com gx en ceo agenda ceo panel survey emergestronger pdf 8 https www pwc com gx en ceo agenda ceo panel survey emergestronger pdf 9 https www hrdive com news gartner over 80 of company leaders planto permit remote work after pande 581744 10 https www businesstoday in current world covid 19 pandemichamstrung global economy in 2020 imf estimates 44 contraction story 426598 html 11 https edition cnn com 2020 12 30 business winners losers 2020 business index html 12 https www aviation24 be airlines global air passenger traffic to drop by60 to 1 8 billion in 2020 13 https en unesco org news covid 19 hits culture sector even harderexpected warns unesco 14 Dave Richards The Sevens Sins of Innovation Palgrave Macmillan London 2014 p 14 15 Max McKeown The Innovation Book Pearson Harlow United Kingdom 2014 p xxix KEY MESSAGES FROM THIS CHAPTER Sparked by the pandemic a shift from offline to online happened worldwide The mindset of people and organisation on working online changed Online tools for collaboration and communication improved user experience Resilience and innovation are more relevant than ever now Online innovation has different dynamics to offline Innovating online gives you seven advantages ONLINE INNOVATION IS MORE RELEVANT THAN EVER

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Running an online workshop or project can be challenging A useful workshop is highly collaborative with well thought out processes and a set of tools that aid this process Online workshops require various techniques to help the transfer of in person sessions to the online world But moving your sessions online can come with pitfalls which unless mitigated will ruin your session and hinder the development of an organisation s innovation culture As this book discusses we have to ensure that we are prepared for such pitfalls and do not become ensnared in those that have ruined many a good innovation project Here we ll explore the challenges of running online workshops that you should consider when planning and delivering your online innovation sessions The pitfalls cover many facets of online work from ensuring the innovation team participants know how to use the workshop tools managing the technical considerations and managing the rules of engagement within the online session These points have been taken from our own experience of running hundreds of workshops with clients online We aim to make these short points actionable to develop an online innovation culture in your organisation We will start with the most critical consideration of having a bad internet connection Without an internet connection your workshop will not launch and the rest of the points are useless PITFALL 1 BAD INTERNET LIMITS PARTICIPATION 24 ONLINE INNOVATION We all know the importance of a good and reliable internet connection It plays a vital role in all our activities in online workshops Every electronic device uses an internet connection from computers to mobile phones As long as the internet connection is reliable so may we be However a bad internet connection can affect your productivity and cause you to experience many unwanted problems A regular and constant high speed internet connection is required if you want to run and attend online workshops comfortably There are two types of connections that you can choose Wired and Wireless Although both of them guarantee an uninterrupted and speedy transfer of data I would recommend using a wired connection wherever possible For example a wireless connection can be thought of like radio waves which drop up and down between devices These drop off points can cause your connection to drop out leading to problems using Zoom and Miro tools Therefore always try to physically connect your PC Mac to the router to help with your connection This leads us to bandwidth Low bandwidth means slow and unpredictable uploads and downloads that might bring a delay in the video or audio stream An adequate bandwidth means uninterrupted service and allows the user to connect to multiple participants simultaneously There are many ways to reduce the bandwidth constraints during your session First stop the camera feed when you are not speaking or engaging in the session Video is a significant draw on your connection s bandwidth resources and although not ideal we should stop the video connection Second when you aren t talking mute your audio connection audio also uses valuable resources that may hinder your workshop If you find that your connection falters a simple trick is to switch off the audio and use a dial in connection such as a conference call to communicate via telephone Although this could be classed as not ideal it is a vital backup device to use should low bandwidth affect your connection And third close all applications when running your session Other applications use memory and processing power which affects how your system engages with your workshop tools Always only have open the tools required for your workshop to allow a more reliable experience for all We experienced these bandwidth problems first hand when we ran workshops at the start of the Covid 19 pandemic They created problems with the workshop s in person experience We had to reschedule an extra workshop session which complicated the project timelines and led to many headaches Therefore we recommend that you always be prepared to adjust how you run sessions and the tools you use to mitigate the use of poor internet connections This leads us to the next pitfall for a facilitator relying 100 on tools that may not work all the time We have all been there you start a workshop and something happens to your video conferencing tool or your digital whiteboard stops working So what do you do if this happens Most facilitators understand the importance of having a backup plan when online tools fail But what few people realise is that if you are not prepared to use another solution your customers will have no choice but to go elsewhere for their needs Many people make the mistake of assuming they can workaround problems that arise by preparation The truth is if you rely 100 on a single set of tools you will find one day that your preparation is not sufficient and your customers have other options to meet their aims However if you had taken the time to prepare and learn additional tools then you can turn the situation around and ensure that the online workshop runs seamlessly When you fail to have a backup plan in place you are putting your session and innovation project at risk No matter how big or small the problem is if you do not take the time to back up and prepare for the failures that can arise you are setting yourself up for failure Some examples of good practices are Video conferencing Although we have named Zoom as our preferred choice you as a good facilitator should be aware of other solutions to meet your workshop needs Google Meet allows innovation project team members and customers to chat over video and text As it is integrated into Google this becomes a seamless task and can be used across different platforms Other platforms that you might consider are Butter through which you can apply techniques outlined in this book to engage facilitate and chat with your workshop participants Digital whiteboards Our two preferred choices for digital whiteboards are Miro and Mural Both have some great features and should be 25 TEN COMMON PITFALLS WHEN STARTING INNOVATION ONLINE PITFALL 2 RELYING 100 ON TOOLS THAT MAY NOT WORK ALL THE TIME

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Finally remember that in an in person meeting you can read body language so ensure that when you are facilitating a session you review each participant s cameras to ensure that they understand the process and do not need any help You should also explain the exercises using precise language to mitigate the lack of body language and build a common understanding Several practitioners have attempted to move in person workshops to the online format in a cookie cutter approach This includes aspects such as the length of the sessions and an assumption that all participants are comfortable in their new environment and ask questions if they are stuck during the process First we recommend that we should keep online sessions to below three or four hours per session Sitting in front of a screen is exhausting and it can be tough to stay focused for anything longer than this These sessions should include breaks and areas for conversations that are not part of the formal process Another pro tip is to use the natural breakpoints in your workshop to split the sessions up and continue either later in the day or carry these over to another session When working in an in person workshop there are opportunities throughout the day to chat and to connect with your fellow participants The informal conversations help build rapport and help generate a more inclusive environment making people more engaged and comfortable at voicing their opinions during the workshop But a common mistake we have seen assumes that this will happen in an online session which is a significant pitfall to overcome As facilitators we need to create these moments proactively to promote sharing ideas with strangers in the session So before we start the formal workshop it s essential to get everyone comfortable and start working as a team One way to do this is to create a virtual watercooler where the participants can hang out and get to know each other and connect outside the session These online watercoolers help the team to get comfortable communicating across digital channels when they haven t met before It also allows team members to understand each other s expertise and fit into the workshop s upcoming process Holding these sessions before a workshop can help you as the facilitator to identify different communication styles and conflicts which can be mitigated before the session to allow for a more productive session A virtual watercooler can be a specific place like Slack Wonder or even a break out room in Zoom We have successfully run a weekly virtual coffee shop format in previous innovation projects promoting this practice As long as it connects your team and familiarises them with one another before meetings happen it will help lay the foundation for successful online sessions 26 ONLINE INNOVATION 27 utilised when running an online session One pro tip is to ensure that you have digital whiteboards set up in both platforms to allow you to switch between them seamlessly should a problem arise As we will discuss in the tools section each has positives and negatives and which platform you choose should match the client s objectives and requirements for the workshop As Benjamin Franklin said failure to prepare is preparing to fail 2 so ensure that you are skilled across the different platforms required when running online workshops A workshop must aid the creative process by equipping the participants with the tools that meet the requirements These include requirements such as effective communication ways to display ideas and ways to visualise insights So as we have discussed ensure that you can cover these areas using a multi tool approach to get your workshops off to the best start and prepare for the worst that can happen in your sessions PITFALL 3 TRYING TO COPY IN PERSON TO ONLINE PITFALL 4 PARTICIPANTS DON T KNOW HOW TO USE THE TOOLS An important element of ensuring a productive online workshop is that participants understand how to use the tools and understand what the process will look like once the session starts We always suggest that this should be part of the onboarding session with the participants to ensure that they have both the technical capacity to use the tools and that the tools are set up correctly As a facilitator you do not want to find out on the first morning of the workshop that the participants are unsure of how to use a certain tool or were not expecting elements within the process 1 We always give the participants a tour of the digital whiteboards and use the video conferencing software that we will use in our sessions to allow them to get used to basic functions such as using break out rooms muting and unmuting and sharing their screen etc When giving the participants a whiteboard tour let them play around on it by asking them to complete a small exercise you ve designed This could be something simple filling in post it notes of their details enumerating their aims of the workshop or finding an image that reflects how they are feeling Getting them to use the whiteboard is much better than you as a facilitator giving a presentation because they will learn more quickly by actually being active The most important aspect is that they learn how to navigate the workspace so keep what you show them to a minimum and be sure not to confuse them with advanced options 1 You need to ask the participants to check that their communication tools are set up correctly and if their webcams and microphones are working properly This can unearth issues such as user privileges stopping them from accessing these functions If this is the case they should consult with their IT team in advance of the workshop and as a facilitator you should follow up to ensure the problem has been resolved An important thing to remember is that it s likely that the team may not have participated in an online innovation session before Therefore it is good practice before you facilitate the workshop to run them through the innovation process and tools you will be using in each element This will allow them to become more familiar with the tools the process and how they fit together You want to portray that that workshop is not an online meeting but that it will be fun collaborative and challenging for all involved Stating this can sometimes change the participants mindset before the session because they understand what to expect and that they need to be ready to contribute If you ensure that you onboard the participants in this manner you will find that the workshop is a lot smoother exercises will be faster and you can keep the sessions shorter TEN COMMON PITFALLS WHEN STARTING INNOVATION ONLINE

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PITFALL 5 YOU DON T HAVE THE RIGHT SETUP Numerous tools can be used to run an online workshop The digital space can be confusing to participants so you will need to ensure participants are prepared as discussed above If you are running the session I would strongly suggest that you invest in two screens because this helps to ensure that you can see the digital boards and all the participants We use one screen for the board and the other for the participants This allows you to read the room better check if someone looks confused or distracted or is having technical problems We would also suggest getting a timer since you will need this to keep the time of the exercises in the workshop to ensure you can fit everything planned As we suggest in this book you can use specific tools for different types of actions that you wish to apply When running an innovation project we would suggest the following tools 1 Digital whiteboard The whiteboard will become the session s focal point so we need to ensure we take the time to prepare this for the workshop You can create ad hoc beautiful templates but if you are new to running a workshop you should use one of the templates we discuss in this book If you do create your own board we recommend that you create a separate frame for each exercise and for each part of the workshop to aid the participants visual appearance and understanding Not only does this allow you to structure your workshop clearly but it also allows the participants to feel a sense of accomplishment as they move through the frames 28 Digital whiteboards like Miro include several important features that you will likely find useful in your workshops when brainstorming ideas for example voting for preferred options and grouping post it notes to see patterns They are the workshop s heart and soul so you want to spend time ensuring your board is right for your workshop Video conferencing If you are running the sessions you want to see all the session participants allow you quickly to recognise any issues that might interfere in the session As discussed we would use one screen for this feature and another for the whiteboard Zoom is a great choice of video conferencing software and is freely available although it s important to state that for running workshops you would need to upgrade your licence to premium due to the 40 minute limit per session You can use other tools such as Google Meet which is free although they do not have certain facilities such as break out rooms that can help your sessions Overall investing in these tools will be beneficial to you and your sessions and we strongly advise that this is something that you pursue ONLINE INNOVATION PITFALL 6 NO CLEAR RULES OF ENGAGEMENT Sparked by the Covid 19 pandemic organisations face growing pressure to maximise productivity by using online workshops to develop innovation Many companies are experimenting with various online workshops which are becoming standard Yet many companies are practising online workshops without applying the correct engagement rules or applying the etiquette required to manage a successful innovation workshop The etiquette factors can be viewed from two different angles First as a facilitator you should always ensure that you have a set agenda for the workshop and that the participants have been fully prepared for the session This will stop questions at the start of the session leading to delays that will affect the timing of your workshop The facilitator should also state what is expected of each person in the session This is important because it will set the tone for the workshop and everyone will understand how to complete certain tasks An example of this would be arriving on time for the meeting and committing to the session This means that participants do not multi task or drop the session for another meeting Multi tasking is a big problem with online workshops because everyone is remote and can view other screens on their PC with a click of a mouse A pro tip is that if you see the screen flicker on the participant s screen they will be multitasking and it s advisable to bring them back into the session by asking how they are getting on An online meeting should follow the same engagement and etiquette as an in person session In an in person session you wouldn t be answering emails replying to calls or checking 29 the internet so ensure that the participants adhere to the rules All cameras should be on unless there are issues with the internet in which case it is then fine to switch off to reduce the bandwidth and all microphones should be on mute until they wish to speak This will stop unwanted background noise from polluting the workshop environment There are no official rules for online meeting etiquette just a set of general guidelines If someone is non professional the facilitator should pick up on this and address it one to one If you find that the lack of etiquette doesn t improve you may need to speak to the project leader or sponsor to address it and remove the person from the session The last thing to mention in online meeting etiquette is courtesy You must maintain a good attitude during business meetings no matter who is involved You want to be polite and friendly but you also need to be professional By holding workshops using this online etiquette guide you can have a successful meeting and stay out of trouble PITFALL 7 BEING UNAWARE OF THE TOOLS AVAILABLE The importance of being aware of the tools available for online innovation workshops is one of the most important things you can do to help stay ahead of the curve bring new ideas and make the sessions more enjoyable You may know lots of different methods and techniques for in person workshops but how do you find the best tools for your needs in the future Well you have made a great start buying this book As you explore the chapters you will be introduced to these tools and what they can be used for You have probably read many books or articles on online innovation and become TEN COMMON PITFALLS WHEN STARTING INNOVATION ONLINE

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familiar with some of the well known tools such as Zoom Miro and others so why should you know more So why should we be aware of the available tools If you are reading this book we would suggest you are an innovator and this goes to the heart of why you should look into other tools Innovation involves continually looking at your toolkit processes and procedures to see what improvements can be made to keep you your organisation and your clients ahead of the game Innovative businesses often have strong management and well trained and motivated employees These businesses maintain a culture of innovation continually looking at every aspect of the practice not just its products and services and asking the question How can it be done better Innovation can come in the form of small changes to your existing workshops or form a completely new type of workshop such as moving in person to online The innovation idea may come from internal sources such as a product development team or be inspired by external forces such as customer requests or developments in related technologies P Some tips for becoming aware of the available tools Become an investigator First you should always try to find out as much as possible about any tool you are considering Write down your main activities in the workshop and rate the tools on a scale of one to ten If you find that you rank tools below five try to understand why this is and write it down This reflective activity is one of the best practices that you should not overlook and is the core of becoming 30 a master of online innovation workshops Once you understand why they may not be working for you it will make sourcing the new tools much easier and targeted for your needs This approach is similar to that of any good researcher you need to understand why you want to change the tool or try another tool before you can test what you have before you You can then enter the keywords of what you are trying to achieve into a search engine of your choice and the relevant options will be displayed at the top Use the information available Appendix 1 presents you a list of the top 25 online innovation tools for you to review try and identify what is new and improved in the market Information is very cheap now more and more sources publish their content online free of charge to allow you to make a more educated guess of what you require Use channels such as Youtube which is now the world s second largest search engine to watch introductions how tos and other types of product videos which will help you visually test the tool to make a more educated choice Use social media and peers The third aspect of becoming aware of the tools is to engage with your peers via social media All the main tools are presented on social channels and promote product updates and free webinars Another aspect of social media that is important is to find peers in the innovation space that may have used the tools you are looking to use You can easily find these people by asking a question online to start a conversation This example of social proof is important to allow you to feel confident in your choice of tool ONLINE INNOVATION Test the tools since most tools offer a free option or trial just download them and try them out In our online innovation journey we tried hundreds of tools to get this list down to the 25 that you will find in Appendix 1 So go out and play with them discuss them with your peers and run informal sessions on them to see if they meet your needs You wouldn t buy a car without test driving it and the same should be said for any online tool Just because one person says it is great doesn t mean it suits you so test it Holding online workshops in different cultures is a challenge to many innovators and facilitators The simple reason for this is that many practices and traditions vary across cultures For instance some people from one country may not want to show their face on the camera due to religious beliefs Thus it can be challenging to hold online workshops with people whose practices and traditions do not match and we must plan for this Holding online workshops in different cultures can be challenging but it can also be made much easier through careful planning and research First of all you need to identify the main differences between the cultures you are trying to accommodate For instance you need to determine if the workshop participants are reserved or outspoken emotional or measured There is an excellent book on this topic by Erin Meyer a professor at INSEAD and The Culture Maps author 4 She presents the differences clearly of what to be aware of when any facilitator or innovator works worldwide Also think about the environment where the workshop takes place Determine if the participants are at their best meeting virtually within their office or at home Again this can affect how they communicate in the session due to pressures to conform Once you have determined these differences create protocols and establish norms so that your colleagues understand how the workshop will run to stop any unwelcomed surprises during the sessions When there are several different cultures represented in the workshop environment and when you know the differences between these cultures you also need to determine how these cultures can add to your workshop by bringing new viewpoints and perspectives that will aid the creative process The next thing you will want to consider is how formal or informal each person s business culture is For instance businesses with a very traditional culture tend to be more formal when it comes to business meetings and workshops 31 TEN COMMON PITFALLS WHEN STARTING INNOVATION ONLINE Finally being patient is essential and one of the best practices for learning and understanding new tools online Treat learning each tool like a challenge That way you ll have a greater chance of remembering essential concepts which will help you retain the critical aspects better in the long run Following these tips is an excellent way to make sure you get the most out of any online tool and they will allow you to become aware of the different tools available Using these best practices as a reference you can avoid getting frustrated with learning online tools This will help you run a better online workshop become a better facilitator and deliver better results for your business or yourself PITFALL 8 NO UNDERSTANDING OF CULTURAL DIFFERENCES

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Simultaneously companies with a more informal culture are much less formal so be aware of this A word of caution don t force the dynamic of the online workshop when working across cultures For example it can be disrespectful to challenge a publicly more senior manager or person in Japanese culture In contrast in particular Latin cultures they tend to be much more forthcoming in feedback and public signs of disagreement When you onboard participants into the workshop try to understand these cultural elements and encourage people to provide feedback in different ways Another example of the cultural differences is obviated by the hand gestures 3 used during workshops There are tools such as Zoom that allow participants to state they wish to speak and encourage this although this may not always be used For example raising your hand to talk in western cultures is accepted whereas in certain middle eastern countries this is disrespectful The last consideration to make is the level of trust that each party needs to work with others Different cultures expect different levels of trust but some participants will try to put everyone on the same level This is good because everyone has similar goals and visions and you can all work together towards achieving those goals However this doesn t always work out the way people would want to Therefore it takes time to build trust by not overlooking the importance of team bonding which encourages colleagues to get to know each other outside the workshop so that cultural differences won t obscure collaboration PITFALL 9 NO CLEAR GOAL OR AGENDA FOR THE SESSION 32 ONLINE INNOVATION Having no clear goal of the workshop is a significant pitfall for both in person and online workshops Don t be distracted by the word goal By the time you finish this section you will have learned how important it is to have a clearly defined goal for your online workshop You may also know how important it is to stay focused on that goal and stay committed to the process so that you will end up somewhere So let s get started The first thing you want to do when setting up your online workshop is writing down your goals your plans and the steps you want to take to reach those goals This will help you set up your workshop with an objective in mind If you don t know what those specific project goals are start discussing this with the project sponsor or decision maker and don t run the online workshop until this has been decided Once you understand the innovation project goals make sure to include a clear and concise description of what you want to accomplish for your online workshop Also make sure it is your goal to focus on what others need to achieve in the session Setting up an online workshop is about starting with a clear goal in mind It is about making a step by step action plan to get to where you want to go Without a clearly defined goal statement you might end up anywhere If you don t know where you are going any road will get you there Lewis Carroll Alice in Wonderland 5 P P P P That s why it s essential to have a clearly defined goal statement for your workshop So before you begin your workshop read your goal statement to everyone involved If you already have goals for your online workshop you must set the details The first step is to sit down and write out your goals Be clear about what you hope to achieve Include your estimated time to reach each goal and what you wish to accomplish at the end of the workshop Having your written goals helps you focus during the workshop for yourself and all participants involved You will be amazed at how much clarity you will experience when you follow through with your workshop s written goals Once you have your goals set an action plan to meet them As you work towards meeting your workshop goals you will end up where you want to be and have a much more productive session that benefits the project and the participants involved Last ensure that you have a detailed agenda of the online session Some tools such as SessionLab see Appendix 1 will help you structure your thoughts and timing Ensure that your agenda covers what s going to happen the learning outcomes you are trying to reach their timing and how to connect to the online workshop to ensure that everyone s time is used the most productively Like any aspect of an online or in person workshop it s important to plan to build confidence in the process enabling better buy in for all involved during the process PITFALL 10 THE WRONG PEOPLE IN THE INNOVATION TEAM OR WORKSHOP 33 TEN COMMON PITFALLS WHEN STARTING INNOVATION ONLINE The best way to ensure that an innovative activity occurs is by inviting the right people into the workshop It is essential to ask the right questions and have the right tools and methodologies to work with individuals to help them implement ideas properly An online innovation workshop should be set up with a few specific goals to take action than to make improvements To set actionable goals it is important to consider the skills of each of the individuals invited and their areas of expertise Who is invited to the workshop can depend on the type of innovation project or workshop you are running but this will help you understand various areas to look out for When you are leading a workshop as an external facilitator it is essential to know the organisation The more information generated about the organisation the more useful the information you can use in the workshop and overall project Once you know about the organisation it is essential to know what type of innovators they are While some workshop members may be promising innovators in one particular field it does not mean that the entire group can be innovative An excellent way to find out this type of information is to ask the decision maker or project sponsor or to meet various team members outside of the office For example someone who has a lot of technical experience and who is an excellent problem solver might make a good team member as long as everyone else in the team also has a good spread of knowledge and skills to contribute to the workshop

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You should invite other groups of participants from research and development those who work in sales and marketing and those who work in operations Of course all of these groups have different needs for the information that they present It is essential to know who to invite to an innovation workshop based on these preferences Once you have identified the participants you should ask to speak to them one on one to get to know them and brief them about the online workshops aims and the process that will be followed If all goes well you will find that your workshop has a diverse group with a set of skills and knowledge that can contribute to the overall process and meet the organisation s objectives Other people to consider inviting are Someone who can see opportunities Being able to remove the blinders and see beyond the obvious is vital So make sure that you consider this when building your team Someone who can draw Innovation workshops include elements of a visual process This is the same online as offline and although not essential it s good to have someone who can draw diagrams and concepts This will help to communicate ideas concepts and prototypes as you go through the process of innovation Someone who challenges the status quo As co author Gijs Van Wulfen states it is always good to invite the naysayers to the online workshops Challenging the status quo is at the core of innovation bringing someone into the session who will ask those awkward questions can promote much more enriching conversations Someone who is outside the organisation Getting an outside perspective can help the company An outsider will see the situation from a different perspective be honest and challenge conventional thinking Look at your strategic partners to find the right person and make sure you don t get someone who will agree with you to keep a good business relationship It is very valuable to have partners who will be honest with you even if what they have to say is not what you want to hear Of course many factors go into an innovation team and can depend on the methodology used But by following the points made in this chapter you will be in a much better position to start innovating online in the right direction 34 ONLINE INNOVATION 1 AJ Smart 2020 The Ultimate Guide to Remote Design Sprints Retriever from https ajsmart com remotedesignsprints 2 https www businessinsider com 7 must read life lessons from benjaminfranklin 2011 3 Bright Side 2020 15 Hand Gestures That Have Different Meanings Overseas Retriever from https brightside me wonder places 15 hand gestures thathave different meanings overseas 769110 4 https erinmeyer com books the culture map 5 https www goodreads com quotes 642816 if you don t know where youare going any road KEY MESSAGES FROM THIS CHAPTER Pitfall 1 Bad Internet which limits the participants from taking part Pitfall 2 Relying 100 on tools that may not work all the time Pitfall 3 Trying to copy in person methods Online Pitfall 4 Participants don t know how to use the tools Pitfall 5 You don t have the right setup Pitfall 6 No clear rules of engagement In the next chapter we will introduce you to the best online innovation tools online collaboration platforms video conferencing tools tools for preparation and instruction tools for prototyping and testing and tools to make online workshops interactive Pitfall 7 Being unaware of the tools available Pitfall 8 No understanding of cultural differences Pitfall 9 No clear goal or agenda for the session Pitfall 10 The wrong people in the innovation team or workshop 35 TEN COMMON PITFALLS WHEN STARTING INNOVATION ONLINE

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Innovation is not just about having a clear process it is just as much about sharing ideas sparking new ways of thinking and interacting with each other Most of us are familiar with in person workshops where if they are facilitated well most of these elements are present This is different when collaborating online to get the best results from a team and keep everyone engaged Therefore it is essential to use a well thought selection of online tools Besides a videoconferencing tool you will also need for example tools for online collaboration and making your workshop interactive For online innovation there are many great tools for different activities like online collaboration video conferencing prototyping planning and creating workshops brainstorming communication and much more In Appendix 1 you will find an overview of 25 tools each with a brief description of what the tool is why to use it to which innovation methods and techniques described in this book the tool fits the killer feature when to avoid it and more For this chapter we have selected ten of our favourite tools from that list to describe them more extensively for you We have divided the tools into five categories Online collaboration Videoconferencing Preparation and Instruction Prototyping and Testing Making workshops interactive 38 ONLINE INNOVATION CHART 25 ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS Online collaboration Video conferencing Preparation and Instruction Prototyping and Testing Making workshops interactive TSCHECK IN In the chart you see the 25 tools divided into five categories The ten highlighted tools are the ones described in this chapter 39 THE BEST ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS

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So how do you select the tools for your online innovation project We advise you to use a combination of an online whiteboard tool for collaboration and a videoconferencing tool for communication In the videoconferencing tool you explain the process steps and the tools and you create break out rooms to work in smaller teams While in break out rooms participants can collaborate live together on a digital whiteboard This gives them an experience close to being in the same room together Other tools we introduce are for preparation and instruction They are very helpful to make sure your workshops run smoothly Since in innovation you need to prototype and test ideas we have selected some tools for that And last but not least we describe tools to make your workshop interactive and more engaging something to pay attention to when innovating online Five general tips using online tools for innovation Tip 1 Combine a videoconferencing tool and a whiteboard tool We recommend always use a combination of a videoconference tool like Zoom or Butter for communication and a whiteboard tool like Miro or Mural for collaboration We have found this to be a very valuable combination since you then make use of each tool s strength There are videoconferencing tools with whiteboard functions but they are far less useful than those in tools that focus only on that Tip 2 Test the technology Do take into account that using the combination of a videoconference tool and a whiteboard tool may eat up more bandwidth of participants which could 40 cause connection issues Always do a tech onboarding workshop before your actual workshop or meeting This means you ask all participants to join a scheduled workshop before your actual workshop in which you do a test run with the tools you plan to use Any issues that may occur can be tackled or you can change your selection of tools If a participant has bandwidth issues you can ask them to disable video for parts of the workshop for example many instructional videos available either on the website of the tool itself or on Youtube Do check these out to train yourself You can schedule a test workshop with friends or colleagues to try out the tools before your actual workshop Tip 5 Collaborate with a tech savvy person If you feel insecure about using new tools or having a hard time learning them ask a tech savvy co facilitator friend student or colleague to help you out You can request this person to explore the tools you want to use and educate you about the key features You can also invite a tech savvy person to support you as a co facilitator in a workshop This will take the pressure off of yourself so you can focus on the process Tip 3 Check for new features updates and free versions While being aware of the fact that over time new tools will appear and existing ones will develop and will be extended with new or improved features we think it is necessary to give an overview of the tools we use and for what activities and purposes at the time of writing of this book We recommend always checking if the tools have free versions available many do and what the restrictions are Since these may change over time check for the latest options There may be limits in the duration of use in a workshop while you have access to all the features For example with Zoom the limit is 40 minutes In other cases you have access to limited features Tip 4 Master the tools The tools that we have selected are relatively easy to use Of course it will depend on how skilled you are in using digital tools but basically anyone that can use a computer properly should be able to use the tools mentioned in this chapter Do make sure that if you are a first time user of a tool to educate yourself properly before facilitating a workshop There are ONLINE INNOVATION ONLINE COLLABORATION PLATFORMS In in person innovation workshops facilitators use all kinds of tangible materials and tools for collaboration Think of post it notes markers for writing and drawing brown paper to put on the wall on which participants can put their post its and other relevant content postersized templates to be used in the different steps of an innovation process whiteboards digital screens and so on With the progression of a workshop or project the room in which the team works will fill with all kinds of ideas You want to capture all that content so that you can go back to it in the next workshop or when working on a longer project It is not always possible to leave it all in the room since you may have run a workshop in an external rented venue or you have to tidy up the office space or meeting room for the next users You will then probably end up photographing everything that s on the wall rolling up brown papers and flip charts and storing it all somewhere for later use Or you find yourself typing out all the handwritten text to digest the input or to share it with the participants colleagues decisionmakers or your client For online innovation there are some great tools that make your life so much easier Tools like Miro and Mural are cloud based whiteboard tools with many great features that if combined with the right videoconferencing tools facilitate online collaboration very well And all the content is directly available in a digital format and accessible for everyone if they have the rights whenever they require access even outside of workshops 41 THE BEST ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS

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MIRO WWW MIRO COM Miro is a cloud based online infinite whiteboard tool that allows innovation teams to collect all their input digitally You can go from ideation to execution on an infinite canvas It s scalable includes many pre built templates and works crossdevice While working simultaneously everyone can see directly what others are contributing Since innovation is about developing new insights and creating new solutions together Miro is a great tool for collaboration when innovating online With Miro you can do just about anything you would want to do when facilitating an in person workshop All the ideas that you would put on brown paper whiteboards or the wall you can put on this digital whiteboard digital sticky notes images text pdfs of templates you would typically print out can be placed on a digital backdrop But there is more You can upload videos to play within Miro or paste a link to a Youtube video Have a pdf file you want people to see Just upload it and with one click you make all pages in the file visible on the whiteboard And there is more When using sticky notes you can adjust the size the colour and the font Did your board get a bit messy No worries Just select all your post its resize them and when you drag them they will all be nicely aligned in columns and rows Do you want to know 42 how many post its have been written by your team Just select the items on your board filter for post its and voila This saves you a lot of counting To keep your work organised you can use frames By putting all the items you need in a specific step of your process like templates explanatory text images et cetera in one frame these will all stay together For example when you create a frame for each process step all participants can easily find the content they need When you give all your frames the right name in the available frame index you can quickly find the content you are looking for and with one click you will be brought to the specific frame Screenshot from a Miro board Another great feature is the voting option If you are including decision making in your process allowing your team to vote is advisable It is quick democratic and you will instantly have insights into what your team prioritises When you initiate voting participants of the workshop can vote by simply clicking on the post its or other objects of your choice Many more functions make Miro more than a suitable tool to use for online innovation It fits a variety of techniques and ways of working that make online innovation successful We already mentioned the voting option To avoid becoming mired in discussions this is a very useful function Using a tool like Miro is great for combining synchronous and asynchronous work This means you can collaborate online in scheduled workshops but also even when workshops are not being run the whole team has access to the Miro board which allows them to contribute individually whenever it suits them You are not dependent on being in the physical room where all the content is it s all digitally available in the cloud Besides the great features Miro also has a library of templates ready to use for your processes Scroll through the many examples select your favourite and with a click it is on your board Do you want to personalise the template No problem Just change and add as many things as you like To learn more about Miro check out Miroverse accessible from within Miro where you can find proven workflows projects and frameworks within the Miro community The bulk mode is a great feature to allow participants to write ideas without being distracted by what others are writing And the other way around nobody sees what you are writing until you are done This is an excellent fit with the technique of working together alone where you combine individual work with group work Since you can put anything on a Miro board it is excellent to use it for a Lightning Demo a technique described in greater detail in the next chapter But basically in a Lightning Demo participants put inspiration they found by doing desk research examples of innovations from a wide range of industries on the whiteboard as a source for inspiration for an ideation session Do you want to visualise an idea No problem Just draw it on a piece of paper scan it and upload it to Miro ONLINE INNOVATION 43 THE BEST ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS

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MURAL WWW MURAL COM Mural is a cloud based digital collaboration whiteboard where you can go from ideation to execution on a big canvas To help you set up your workshops it includes more than a hundred pre built templates To allow anyone to contribute and collaborate anytime anywhere it works cross device The great thing about a tool like Mural is that it enables teams to work remotely both synchronously and asynchronously So for example if you work for a multinational with offices around the world everyone can contribute during scheduled online workshops as well as in between workshops at any individual s convenience Of course there are many advantages of working with a team in person think of real personal interaction and social talk that helps for team building but working remotely has some great positive aspects too You don t have to arrange a global team to travel to one place pay for expenses like hotels and meals and face challenges like taking people out of their busy day jobs for a couple of days A tool like Mural or Miro is the perfect online spot for innovation processes with all their different stages that need space for insights creativity and focus 44 Mural is a very easy to use tool with a great number of functions for example the digital post its These are as simple to use as real ones Just click on your favourite colour in the menu and off you go Start typing and your contribution appears on the whiteboard right away And you can see live what your team members are writing Since you may end up with a lot of content on your Mural board there are two features that help you find the content you are looking for the find feature by which you can type in a word you know is somewhere on the board and be directed right to it and to organise your content you can create so called outlines These are areas you can select and give a name to that will appear in an index of outlines Just click on the name of the outline and you will be taken to that specific part on the board Do you want to get insights into your participants opinions Just start a voting session with a few clicks This is great for anonymous voting since participants can t see each other s votes until the voting session ends This means they will not be distracted nor will they be biased in their voting Furthermore to empower facilitators Mural offers some so called facilitator superpowers These include a timer to stay on schedule when running timeboxed workshops summoning all participants to the area on the Mural board you want them to look at so you don t need to waste time cat herding And there is the option to designate other people as co facilitators which gives them extra functionalities to host a workshop together with you For speeding up the preparation of a workshop Mural has a library with more than a hundred templates ready to use Choose a template from one of the categories such as design thinking and innovation instruction and facilitation or any other and off you go There is much more to Mural And both Miro and Mural keep adding and improving features and functionality There will always be differences in the tools and you may find one fitting your way of working better than the other Or you might prefer the graphic design of the different elements of one of the tools over the other It is a matter of trying them both out and deciding which you prefer As our German co author Florian Hameister says Mural or Miro is like choosing between a BMW and a Mercedes They are both top car brands it s just a matter of style Page 44 and 45 Screenshots from a Mural board ONLINE INNOVATION 45 THE BEST ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS

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HOW COMMUNICATION TOOL SLACK WAS BORN OUT OF A FAILING VIDEO GAME Innovation is about experimenting and being prepared to pivot When you are doing new things you don t know beforehand where you will end up And by taking action you will gain new insights that will help you decide what your next steps should be On your journey you may encounter not only barriers but also unexpected new opportunities This could mean that it is better to say goodbye to that idea you fell in love with and pivot to an unexpected better opportunity that presents itself Slack founder Stewart Butterfield and his team set out to create something new and original for the massively multiplayer online role playing game MMORPG market As it turns out they revolutionised how we communicate at work instead Slack was born out of a gaming company called Tiny Speck Butterfield and his team didn t intentionally set out to create a SaaS Software as a Service product for the workplace They built a tool for themselves It was created out of necessity and allowed the company to pivot from a confused gaming product to a Popular profitable productivity tool Video game developers might not seem like the most logical group to make a sticky engaging communications tool for today s workplace but Tiny Speck s gaming expertise provided a significant competitive advantage Butterfield and his team already knew how to make repetitive tasks fun and engaging as this is the core of the MMORPG gameplay experience This is a genre of role playing games in which many players interact with each other over the Internet Making work based communication fun and engaging would be the secret sauce that made Slack so wildly successful 46 The development team building their game Glitch consisted of just four people in New York San Francisco and Vancouver To overcome the challenges of communicating across multiple time zones Butterfield and his team used Internet Relay Chat better known as IRC This online chat tool was enormously popular in the late 1980s and early 1990s IRC served Glitch s developers well for a while Before long however Butterfield and his team felt IRC was no longer up to the task They needed something more That s when they decided to start building their own communications tool Butterfield had no plans to develop Tiny Speck s internal chat tool as a commercial product Instead the team kept tweaking and improving its nascent communications tool as they worked on their game New functionality was added on an ad hoc basis Meanwhile Glitch didn t attract enough new players Its design and features could not cope with what players of the MMORPG genre were attracted to Besides that the game was based on Adobe Flash which once was the industry standard but has since fallen out of favour Although Glitch would in the end fail as a game it ended up producing an incredibly valuable application the communication tool that the Tiny Speck team used for their offices Tiny Speck pivoted from Glitch to the development of this cloud based collaborative chat platform designed to make conversations easier between team members which would be named Slack Many start ups focus all their energy on growing as rapidly as possible By contrast Slack focused on growing steadily Each time the company received new feedback on Slack they would address or implement changes based on that feedback but they also invited more large teams to try the product The company practised active listening to continue to address customer needs as they occurred Slack today has many features that the team implemented due to a commitment to reading and analysing end user feedback This iterative approach to development helped Tiny Speck build a reliable product based on how people were actually using it and progressively expand its user base Resources https blog lemonadestand org an in depth history ofslack and its overnight success https usefyi com slack history Slack and its founder have a fascinating history that goes through a lot of twist and turns This communication platform is a must have service for millions of organisations and the company s responsiveness to applying customer feedback to its product development fuels the growth of its avid fanbase Butterfield may not have achieved his dream of creating a successful online game but revolutionising team communications is a great consolation prize SLACK WWW SLACK COM However while Tiny Speck was using Slack internally for several months the team using it still consisted of just a handful of people To keep improving the product Tiny Speck needed more users Butterfield and his team started asking around and calling in favours from friends at other companies They listened to the feedback of the early adopters carefully tweaking and refining the product as they went ONLINE INNOVATION 47 THE BEST ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS

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VIDEOCONFERENCING TOOLS During the Covid 19 pandemic most of us had no choice but to familiarise ourselves with videoconferencing Many meetings and workshops that generally would have taken place in person now had to be done online We simply had no choice The good thing is that there are quite some great tools for videoconferencing In Chapter 1 you read about the rapid growth of Zoom For collaborating online having the ability to use video and see participants in workshops is very important We appreciate that due to circumstances like limited bandwidth or cultural restrictions using video is not always possible But encourage everyone to turn their camera s on if they can It makes collaborating online less impersonal The available tools for videoconferencing have their strengths and differences For online innovation you want to look for those that suit the way you want to deliver your workshops For example it is advisable to split bigger groups into smaller teams for more effective collaboration In face to face workshops you would give each team a separate workspace When collaborating online find a tool with virtual break out rooms that can be managed easily We have picked two tools that we think are easy for you to work with and have the functions needed for online innovation workshops Zoom and Butter 48 ZOOM WWW ZOOM US Zoom is a cloud based videoconferencing tool that allows you to set up virtual video and audio conferencing It has a quite easy to understand interface which makes it very user friendly It is one of the tools used by many people and organisations since the start of the Covid 19 pandemic The name has even become a verb in itself let s Zoom There are many very useful features in Zoom for running online innovation workshops First of all the gallery view allows you to see up to 49 people on your desktop screen at once This is great because being able to see participants helps to make your workshops more human Not all videoconferencing tools allow you to see this many people so this is a significant advantage of Zoom Since discussions on innovation in a large group often lead nowhere working in smaller groups is highly recommended The break out room functionality in Zoom is great to tap into this With a click of a button or two the workshop host can send participants to break out rooms These can be set up during the workshop or beforehand Or people can be assigned randomly The facilitator when having host rights in Zoom can quickly jump in and out of break out rooms to guide the different teams in each step of the process Need to get everyone back in the plenary room Just close the break out rooms and everyone will be sent back to the main workshop This makes an online workshop very efficient since in in person workshops can be challenging to get everyone together To explain a theory a process step or to show slides there is the share screen functionality You can choose to share a specific window for example your PowerPoint window or a browser ONLINE INNOVATION tab It is also possible to share a particular section of your screen If you want to play a video no problem Just make sure you have selected the box to share your computer sound and start your video Do you want to play music before your workshop or on breaks Just find your favourite playlist on your music streaming service go to the advanced sharing options in Zoom and share your music These sharing options work quite smoothly in Zoom which is not necessarily the case in other videoconferencing tools It can be challenging to have conversations in a video conference Sometimes people start to talk while their microphone is muted As a facilitator think about when you want people to contribute by word of mouth and when it can be in writing There is a chat feature in Zoom for people to type what they want to say Especially with larger groups this can be very effective When you want to have spoken conversations always ask everyone to mute themselves to avoid disturbing background noise As a host in Zoom you can mute people by clicking on the allocated button in the participant list Besides using the chat function for interactivity there is also the option to do a poll Simply create questions with this built in feature to engage your audience This is extra important in online workshops due to the lack of normal human interaction in in person workshops like those spontaneous conversations at the coffee machine One of the challenges when working remotely can be finding a quiet working area that doesn t show the laundry you just did at home That is where the virtual background feature comes in handy Just select a virtual background and only you and the chosen virtual background are visible for participants Don t bother about tidying up when running late for a workshop find this feature and you are good to go Have you never used Zoom before and want to try it out No problem You can use the tool for free The only restriction is that you are on a time limit after 40 minutes your workshop will be ended automatically If it is no trouble for your audience to join again then you will be fine Of course you are better off with a paid account to not frustrate your participants But at least with the free version you can try out Zoom before buying Screenshot from a Zoom meeting 49 THE BEST ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS

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BUTTER WWW BUTTER US With Butter you can run smooth and interactive virtual workshops It is an all in one platform built with all the tools you need to host interactive workshops training workshops and live courses Although it has similar features to other videoconferencing tools like Zoom it is more than just that Butter implements other aspects of hosting a successful workshop such as a poll feature and a timed agenda with a countdown to let participants know when the time is up The laser focus of Butter is on running online workshops smoothly Besides this focus it stands out from other tools because of its fresh design In an online workshop it is essential to manage conversations well This is quite different to being in an in person workshop Most of us have been in online meetings where everyone wants to participate in a conversation but only one person can talk at a time To help manage this Butter has the speaker queue function So instead of a raise your hand feature where you only see who wants to say something a queue appears where you can see who has risen their hands first This way everyone gets heard and always knows who s up next The built in agenda is also a great feature You can create agendas before your workshop and timebox each point While in your meeting the agenda is visible which allows everyone to see how much time there is left for a topic which helps to maintain focus You can also adapt your agenda while in your meeting which allows flexibility 50 As mentioned before Butter aims to make online workshops work smoothly To that end another helpful feature is Miro integration This online whiteboard tool can be used directly from within Butter so no need to have a separate browser window open Just click on the Miro icon find the board you want to use or create one from scratch and off you go Putting your participants in smaller teams to allow them to collaborate is also possible Just create different break out rooms and assign participants by dragging their names to the right room It is easy to check in on your groups by hopping between rooms or peeking in Do you need to send a message to all the break out rooms at once Then simply broadcast your message to all rooms Just as described in the section on Zoom Butter allows for using different techniques for online innovation You can use the chat function to add extra interactivity to your workshop when spoken word is less handy for example when you want quick responses from everyone in bigger groups You can also consider using the poll feature for that Also the working together alone technique can be used in Butter Ask everyone to contribute in silence by muting themselves This way every participant can add to the workshop without being disturbed by others Butter doesn t need an install on your computer You can use it with a browser which makes it easily accessible for almost everyone Consider though that there is a limit to the number of participants for a workshop 200 And only a maximum of 20 participants can use video These limits may change over time so we recommend always to check the latest options ONLINE INNOVATION Screenshot from a Butter meeting 51 THE BEST ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS

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3 TOOLS FOR PREPARATION AND INSTRUCTION When facilitating online workshops during your innovation process having a structured workshop agenda is very important since you are less flexible than when facilitating in person workshops This also requires giving participants clear instructions since in remote workshops you want them to collaborate as efficiently as possible For these reasons we will explain SessionLab which is a great tool to help you prepare your workshops easily When you don t just want to rely on live explanation during your workshop use Loom to make explanatory videos that will help your team to clearly understand what is expected from them 52 SESSIONLAB WWW SESSIONLAB COM To run any workshop successfully there are three important things preparation preparation and preparation Plan and prepare the activities you are going to do the breaks and any materials and templates For online workshops this also means setting up your virtual digital whiteboards in Miro or Mural tion You can search hundreds of exercises filter by the number of participants duration and topics and add exercises that fit your workshop plan Create a workshop plan from scratch or browse the library to see if there is a readymade workshop agenda you can use to adjust to your needs Are there any activities that you are sure you are not going to use in your workshop Simply drag them into the parking lot This way you have your carefully prepared activities at hand to put in your agenda later or even while you are running your Preparation is especially important in online workshops You are less flexible since you want to make your workshops shorter than in person workshops to keep everybody engaged So you may find yourself being on a tighter schedule By having prepared your workshop well you make sure you don t run out of time Having a well prepared agenda doesn t mean it is set in stone The better prepared the easier it is to move around add or skip activities SessionLab comes in very handy here since it keeps track of your workshop timing As soon as you take out an activity your overall timing is adjusted automatically In SessionLab you can create the agenda for your workshop by the minute It is an online workshop planning platform that allows you to break your content into chunks and outline a workshop organising it into various time blocks Every block in the agenda represents a different module or activity in your workshop In each block you can add instructions on how to run the specific activity make an overview of materials you need and add attachments In preparing your workshop you can collaborate on SessionLab with co facilitators To create your agenda drag and drop exercises and modules in a workshop plan The tool offers an inspiring library of activities to integrate into your workshop when you need inspiraONLINE INNOVATION workshop Are you running a workshop with a co facilitator or colleague No problem You can collaborate on your preparation in SessionLab You all can change things or add comments and more Do you want to save your session plan in another format Simply export it to a PDF or Word file You can also duplicate your plan if you want to use it as your starting point to create another workshop Screenshot from a SessionLab workshop agenda 53 THE BEST ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS

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LOOM WWW LOOM COM If there is a message you want to get across in a quick clear and easy way Loom is the perfect video tool for you With Loom you can simultaneously record your camera microphone and desktop to create instantly shareable videos With this tool it takes less time than it would to type an email Use it to explain the features of the online tools you want to use for your innovation project Record your explanation while showing what you do on screen Use it while explaining a template you have put on a digital whiteboard for example in Miro or Mural so your team can work on it asynchronously For anything you want to explain you can use Loom Loom makes any message personal since you can record your face while showing on the screen what you are doing From this perspective using this tool makes online innovation a bit more human Loom adds a personal connection If you prefer not to be in the picture you can choose to record your screen only There is also an option to record your camera only Want to take a breath while recording Simply pause your recording and continue whenever you are ready In the pro version you can also draw on the screen if you want to highlight something Once you are done recording your video will appear in your library on your Loom account You can then trim your video if needed add comments and download or copy the video s link to share it on social media If you are not happy with the result you can delete your recording directly 54 Because of its simplicity and ease of use Loom is a useful tool for online innovation workshops You can create a video for every step in your innovation journey explaining tasks to instruct participants Do you want to give your participants instructions before a workshop about the tools and platforms you will use in your online workshop Why not provide them with a guided tour recorded in Loom This way you guide users to quickly find their way to navigate around a platform You are notified once someone views your video and recipients can add comments You can also embed a Loom video thumbnail in an email instead of a link which encourages people to open it Of course you can use your creativity and think beyond using Loom for creating instructional videos Why not create a video to explain your prototype so you can test it with your target audience Especially in the early stages of an innovation process where you want to create low fidelity prototypes to get feedback quickly Loom is a very helpful tool Making videos is not something everyone feels comfortable with But in this era of Youtube and other video platforms people are used to simple short and quickly made videos that are not spotless Don t go for perfection focus on a clear explanation Don t worry if there is an uuhh in your instruction video People don t expect a perfect for cinema result They expect a human to help them on their way ONLINE INNOVATION One of Loom s distinctive features is that the presenter is visible in a small freely positionable circle on the screen 55 THE BEST ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS

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4 TOOLS FOR PROTOTYPING AND TESTING When you are innovating you are doing new things or things in a new way This means the risks are high since you are doing something you have not done before So how do you know if the solution you came up with will work It is not good to start building a high quality end solution right away because hardly any idea survives without criticism from first contact with the target audience By building a prototype and testing your new concept with your target audience you will learn what can be improved Keep in mind that a prototype is not a scaleddown model of your end solution You want to focus on the core elements to test assumptions This means keeping it small in both execution as well as in the parts of your solution you are going to prototype and test To help you build your prototypes quickly there are a lot of tools out there Of course it depends on what you need to prototype which of those tools are the most suitable To inspire you and to give you some ideas we have picked two tools as examples The first is Marvel with which you can build first drafts of apps and websites and develop and improve them step by step The other tool is Toonly an animated explainer video tool to get your story across in an engaging way 56 In Chapter 7 we will discuss online innovation methods One of these methods is Pretotyping a method to quickly and economically validate whether your idea is worth pursuing in your innovation process The word Pretotype is a neologism that indicates the realisation of a fake product service you want to realise that simulates pretends and precedes the real one ONLINE INNOVATION WWW MARVELAPP COM Marvel helps you to turn any sketch or image into an interactive prototype for an app or website It has everything you need to bring ideas to life and transform how you create digital products with your team So instead of presenting static designs use easy to create interactive prototypes to communicate ideas better To build your realistic prototypes you don t need to write any software code In just minutes you can make your ideas interactive by just uploading images or photographing your sketches adding hotspots and creating hyperlinks Bringing 57 your ideas to life like this is the fastest way to go You simply don t want to allocate a lot of time and budget to something that has not proved to work yet do you One of the best features is that you can easily share your prototype in seconds via email or social media to get early feedback from your target audience customers and stakeholders to test your assumptions It may be hard for some people to start building something almost from scratch They even may have an I can t draw attitude Providing them with hands on easy to use tools will help them overcome any barrier Also using some templates as a starting point can help There are some available in Marvel Another way to trigger inspiration is to let people take a close look at their favourite apps on their smartphone and copy and morph features designs and layouts Or do a Google search for GUI elements Graphical User Interface to give yourself a head start UI Stencils can also be a great help Just put your pencil in and start creating your screen designs Marvel is an easy simple app with a very steep learning curve It is a great tool to visualise app ideas literally within minutes and start the conversation when testing with possible customers which comes in handy in any innovation method where you want to create quick prototypes to test with users and get feedback THE BEST ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS

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TOONLY Prototyping is being creative in clearly explaining your solution so people understand it and so that you may therefore receive feedback to improve your concept A great way to tell your story is by creating animated videos This way you create easily digestible content that is enjoyable to watch With an animated explainer video you can communicate abstract subjects very easily i nnovating online with remote teams creating an animated video makes it very easy to spread your ideas across teams or to show it to decision makers and people you want to test it too You can easily send it for example accompanied by a feedback form to many people at the same time to get a lot of feedback in a short period Another way to use this tool is to explain tasks or to instruct participants authentically and engagingly which Is helpful when you want to combine synchronous and asynchronous work in your process Toonly is an animated explainer video creator that you can use to create simple videos to provide information on your solution and how that solution works It is great for creating an engaging video about the user experience once your solution has been realised It helps your target audience understand the idea better so they can provide you with valuable feedback The tool is easy to use You can choose a background for your video and click and drag characters onto it Click your mouse to animate them and off you go There is a massive library with tons of characters props and backgrounds The images are all custom drawn not stock To make your life even more comfortable Toonly offers pre made scenes combining a background characters and props into one complete package To finish off your video you can record a voice over upload a professional one or use audio exported from other software You can also drag and drop background royalty free music to create the right mood in your video A tool like this is great in any process where you need to prototype your solution And especially when you are 58 ONLINE INNOVATION 5 TOOLS TO MAKE WORKSHOPS INTERACTIVE Keeping participants engaged during a workshop is challenging when collaborating online Everybody is working remotely and on their own There are no spontaneous conversations between participants When the workshop ends everyone is back in their own private bubble after one click of a button No small talk no unexpected engaging personal conversations Therefore it is extra important to make online workshops engaging and interactive which we discuss more extensively in Chapter 5 There are multiple ways to foster interaction in an online workshop You can use the chat function in a videoconferencing tool or simply use spoken word Besides that many tools allow everyone to contribute based on your workshop s content or to trigger those personal stories you miss out on when working remotely In this chapter we describe Mentimeter a tool for creating interactive quizzes polls and Q As and Tscheck in which is a very simple tool to start conversations on a personal level MENTIMETER Quizzes polls and Q As are great ways to engage participants whether you are in a remote in person or hybrid workshop Mentimeter is a cloud based tool that allows you to interact with your audience Very quickly you can get feedback and input from everyone Since being online feels more distant than being in the same physical room adding interactivity to online workshops is especially important to keep your audience engaged Mentimeter enables you to turn workshops into interactive experiences that are fun for both you and your participants You can create word clouds based on your participants input ask a quick multiple choice question to let your audience vote or energise the entire virtual room with a quiz competition 59 THE BEST ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS By using this tool you can interact with your target audience in real time Participants can give their input using a mobile phone or any other device connected to the Internet You get unbiased results visualised in a way that encourages reflection and sparks discussion It is easy to use enabling you to turn your audience s opinions into real time tangible and actionable data With Mentimeter you can easily boost your workshops and it helps you become a better skilled facilitator by giving more engaging workshops To give you a head start in Mentimeter you will find pre designed templates to make your slides look professional with just one click And to inspire you there are all kinds of example slides available for different purposes like evaluation

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check in and icebreakers And there are many different ways to visualise participants input like open ended questions word clouds Q A and pie charts doughnut charts and spider charts 60 Besides using this tool at the beginning or the end of an online workshop you can of course also use it as an energiser during a workshop for example right after a coffee break It will break the formality and it helps everyone to be off topic for a moment This makes them more creative in what they are working on if you give people a short simple task for which they have to focus on something different their creativity will be piqued One of the features in Mentimeter is creating word clouds TSCHECK IN WWW TSCHECK IN Adding a personal touch to your online workshops is very important To engage people on a personal level it comes in handy to use conversation starters It is not for nothing that there are brands out there that print triggering questions on their products to challenge the reader to start a conversation based on an unexpected topic In all its simpleness the online tool T scheck in does exactly that it randomly shows questions on your screen that can be used as conversation starters at the beginning or the end of your workshops Simply choose the tscheck in or tscheck out option depending on what you prefer In an online workshop you can go to the website and share your screen with the participants Ask a person to answer the question shown You can ask that person to identify the next person who can answer the same question or click shuffle and a new question will appear for that person to answer ONLINE INNOVATION 61 THE BEST ONLINE INNOVATION TOOLS Besides the engagement you create with your participants by asking them to interact and to share their ideas and answers the outcomes of your polls or quizzes can also be great conversation starters Especially in online workshops this is important due to the lack of direct interpersonal contact Screenshot from Tscheck in

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There is nothing more to this tool It works as easily as that But this simplicity makes it a powerful instrument to make connections on a more personal level besides the more formal content of your workshop It can even trigger new connections and conversations between participants outside your online workshops Tscheck in question examples Which habit do you want to break For what in your life do you feel especially grateful Which is your least favourite fruit What is the best gap in your CV Tscheck out example questions What made you laugh today To make tomorrow more optimistic I will What is your favourite dinner What is the first thing you are going to do after work Now you are familiar with the best digital innovation tools for online innovation workshops we will present you in the next chapters ten online innovation techniques to get the most out of your innovation journeys KEY MESSAGES FROM THIS CHAPTER There is more to online innovation than just scheduling videoconference calls with a team With the right tools you can make your workshops much more engaging and effective Use a videoconferencing tool like Zoom or Butter combined with a digital whiteboard tool like Miro or Mural for online collaboration Add interactivity like polls or quizzes to your workshops with a tool like Mentimeter To make your workshops even more personal use Tscheck in which randomly generates check in and check out questions to connect your participants Besides tools to use in workshops there are very helpful online tools to instruct participants asynchronously in between workshops for example and even quickly build prototypes of your solution for testing purposes Always check for the latest features and updates of the tools to see pricing plans and free versions In many cases there is a free version available with all or at least many of the functionalities that you can use for a limited time which allows you to check if the tool is for you 62 ONLINE INNOVATION

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In the previous chapter we showed you ten tools we use frequently and found very helpful in facilitating online innovation workshops But a fool with a tool is still a fool That s the reason why we present you ten techniques in this chapter to help you prepare and facilitate your online innovation workshops better and to prevent you from falling into the pitfalls of Chapter 2 They also help to minimise some of the Achilles heels of online innovation we will discuss in the next chapter We group the ten online techniques in three categories designing engaging workshops facilitating interactive workshops and communication and feedback In designing engaging workshops we show you what it means to make a Virtual Room Design how making videos helps you and what combining synchronous and asynchronous work means In the second category we describe how the techniques like together alone anonymous voting the Bulk mode Break Out Rooms and Lightning Demos can help you to facilitate more inter active workshops In communication and feedback we have a look at the possibilities of online surveys and how the chat function can be used 66 DESIGNING ENGAGING WORKSHOPS CHART THE FORTH IDEATION SPACE 1 Virtual Room Design In the offline world a good workshop differs from an excellent workshop when the setting fits the purpose of the workshop for innovation workshops very spatial open rooms with lots of light function well to inspire people as do crazy ones like in a windmill or an art gallery Nice music a good light setting and a great smell all add to the experience The more senses are stimulated the more someone becomes immersed and the more intense the workshop will be Online the experience is completely different We do not see what our participants see The gallery view of videoconferencing looks different on an 11 inch screen or a big 30 inch desktop screen The sound quality and volume differ between old laptop speakers or good quality Bose headphones You get inspired differently if you are sitting in front of your PC and looking at a beautiful lake and green hills or looking at your laundry in your bedroom Using online collaboration platforms and videoconference tools it is possible to create at least a decent experience for your participants We experimented with videoconferencing tools We tried funny serious and spacious virtual back grounds which are nice for a specific activity or energiser Still in general they are more disturbing especially when parts of you or the participants disappear With Butter or Wonder me it is possible to create a different feeling than Zoom or MS Teams straightforward style Butter has a fresh playful and colourful design Wonder me is also a bit more stylish You can make a background picture to be your room and because you can move around it feels more open ONLINE INNOVATION 67 ONLINE INNOVATION TECHNIQUES

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The best experiences we have had designing whiteboards with the online collaboration platforms are with Miro Mural or Klaxoon With them it is possible to embed pictures gifs and videos and to design a room the way you as a facilitator like to have it from using the colours and branding of your organisation to specific themes for the workshop Everything is possible For the idea generation phase of the FORTH innovation method we designed a board that looks like you are in space We created it so people would feel no limits feel free to ideate without restrictions in an ideation space The next level of experiences is AR VR Environments We will discuss them in Chapter 11 on hybrid innovation Watch their development closely as AR VR will have a real breakthrough in the coming years in professional facilitation 2 Making videos The shift to online and more asynchronous work made it necessary to rethink how we present tasks or results When someone does not understand the task or what was given maybe because of a bad internet connection because he was disturbed by something next to his screen or if the issue was just badly explained by the facilitator two things can happen The participant is honest and asks if the facilitator can repeat what she just said The other option is that he says nothing and will not do the task properly Both are unacceptable for strictly timed and outcome focused workshops they then have to do the task We get a lot of positive response for it The other action for which we use videos is to make the participants record a video of their results their presentation or their prototype That helps to reduce time spent during presentations raises their quality and makes them more entertaining We also reduce our online time with it We shift these tasks to occur before workshops if possible so people can work on their presentations when they prefer and to provide considered feedback to start solving right away With special tools presented in Chapter 3 like Loom or with videoconference tools like Zoom or MS Teams you can record your videos Making a presentation could also make sense using Toonly to create tool making animated videos that sum up the findings TIP When you make a video for assignments focus on what the participants should do not on your face Guide them visually through the process with an example Make the video short less than three minutes and entertaining For parts of our innovation journeys we meet in workshops We are with all participants together in a videoconference for example and work in groups or individually meaning we are all synchronous working at the same moment on the same online whiteboard Asynchronous means that the whole team works online in groups or as individuals but not at the same time We give them a time frame most days to do specific tasks on their own Whenever they do it within this time slot does not matter We learned that it is even more relevant for participants to know why they are in this workshop and that it has to be relevant for them How does that look in practice We use it for example for our ideation sessions in the phase Raise Ideas of the FORTH innovation method see Chapter 10 A few days before the actual ideation session we already send our participants the prepared ideation whiteboard with personal idea spaces and the ideation question The participants are still in the Observe and Learn phase of the FORTH journey and most of them already have many ideas in mind So they feel pretty happy to be able to put their ideas down on a board What is the advantage of working this way Well first of all we save time in the workshop itself Because we do not need to do the so called braindump anymore The participants shaped their ideas before the workshop asynchronously It helps the participants write all ideas down when it suits them best which results in both more and better ideas Seeing all the ideas of all the others upfront results in two behaviours that benefit the innovation expedition A competition on who has the most ideas and people getting inspired by all A picture says a thousand words A video does it even better We have very good experiences with videos we make to explain tasks and to show examples to instruct people online Video offers a tremendous help when people perform asynchronous tasks because if the message is not clear the result will be an extended email ping pong With a video we take our time and make short entertaining videos to explain the tasks and give the participants an example directly where 68 3 Combine synchronous and asynchronous work One of the main advantages of working online in teams is that you can perform both asynchronous and synchronous work What does that mean ONLINE INNOVATION 69 others ideas It puts them in a creative mood that helps get more ideas and more innovative ideas We also use asynchronous work after the ideation session We end our workshop after presenting the ideas of the last idea generation technique To initiate the converging phase selecting top ideas we give the participants 24 48 hours to make their decisions This has the advantage that the participants work when it suits them best when they are alone and focused This can be done with the technique of anonymous voting In Miro it is possible to set voting without disturbing the process on the boards We also use the technique Lightning Demos asynchronously if it fits timewise Then participants can do their research alone and just do the presentation in the workshop itself TIP We have the experience that the ratio of asynchronous and synchronous work always depends on the participants commitment and engagement In the FORTH innovation method for example we have in the beginning only a small amount of asynchronous work We increase it over the progress of the process In the last phase Homecoming the most work is done asynchronously In the end you have so much engagement and commitment that people always deliver ONLINE INNOVATION 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A S Y N CH N O U S A L O N ASYNCHRONOUS YOU GET A CERTAIN TASK WHICH HAS TO BE DONE BY A DEFINED DUE DATE INDIVIDUALS OR GROUPS WORK ON THE TASK ON THEIR SCHEDULE ALONE EVERYBODY WORKS ALONE IN SILENCE S Y N C H R O N O U S T O G E T H E R SYNCHRONOUS WORKSHOP MEETING VIA A VIDEOCONFERENCING TOOL EVERYBODY IS VIRTUALLY PRESENT SIMULTANEOUSLY AND IN ONE SPOT TOGETHER EVERYBODY WORKS AT THE SAME TIME ON THE SAME TASK FACILITATING INTERACTIVE WORKSHOPS 4 Working Together Alone It often happens that teams have endless discussions about possible solutions while generating ideas With the technique together alone originated in the Design Sprint you can solve this issue because participants get their own space and time to write down their thoughts before discussing them in the group One of the main problems is that individual people cannot speak out or that team members influence one another due to hierarchy or other group dynamics and certain great ideas get lost To reduce these negative effects on the outcome you can also use break out rooms to make smaller groups which are hindered less by group dynamics or hierarchy 70 R O How does it work Together alone works best with collaborative digital whiteboards like Mural Miro or Klaxoon because everybody can work within them simultaneously on the same task and the results are visual in one spot In the beginning the facilitator explains and shows the assignment If there are uncertainties questions can be answered so all participants have a clear and shared understanding of the assignment The whole exercise is timeboxed This means that you as a facilitator set a time for the exercise so everybody knows how much time is available for the task The difficulty is to find the right time frame It always needs to be a little on the short side so people do not get too relaxed or start doing something else themselves in a personal ideation space or using the private mode in MURAL or the Bulk mode in Miro Or they can see what the others are writing and build on the thoughts and ideas Most important is that the ideas are written or drawn made visible so nothing gets lost and each idea stands for itself without explaining leaving little room for misinterpretations We use together alone for almost all exercises Because we realise that online when people go into break out rooms they easily drift into talking chatting and discussing instead of creating Together alone helps speed up our processes and increase the engagement of the participants 5 Anonymous voting Making decisions is the most important and most challenging part of workshops especially when talking about innovation When it comes to decision making people in western cultures start to discuss because everybody wants to be heard That has two major disadvantages On the one hand the whole process needs a lot of time frustrating everyone On the other hand the decision may be significantly biased by the hierarchy in the organisation and extroverts dominate the conversation With anonymous voting which you can use on the digital whiteboards Mural and Miro you can solve this issue With anonymous voting you get a fast clear and unbiased picture of the opinions of the participants It can be used as a decision or can be used to make the deciders help to decide 71 ONLINE INNOVATION TECHNIQUES Now everybody starts working on the same task but alone When using digital whiteboards there are two options Either they should generate thoughts and ideas totally by ONLINE INNOVATION E

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How does it work As a facilitator we open up a voting session We give it a name and define the number of votes each participant gets When we are using Mural we start voting right away The voting will pop up for all participants and everyone can vote directly We can see who voted already This makes it easy to see when it is time to close the voting The results pop up directly after the closing ranked by the number of votes received We also see how many people voted on it which is helpful if you have a tie When using Miro you have more options You can define how long the voting will be open and on what exactly you can vote which sticky notes or text or pictures That makes it possible to make voting asynchronous without limiting the activities on the board In our online innovation practice together alone and anonymous voting are a perfect combination to go forward quickly and with purpose TIP It is also possible to do limited anonymous voting with the poll functions of video conference tools like Zoom and Butter When we work with another digital whiteboard without voting function we use simple circles for an anonymous dot voting others or worry about selecting a digital note to write on When you start Bulk mode the whole screen goes grey Only in the centre of the screen you see something a line type in bulk add notes Here you can type in your ideas By pushing enter you start your next idea without leaving this modus The Bulk mode can be used for two things One is allowing people to focus not getting distracted by the activity of others on the board When using other whiteboards like Mural or Klaxoon which do not have Bulk mode we try to make it easy for participants and already have empty stickynotes prepared They just need to double click start writing and not worry about making their own sticky note The second use is when you want people to share problems thoughts that should remain anonymous If you are using Mural you can use the private mode Then your participants can only see what they are writing The texts of the others are hidden TIP If you do not use Bulk mode or another digital whiteboard you could tell your participants to open an empty word document or spreadsheet and start writing ideas there Each idea has to be separated with the enter button in the word document For Mural you need to copy everything and paste it into the board Then for each idea a sticky note will be generated For Miro it has to be in a spreadsheet format to work in this way 6 Bulk mode Generating ideas on digital whiteboards hinders some people s creativity because they have to also focus on the technical part of how to create a sticky note and write or draw on it So ideas or thoughts might get lost For this case the online collaboration whiteboard Miro has the so called Bulk mode We have good experiences with it Participants use it when they want to focus and do not want to get distracted by 7 Break out rooms In online meetings with Zoom MS Teams Butter and many others it is only possible that one person speaks at a time otherwise nobody can understand anything To keep the workshops engaging as much as possible participants need to communicate and share their thoughts verbally For this 72 ONLINE INNOVATION you can use so called break out rooms BOR They are onlinemeetings separate from the main meeting room providing the advantage that you can send participants into these rooms and get them back whenever you want This is very important because some participants are already waiting in the plenum and others are still in the BORs BORs are very useful in creating smaller teams which helps introverts speak up more quickly since it is harder for them to do that in bigger groups In our experience BORs should not exceed five people With more than five people in a room attention goes down Only a few will engage in the activity while others will be passive and drift off BORs are extremely valuable for getting to know each other in the beginning Putting people in pairs into rooms for five minutes helps immensely to increase the mood and engagement Because everybody is able to talk and has a direct personal connection they are also helpful when group work is needed and people need to communicate Until now Zoom has the best BOR feature It is very simple to use and has many possibilities like random or manual placing or participants can choose themselves As well as in Zoom you can pre set break out rooms in Butter before the actual meeting The advantage of Butter is that you can set up more than one BOR setting in advance That means you can create different BOR settings four groups selected five groups shuffle etc During the workshop you can also pre assign the participants to different settings That saves a lot of valuable workshop time makes it easy for the facilitator and feels smoother for the participants Tools like Wonder me use a different approach Every participant can move around in a virtual space and decide with whom he wants to have a video chat Facilitators can broadcast so everybody no matter where they are can listen 73 ONLINE INNOVATION TECHNIQUES

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Here break out rooms are generated and closed by the participants themselves naturally This means you have much less control as a facilitator This can be a disadvantage if you need to get a team to work towards their specific objectives When MS Teams did not have break out rooms we used different channels as BORs That initially seemed to be a good idea but proved to be a big failure We had instructed the participants to come back after a certain time But the discussion in the BORS was so intense that they lost time Visiting all BORs and asking the participants to come back took almost ten minutes before everybody was back in the plenary workshop And ten minutes is a lot of time in a tight and structured online workshop 8 Lightning Demo Lightning demo is an exercise coming from the Design Sprint The idea behind this is to inspire the team to take off their blinders and stimulate thinking beyond their organisation or industry It has two steps research and presentation of the findings We recommend that the presenter shares the screen while demonstrating her findings one by one When all findings are presented you have a colourful inspiring whiteboard on Miro or Mural with their key points as a source of inspiration for the ideation phase 4 TIP Do this asynchronously We for example try to finish the last problem space workshop with the problem statement and the how might we question HMW Then we give the task to prepare lightning demos as preparation for the ideation workshop Next they present the findings Each participant presents her inspiration with a time limit of three minutes for each finding 74 5 9 Chat function The chat function in videoconferencing tools it is simple it is powerful and everybody knows it You can use it in five different ways 2 One on one communication It allows the facilitator and the participants to contact each other directly so messages can be exchanged without disturbing others It is a little bit like the chit chat of two people during offline workshops when they sit next to each other Or we like to use it to give a tip or a comment to participants individually that others should not see The only problem we experience is that the chat messages will mostly not be noticed right away which kills the direct messaging Additional communication Gijs van wulfen always says that if you want to explain something use three ways to make sure everybody gets it tell write and show Here the chat function can help to explain an exercise or task ONLINE INNOVATION Short feedback Use the chat for quick feedback when you do not want to disturb the whole group s process by speech It is also possible to use the chat as a simple voting tool when participants write within the tool their choice For Interactions Chat can also be used for warm up games presenting your findings and for Q A Share files and links If you want to share a file with participants or want them to go to a specific URL for your digital whiteboard you can share it in the chat TIP In Zoom you can also auto save the chat so you have it also available after the session which can be very useful if you want to be able to read the input of the participants later COMMUNICATION AND FEEDBACK 1 We start with research when we ask all participants to come up with three products or services that might inspire us They get about 25 minutes to search the internet When using online collaboration tools like Miro or Mural they can drag and drop the board s information It can be anything a website a pdf a video or just text We encourage our participants to research both inside their own company and sector and also outside their industry Other industries might be using great solutions already and we do not want to reinvent the wheel The participants need to write a sticky note with the big idea behind each inspirational idea found 3 TIP When you use a setup that has more than one chat possibility For example Miro and Zoom clarify what chat you will use and which should not be used 10 Survey We use surveys as well as polls For online Innovation processes we use them differently Polls we use to get immediate feedback mostly with multiple predefined choices We use it to engage our participants in the workshop itself Surveys we mostly use to gain insights and feedback for ideas from customers 75 Polls With Polls you get quick unbiased results visualised in a way that encourages reflection and sparks discussion We use them a lot for a short check in or check out feedback or collecting insights during the workshop Polls correlate closely to the anonymous voting technique because most polls are unknown and work the same way Tools like Zoom Butter Howspace and Klaxoon have polls already integrated so you do not need an additional tool Kahoot and Mentimeter are poll tools that make workshops more engaging and fun Kahoot has integrations with MS Teams Zoom and Slack Miro and Mural have the already mentioned anonymous voting function With them you can create polls right on the collaboration boards We also have good experiences with the poll function of Butter it is easy to make quite flexible and looks good Howspace even has AI support to help you interpret the results correctly For us polls get fast results Surveys We use surveys to get quantitative insights from participants or customers or we ask for feedback on ideas or the outcomes of workshops While polls make the most sense when used during workshops surveys are done most often asynchronously so people can answer the questions in their own time For surveys we use Google forms or other survey tools like Typeform One specific example when we use it is concept testing in the Test Ideas phase of the FORTH innovation method We do a short survey for each of the 10 to 15 developed concepts The survey consists of the written concept with all relevant information five rating questions and two questions where customers share their likes and dislikes about the concept The survey is both long enough to get enough valid data as well as short enough that customers fill it out ONLINE INNOVATION TECHNIQUES

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POLL DON T NEED DETAILED RESPONSES VS KEY MESSAGES FROM THIS CHAPTER SURVEY NEED DETAILED AND EXTENSIVE FEEDBACK R NEED IMMEDIATE FEEDBACK HAVE MANY QUESTIONS TO ASK R ONLY ONE QUESTION TO ASK NEED TO GATHER PERSONAL INFORMATION R REQUIRE TEXT COMMENTS R NO TIME FOR ANALYSIS Online innovation is not worse or better than in person innovation It is different and you can facilitate awesome workshops with these techniques Designing your virtual room and using video to explain it is the key to making your workshops customerfocused and clear A fool with a tool is still a fool Using the right techniques with these tools make a difference Use polls to get fast insights for yourself as facilitator and for the participants source www questionpro com polls poll vs survey html Use break out rooms wisely to make your innovation workshop more engaging Working together alone is the key feature for making online workshops fast engaging and effective TIP Switching tools online takes time and has a certain risk that it does not work straight away Depending on your participants online skill set your process and your timing consider whether the additional value of bringing in another poll tool is higher than the risks 76 Working online is different than in person We presented you great tools in Chapter 3 and ten useful techniques to employ them in this chapter There is of course an Achilles heel in innovating online which we present in the next chapter which discusses critical points we experienced during our online innovation projects ONLINE INNOVATION 77 ONLINE INNOVATION TECHNIQUES

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Working online tires you out right The same is true for us too And that s not the only challenge confronting us as online facilitators of innovation There are practical issues perception issues and human issues that lead to lower engagement This chapter discusses the Achilles heel of working online and what to do about it PRACTICAL ONLINE ISSUES HUMAN ISSUES WHILE WORKING ONLINE DISTRACTIONS AT HOME First of all we have technical issues You also experience that participants maybe even you with bad internet have dodgy connections and frozen screens and make endless efforts to log in again And while the online workshop continues you start to feel helpless and sometimes hopeless which is not the most productive mindset for a creative workshop Sometimes it just sucks When you work with a team across different time zones it s quite challenging to pick the right time slot for your workshops We operate a lot with worldwide teams with people from Silicon Valley Europe and Asia Pacific for example When you start at 17 00 Central European Time it s 08 00 in the morning on the USA s West Coast and exactly midnight in Malaysia The Americans are ready but the European participants are out of energy and you see the participants from Malaysia fall asleep behind their screens Online video calls can t compare with physical interaction We miss emotional moments like patting someone on the shoulder because you re happy to meet him or her winking to someone to make contact or laughing out loud together about the same bad joke But on Zoom everyone except the speaker is muted No back patting No winking And no big laughs together On a computer screen facial expressions are very hard toread You only see each other s fa ade a lot of times with a virtual background to hide the mess at home or the children playing in the background In real conversations you get non verbal cues that are helpful because body language is important in showing emotions But in a Zoom call you are just talking to a screen And you have no clue if it resonates with the others in the call Do they understand it Should you pause or perhaps slow down Or on the contrary should you speed up You just can t tell The conversation flow online is much slower than when live since we have to unmute first before we can speak We think that you have to unmute is the most said sentence online All these factors together the lack of interpersonal dynamics is bound to lead to more miscommunication between people Due to the lack of personal connection you run the risk that especially in innovation teams where people have never met personally you stay strangers to each other during the whole online project as you never truly meet You might have a problem focusing on your work at the office by always being disturbed by your colleagues That s why for very important workshops everyone leaves their offices to a great quiet venue somewhere in the woods near the seaside or in the middle of nowhere So in in person workshops when the participants put their cell phones in silence you can control and minimize the distractions for participants as workshop facilitator 81 THE ACHILLES HEEL OF WORKING ONLINE PERCEPTION ISSUES OF ONLINE WORK In Non Covid 19 times we have a choice of doing workshops online or in person There might be a perception in the company culture that online is less important People would come together physically for strategic workshops yet for less important subjects online workshops are enough If this is the case you might experience as a facilitator or project leader that the participants motivation to be present and to participate actively in the online workshop is not very high Especially with screens turned off they might be doing other things instead of participating actively 80 ONLINE INNOVATION That has completely changed since we all had to work from home online When the cat jumps on your lap the washing machine beeps that the laundry is done or your doorbell rings you are seriously distracted and often log out mentally from the online process This happens more than we like You will recognize the majority of the 50 distractions while working online at home that we mention in the following chart Online it s hard to stay immersed in a workshop in a physical environment beyond your control

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CHART 50 DISTRACTIONS WHILE WORKING ONLINE FROM HOME 29 30 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 82 My cat jumps on my lap The doorbell rings My washing machine beeps that the laundry is done My kid is hungry Participants in the call are not muted My dog starts barking My cursor is stuck in this tool My favourite series on Netflix starts now My kids come out of school My neighbours are shouting at each other again It started snowing Wow My mother calls My screen freezes I can t find the link to the Miro board anymore The lawnmower of the neighbour is making considerable noise My children need my computer for schoolwork The electricity has stopped I get blinded by the setting sun Oh I forgot to put out the garbage MS Teams crashes mid meeting There are construction noises outside My cell phone rings I have bad computer sound My pizza gets delivered No I lost connection again My girlfriend is WhatsApping me continuously I need some time to prepare for my next call My neighbour s son has his percussion hour 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 The session runs late and I have to pick up the kids Our CEO is shouting she can t type on Mural anymore Muted participants talking My laptop is out of battery Other participants are sitting in the dark The kids of the neighbours upstairs are yelling Tesco is bringing the groceries I need to finish this memo now during the session Jehovah witnesses at my front door My son can t find his soccer shoes A non muted participant has a barking dog The facilitator talks all the time while I need to think A courier called to say that I can pick up my parcel I m seeing WhatsApping jokes with other participants I can t find the Miro link to this new board I need to cook a meal in the meantime My mother calls again I am or others are playing around with virtual backgrounds I hear police sirens what s going on out there My kid kisses me goodbye I m getting new emails continuously Just now my washing machine transitioned to a spin cycle ONLINE Zoom or Microsoft Teams tires you out Online work requires more focus than a face to face chat as you can read in the interview with Gianpiero Petriglieri an associate professor at Insead and Marissa Shuffler an associate professor at Clemson University Our minds are together when our bodies feel we re not That dissonance which causes people to have conflicting feelings is exhausting In our experience being in an online workshop for an hour feels the same as being in an offline workshop for two hours When we started to bring the FORTH innovation method online in April May 2020 we just copied the methodology which resulted in eight hour workshops with Zoom and Trello at the start Besides the fact that it was boring it was extremely tiring As you will read later in Chapter 10 we brought back the workshops length to a maximum of three or four hours as we were completely knackered otherwise THE REASON ZOOM CALLS DRAIN YOUR ENERGY But what exactly is tiring us out In this section we like to quote an interview BBC Worklife had with Gianpiero Petriglieri an associate professor at Insead who explores sustainable learning and development in the workplace and Marissa Shuffler an associate professor at Clemson University who studies workplace wellbeing and teamwork effectiveness Is video chat harder What s different compared to face to face communication Being on a video call requires more focus than a faceto face chat says Petriglieri Video chats mean we Source online brainstorm with 20 participants of the training as a certified online facilitator of the FORTH innovation method from the USA Canada Costa Rica Ireland UK Netherlands Italy South Africa Malaysia and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia February 2021 ONLINE INNOVATION WORK DRAINS OUR ENERGY 83 need to work harder to process non verbal cues like facial expressions the tone and pitch of the voice and body language paying more attention to these consumes a lot of energy Our minds are together when our bodies feel we re not That dissonance which causes people to have conflicting feelings is exhausting You cannot relax into the conversation naturally he says Silence is another challenge he adds Silence creates a natural rhythm in a real life conversation However when it happens in a video call you become anxious about technology It also makes people uncomfortable An added factor says Shuffler is that if we are physically on camera we are very aware of being watched When you re on a video conference you know everybody s looking at you you are on stage so there comes the social pressure and feeling like you need to perform Being performative is nerve wracking and more stressful It s also very hard for people not to look at their face if they can see it on screen or be conscious of how they behave in front of the camera Most of our social roles happen in different places but now the context has collapsed says Petriglieri Imagine if you go to a bar and in the same bar you talk with your professors meet your parents or date someone isn t it weird That s what we re doing now We are confined in our own space in the context of a very anxiety provoking crisis and our only space for interaction is a computer window Shuffler says a lack of downtime after we ve fulfilled work and family commitments may be another factor in our tiredness Some of us may be putting higher THE ACHILLES HEEL OF WORKING ONLINE

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expectations on ourselves due to worries over the economy furloughs and job losses There s also that heightened sense of I need to be performing at my top level in a situation Some of us are kind of overperforming to secure our jobs Big group calls can feel particularly performative Petriglieri warns People like watching television because you can allow your mind to wander but a large video call is like you re watching television and television is watching you Large group chats can also feel depersonalizing he adds because your power as an individual is diminished And despite the branding it may not feel like leisure time It doesn t matter whether you call it a virtual happy hour it s a meeting because mostly we are used to using these tools for work So how can we alleviate Zoom fatigue Both experts suggest limiting video calls to those who are necessary Turning on the camera should be optional and in general there should be more understanding that cameras do not always have to be on throughout each meeting Having your screen off to the side instead of straight ahead could also help your concentration particularly in group meetings says Petriglieri It makes you feel like you re in an adjoining room so it may be less tiring In some cases it s worth considering if video chats are the most efficient option Shuffler suggests that shared files with clear notes can be a better option than avoiding information overload when working She also suggests taking time during meetings to catch up before diving into business Spend some time to check into people s wellbeing she urges It s 84 a way to reconnect us with the world and to maintain trust and reduce fatigue and concern Building transition periods between video meetings can also help us refresh try stretching have a drink or do a bit of exercise our experts say Boundaries and transitions are important we need to create buffers that allow us to put one identity aside and then go to another as we move between work and private personas And maybe says Petriglieri if you want to reach out go old school Write a letter to someone instead of meeting them on Zoom Tell them you care about them Source April 2020 www bbc com worklife article 20200421 whyzoom video chats are so exhausting LOW SERENDIPITY All reasons mentioned above the practical online issues the lower status of online work the lack of personal connection the distractions at home the energy drain of video conferencing and the low chance of serendipity lower engagement from participants during online workshops compared to in person workshops at a special venue More bad news is that from our perspective as innovation workshop facilitators online workshops are in practice much harder to facilitate than in person workshops for several reasons As an online facilitator you experience the same problems as the participants in connecting because you too miss their facial expressions and body language As facilitators this is even more important when we are guiding the online innovation process Getting a personal connection is essential for us facilitators to connect to each of the participants to get a feel if there s a buy in for the direction taken in the project and to support the outcomes produced In innovation and creativity the phenomenon of serendipity is well known It s when someone accidentally finds something great Our innovation projects benefit from serendipity and we try to stimulate it by adding an Observe and Learn phase in our methodologies Random encounters trigger serendipity It s sparked by unexpected new inspiration which triggers new ideas On our in person innovation journeys these moments of serendipity are triggered by spontaneous meetings which can happen at any moment during workshops at breaks at the coffee machine or later at night in the bar Unfortunately you miss these moments during online workshops So online there s less serendipity from interactions by chance because personal interaction is minimal or even absent Getting personally connected to participants is so hard especially when you are facilitating with for example the Microsoft Teams video conferencing tool At the moment we wrote this book you could only see nine people simultaneously while the group we worked with was double that size So we could only see half the group which is madness of course On the other hand when using Zoom for example where you can see every participant when using Gallery View you see the many videos of participants in such tiny dimensions that it becomes very hard to see facial expressions To be brief the engagement of the group online is often minimal while the online facilitator s job is much more demanding because the online technology has to be managed at the same time too ONLINE INNOVATION 85 THE ACHILLES HEEL OF WORKING ONLINE Although online workshops have many advantages as you read in Chapter 4 the Achilles heel for us as online guides is being able to create and experience a group flow You know these moments too where there s a high energy wave of excitement in your team building upon each other s ideas leading to a familiar group feeling of creating something special While we have facilitated very successful online innovation workshops generating 1256 ideas with the FORTH innovation methodology 100 online we never sensed this common group feeling as it s so hard to show and feel personal emotions behind a screen Was the online workshop less successful In a rational sense No But after the workshop when we switched off Microsoft Teams and logged out of Miro I was alone at home which felt like a cold shower In in person workshops we would have had a drink together to celebrate our success and we would feel the high energy level and enthusiasm of everyone else And we would see excited participants all proud about the milestone reached You miss the pat on the shoulder of your leader or the kind words Well done mate from your colleague In online workshops RATIONALITY RULES which is not bad as results are great too You just miss those magical moments of feeling connected as a team THE ACHILLES HEEL OF WORKING ONLINE

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HOW TO CREATE MAGICAL MOMENTS IN AN ONLINE PROJECT So we need to compensate for rationality rules And that s why we also focus on creating magical emotional moments for online teams From the perspective of Jens Emrich von Kajdacsy leadership and team coach magical moments create togetherness As online facilitators and project leaders we should try to develop special team moments to facilitate the experiencing of togetherness in a team even while we are working remotely This emotion emerges when something unexpected happens and surprises the people when they learn as a team and create insights or ideas for a sustainable change that fuels togetherness And moments when people feel proud to be part of a team or something bigger are typical magical moments CHART HOW TO CREATE MAGICAL TEAM MOMENTS ONLINE Sure online experiences are not in person But this is no reason for not being able to create curiosity and relationships in the online world The first question is What makes a moment a magical moment My perspective on this is TOGETHERNESS These are moments that we experience together in a team When something unexpected happens and it surprises the team To learn as a team and create insights for a sustainable change Being proud to be part of a team or something more significant 86 First TIP THE PRESENT Send your participants a little gift beforehand by the postman This builds a physical bridge to and between the teammates in the online world The magical moment created Everyone loves to receive presents especially when they are unexpected It creates a really surprising opening moment when you unbox a package together online Third TIP THE PURPOSE People want to know why they should do what they ve been asked to do Many of the teams in the online world prefer to wait for an in person meeting because they are sick of online video conferences with long durations without enabling video or voice because of performance issues just watching a shared presentation It s boring They miss interaction and inspiring facilitation When you create online workshops tell your participants why they should be part of it Integrate them already in the concept process and make clear why you need them for this special journey And don t forget to ask the team about their perspective on a higher purpose to understand their goals and targets to reach Second TIP THE ONBOARDING Preparation is essential for every event especially in the online environment Create a separate onboarding process before your online workshop to explain the process platforms and techniques Let the participants introduce themselves ask for their roles and describe their superpower and passion Above all build a virtual playground area where they can try the new stuff Mail your invitation and use the target platform you will facilitate your innovation journey on And don t forget to check if everybody received it well The magical moment created With the onboarding process you already escort your participants to the lobby of your workshop room They will be prepared to start the workshop on a common level to create outcomes and insights from the first moment on Your participants will feel safe and secure because all of them have a shared jump base to start from ONLINE INNOVATION How to do it Connect your invitation to a workshop ALWAYS with goals you want to reach and with a strong background a particular purpose you can formulate by using words or a picture with a clear message Think about questions to ask in the onboarding process team introduction or the team s expectations which triggers a possible why So ask why we should do something instead of what we should do and connect these questions to current situations in the real world For example If you are thinking of the pandemic and its impact why should we change the model of collaboration in the team 87 Let me remark on one point Talking about what we are doing triggers the rational part of our brain But when talking about why we are doing what we do we trigger the limbic system and the emotional part of us By asking Why you can already address your team s limbic system in the workshop from the start The magical moment created When you trigger the purpose by asking WHY it creates a special momentum within the team it connects the people on a deeper and visionary sense to their goals and gives a great boost to reaching those goals together Fourth TIP THE VALUE SYSTEM Invite the team to create and rely on a shared value system Talking about values and principles explaining each to everyone s meaning is a strong element for understanding each other how people act or react in a certain way and for feeling safe It permits the whole team to be themselves Don t forget to let everybody confirm the common values you make together online How to do this In a team session ask the team members to think about their values and principles which are important Timebox it with 15 minutes and let them write down the results 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In the next step ask everyone which value they want to add to a team s common value system It should be the most important one for them and they should be given time to explain why it is their favourite They should use a formulation like I want to add the value ____ because ____ Then ask the others if they understood the meaning and the context of the stated value and if they agree to integrate it into their value system If so ask how to formulate the value or the expression that describes the value at its best and write it on a flipchart or a whiteboard When all values are documented on the board ask the team how to name it which title they want to use and ask for a consequence of the value system that the team or a team member will break The consequence should come out of the team and be written on the board with the values before The picture of the whiteboard can be integrated as a background to the virtual team room The magical moment created Creating a common value system builds a trustful room self confidence and an open atmosphere where people can be authentic and honest and speak directly from their souls Be prepared to find new potential in your team when formerly calm people raise their voices 88 Fifth TIP EMOTIONS A workshop in the online world is a special space that you may create and design with care It demands your cognitive abilities on a high level so you have to consider integrating a variety of different impulses triggering the conscious and unconscious minds and indeed emotions We have five senses we can engage in when addressing our emotions to support an effective learning environment this leads to a deeper connection between you and the participants it leads to real personal growth If you get to this point you will realize the true meaning of being a team KEY MESSAGES FROM THIS CHAPTER Above all you will recognize a special flow within the team That s the moment when the team discovers its soul and rides its team wave Practical online issues the lower status of online work the lack of personal connection and the distractions at home all hinder you Guest author Jens Emrich von Kajdacsy Team and Leader Serendipity has a lower chance to occur online than offline ship coach www jensemrich de Include different tastes and smells to expand the user experience Use strong visual language like pictures and colours to create a familiar space for your customers Decorate your room your background and yourself by carrying hats or clothing that fits your event topics Tell a story I mean everyone likes stories that have a message And music is a fantastic medium to transport feelings and flood a room with special kinds of energy The point is that it is already difficult enough to recognize and react to emotions in person all the more we should focus on this point in the online environment And remember our senses often lead to emotions so why not engage all our senses in a workshop to support an effective learning climate The magical moment created The emotional state of workshop participants is a great determinator for their insights and the workshop s outcomes Our senses trigger our limbic system which is the home of our emotions so this means we can create emotional moments by using them Moments of sorrow and rage fear and joy And ONLINE INNOVATION Online video conferencing can t compare with in person interaction as it drains your energy In the next chapter Ten rules for online innovation we will guide you further in facilitating innovation online helping you deal with the challenges that online work creates for facilitators project leaders and online project teams We will also support you in creating magical moments to motivate the elephant as you will understand in a moment All leads to lower engagement from the participants during online workshops We compared offline workshops at a special venue The Achilles heel of online workshops can create and experience a group flow You need to create magical emotional moments especially in an online project 89 THE ACHILLES HEEL OF WORKING ONLINE

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Working remotely you encounter advantages and pitfalls Some people love working online for its freedom flexibility and productivity while others hate it because they miss social interaction struggle with new tools and become exhausted by the virtual experience To be sure moving from in person to online workshops is one of those dramatic shifts that you only experience every once in a while The two primary questions are What do you need to help people change the way they do things How can you be more effective when starting online innovation 92 CONSIDER BOTH THE RATIONAL AND THE EMOTIONAL SIDE We like to use the metaphor that appeared in Switch 1 a book about change Imagine a person riding a six ton elephant who wants to lead it to a lovely lake He manages to guide it thanks to his intention abilities and strong control Indeed the elephant walks reliably up to a certain point After a while he is tired and does not know how much further he has to walk and whether he will get there before nightfall Moreover a series of tree trunks on the path make it necessary for him to exert a tremendous effort to proceed in short he no longer wants to continue So even if you ve never ridden an elephant you can still imagine how things will end if the elephant doesn t want to move Now let s find out who these two characters are the rider is our rational mind the one that expresses willpower makes plans defines actions for change analyses data and makes conclusions while the elephant is the emotional mind the one that maintains energy intuition enthusiasm fear sadness and all our other emotions This story tells us that there are three conditions to facilitate any change Motivate the elephant engage the emotional part so that it puts all its energy into motion and works alongside us Direct the rider indicate the direction and support the rational element to take action Shape the path remove obstacles from the environment Why do we love this metaphor Going online needs a shift in mindset We have suddenly found ourselves to be beginners again despite our long experience The perimeter and therefore the circumstances are entirely diverse ONLINE INNOVATION RULES MAKE THE JOURNEY SIMPLE They result from our online experience and many mistakes but mistakes are part of life aren t they And this is how we learn You ll find the ten rules in a logical order of before during and after your innovation workshops or journey Start applying the ones you feel are the most suitable for your situation and challenge The ten rules we describe in this chapter will help you engage the emotional side online set a clear direction online and shape the online environment to obtain a seamless online innovation journey We ve chosen the following ten rules out of dozens we ve tested based on their effect on the online innovation process CHART RULES BEFORE DURING AND AFTER YOUR INNOVATION WORKSHOPS OR JOURNEY BEFORE 1 DO A TECH ONBOARDING 2 KEEP THE DIGITAL BOARDS SIMPLE 3 SEND STUFF FOR ENGAGEMENT INSPIRATION AND FUN DURING 4 CO FACILITATE 5 LET PEOPLE INTERACT FREELY 6 USE A STAR MODEL FACILITATION 7 ENGAGE PARTICIPANTS EMOTIONALLY 8 MANAGE THE ONLINE TIME 9 SET CLEAR INSTRUCTIONS TO DIRECT THE RIDER 93 TEN RULES FOR ONLINE INNOVATION AFTER 10 MOVE TO ACTION WITH THE FOLLOW UP

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BEFORE The online preparation phase aims to create all the enabling conditions in your technical set up effective planning and knowledge Online workshops require more careful preparation than in person ones because there are so many more issues that can jeopardize your workshop s success 1 Do a tech onboarding Depending on whether you are using a methodology that is applied in a three hour workshop or during a 12 weeks series the onboarding workshop can be longer or shorter from ten minutes before the workshop starts up to one hour or two or three days before the beginning of your online innovation project Why To ensure that the participants know the tools so they may be fully involved in the workshop and that participants unexpected tech issues won t slow down your workshop Online workshops are significantly more reliant on technology than in person Technology issues can have a ripple effect on your innovation journey Even if you are only using a video conferencing tool there are several audio video and connection issues you may encounter when facilitating The question is not if they will happen but which ones and to what extent So when facilitating online you need to be prepared for these types of issues and have a plan in mind in case they happen Send the participants all the information they need both in terms of hardware log ins sign up pages links and tips and then check synchronously In our experience the four main things to check are 94 Connection of course A high speed connection allows participants to have the video on and use collaboration tools Otherwise you will have variable geometry workshops with people coming in and out There are ways to increase band width to suggest to your participants before the workshop check the router s location because it can encounter interferences like other wireless devices or obstructions like doors and walls reboot it before starting and shut down back ground apps that are consuming bandwidth A quick solution to suggest is to set the mobile phone to a data network for the videoconference tool and the computer uses wifi to access the collaboration board to free up the bandwidth If you have the possibility use a cable connection because wired connections have better internet speed than wireless ones Audio and video Do a quick check to make sure everyone can be seen and heard clearly Interacting with impassive or live but soundless pictures hinders engagement Again use mobile phones for videoconferencing and computers with wifi for collaboration boards or you can use computers for video and phone for audio to increase your audio quality Browser Some browsers match better with specific tools for example Chrome for Miro Mozilla for Jitsy Also check that everybody has updated the browser to the latest version Check it before the workshop rather than in the middle of the process when someone says Help My board is frozen I can t move anything anymore In some cases participants will have to download it on the spot so consider the time needed Participant s experience The tools ability level of your participants may vary Check the people s practice with it on some basic features you will use ONLINE INNOVATION 1 Raise a virtual hand chat writing screen sharing on videoconferencing 2 Effectively navigate and use the essential features on a digital collaboration board 3 Let them experiment how to switch from videoconferencing to the board as you will probably do so often during your workshop These checks will allow you to redesign some of the interaction forms or if you do this just before the workshop to quickly switch to more straightforward ways Plan at least a twenty minute buffer in each workshop for tech reasons Prepare an alternative plan tech wise and be sure you have agreed beforehand with your stakeholders what to do if you can t solve the technical problem TIP Do a trial run with colleagues or friends to get an idea of the whole experience 2 Keep the digital boards simple Environment shapes behaviours So create an environment that helps participants have a pleasant online journey Remove frictions and set up tasks in the simplest way possible Digital collaboration boards are one of the main tools in online innovation for solving problems and generating ideas Everyone needs to be able to work on them quickly and be productive However working on online collaboration boards is potentially more difficult for many reasons If you don t have two screens you have to continually change your view from the Zoom or whatever videoconference tool you are using to the board to read the instructions and do the assignments To 95 follow the process and work on a board you have to zoom in and zoom out all the time which is fatiguing for your eyes Finally the risk of miscommunication is higher in online processes because there are fewer opportunities to ask questions Keeping a digital board simple means essentially to care about three aspects design activities and instructions Design For beginners the route of the process should be straightforward and intuitive Design your board in a compact working space limit it to what is necessary and make sure that people move around as little as possible Define a logical flow for example from left to right and from top to bottom so that participants can predict where the next step will be without feeling lost in space on the board Display the different workshop steps on the board separated into boxes since they are on the agenda you sent in advance If people have to brainstorm set up a dedicated working space for each person so that while they are writing post its they don t overlap with each other When you divide people into break out rooms prepare in advance the board work areas write the group s number or nickname and insert the participants names and photos Activities Start with simple tasks that require minimal actions from the participants for example drag and drop items that you have already placed on the boards When they become more confident you can ask them for more complex actions If participants need to upload files consider having them sent to you via chat or even by email if that is easier for them so that you can upload them Set up all the elements needed for the task post its grids kanban and mind maps so that people do not have to copy or duplicate them TEN RULES FOR ONLINE INNOVATION

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Instructions Write instructions in a simple way next to the space to be used by the participants if you have many groups working simultaneously copy the instructions next to each workspace In the instructions especially if asynchronous work is required you should always write and show information visually WHAT e g Find the space with your name and photo Write down as many ideas as you can think of related to the problem statement HOW e g Select the arrow on the toolbar to the left of the screen to write on a post it WHEN e g Ten minutes You can use the boards timer to make time apparent to everyone The board s design defines the modus operandi with your users and can determine whether or not a workshop is useful Spend some time on this phase three or four hours to set up a board for a workshop that lasts two hours is not too long especially if you are a beginner You can design templates and then improve and adapt them from time to time After a while you will be impressed by your design power and take on more challenges The leading collaboration tools have ready made templates that you can import or take inspiration from a smart tool is Boardle with which you can find templates divided by workshop type 3 Send stuff for engagement inspiration and fun What is the thing we most suffer from having been catapulted into an online life The lack of in person relationships of course And the second one Second is the lack of tactile experience the objects we used during our workshops markers papers to hang on the walls billions of post it notes and artefacts of various kinds Nostalgia aside objects serve to inspire develop creativity give a sense of solidity and feel a real connection to what we are doing Touch taste and smell are the senses that are missing in the online world Especially if you are about to embark on a long innovation journey you can send participants at the beginning of the trip a physical toolbox It will be a pleasant surprise an act of care and a call to concreteness To inspire you below are some ideas for composing your five senses toolbox more on this in Chapter 5 to send before kickoff It will make participants feel like they are present in the room by sharing a concrete live experience Ensure the objects activate all five senses take care of the packaging and enclose an intriguing note Use the common unwrapping moment together in the kickoff to present each step of the route TIP Set the board s start view for newly invited members whenever possible so that your participants won t get lost on the board at the beginning Block all elements on the board boxes graphics instructions to keep the layout as you imagined it 96 ONLINE INNOVATION 97 TEN RULES FOR ONLINE INNOVATION

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CHART HOW TO COMPOSE A 5 SENSES TOOLBOX A wellness kit scented candles bath salts room aromas oils soaps A book connected to the methodology you use or this one A novel related to the places the environment the trip or simply that has inspired you and you want to share We like Raymond Queneau s novel Exercises in Style the same story retold in 99 different ways to look at things from different perspectives Posters with canvas templates to use in asynchronous work the FORTH innovation map the Lean Canvas the Business Model Canvas One whiteboard for creative activity or a prototype Card decks to use during icebreaking or creative tasks for example Dixit 2 Method cards 3 or Superpower cards 4 Objects to use during tasks for inspiration an innovative object the storyteller cubes Gadgets an hourglass to measure time as the ancients used to do a magnifying glass to observe reality better A notebook a bullet journal with pencils stickers and washi tape for artistic notes 98 Delicatessen for the palate s joy a sweet and savoury mix representing your land or something related to the company or the route TIP Send your box in time to the various destinations to ensure that everyone has received it before the kickoff and can participate in the magical unwrapping moment ONLINE INNOVATION DURING These rules serve to immerse participants in an online environment where they can feel at ease share generate ideas co create and enjoy a seamless experience to the fullest 4 Co facilitate No matter how much of a tech lover expert or nerd you are running a remote workshop is a hard job Therefore we recommend always having a second person facilitating the workshop to help you with the technical issues In this way one of the facilitators can focus on the process looking at the participants more or less weak signals and decide if there is something that needs to change We have experimented a lot with both It s not impossible to run an online workshop on your own even for groups of 20 people it s just that a large part of your attention will be on making sure the flow is smooth from a technological point of view You ll have to answer all the questions on how to use the tools Plus any technical problems with one of the participants will stop the flow of the workshop A tech facilitator is a person who also knows the process and can identify alternative solutions on the spot to guarantee results at any stage of the process Here is a checklist of the primary tech facilitator s activities The important thing is that you have rehearsed the flow first and have agreed on an effective way of dealing with each other during the workshop and how to deal with the most common contingencies Watch out Even tech facilitators may also suddenly disappear from the workshop make sure they have a wired connection and be prepared 99 TIP If you can t have technical support you might get light help from one or two persons in the group that helps keep things running smoothly and improve team cohesiveness and engagement The activities you can assign to them are to chat check set times and support the less experienced participants in using the tools CHART TECH FACILITATOR ACTIVITIES CHECKLIST BEFORE 1 Supports the facilitator in preparing the boards and other necessary tools like polls and surveys 2 Facilitates the tech check 3 Sends an email to the participants explaining the facilitator s role DURING 1 At the beginning of the workshop explains how video conferencing works and how to use chat reactions and polls 2 Checks that people are on mute and if necessary puts them on mute 3 Asks people to unmute if necessary 4 Reads the chat continuously to see if there are any requests or difficulties TEN RULES FOR ONLINE INNOVATION

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5 Makes links and other resources available to the participants via the chat 6 Shares the screen to show slides boards or other tools 7 Sets music if scheduled when people are working in together alone mode after checking that nobody gets disturbed by the music 8 Sets the timer for activities 9 Manages icebreakers and some of the energizers 10 Imports documents to be entered by participants if they fail to do so themselves 11 If needed prepares and launches voting workshops and supports people voting and shows the results 12 Can write post it notes for participants to make the flow smoother 13 When using break out rooms prepares and activates the BORs checks that everyone is in supports people sends broadcast messages warns five minutes before closing them and checks everyone has logged in And during BORs the tech facilitator monitors that people are able to work with the tools 14 Sets up the boards after the exercises AFTER 1 Updates the boards with new tasks 2 Supports people in asynchronous work 3 Sends materials after the workshop 100 5 Let people interact freely Innovation is a co creation process for which people have to interact confront each other generate ideas test solutions and define actions together Compared to in person workshops it is more critical to change settings in online innovation processes because in the plenary the interaction is regulated in a very structured way to not slide into delirium People are sitting in front of a screen and depending on the tool you use they may or may not see each other there is little movement no informal communication it s challenging to wink at your neighbour without being seen by everyone and the idea of always being on stage even if you are participating in a meeting are all very relevant That s why Rule 5 is to recreate differentiated online settings to allow people to interact freely in small groups You can do this with break out rooms virtual rooms where you can split your group into subgroups What can people do in BORs Look each other in the face Interact informally Explain their doubts Come up with crazy ideas Collaborate synchronously on a tool Laugh Comment on one s personal environment You can find this feature in Zoom which was the first to implement it successfully and in our experience the easiest and most flexible way From early 2021 it has also been possible in Microsoft Teams and Butter You can find an overview of these tools in Chapter 12 We recommend choosing tools that offer the BOR option in an online innovation process If your group is bigger than eight people in a two hour workshop you have to foresee at least one moment of free interaction in a BOR When people don t know each other always provide break out rooms of two in a moment during the workshop because it allows everybody to interact in the workshop In the online tools you can set a casual mode that randomly puts people in the BOR or can define how to divide people into subgroups And with most of the tools you can prepare the rooms in advance You can use the random option for a big group in which people do not know each other and you want to allow a more personal exchange in pairs or triplets Homogeneous groups allow people to have more confidence and interact However to have different perspectives new ideas and contamination you have to mix all these elements and make heterogeneous groups by hierarchical level functions technical skills and nationality How long in the BORs It may seem like magic to you to make five ten or twenty groups with a simple click and with the same ease to make them return to the plenary sitting avoiding scanning names repeating them going around the groups and calling everyone back These actions are more or less time consuming depending on the level of tech savoir and discipline of the group However the process is less fluid than in person people find themselves thrown into a virtual space without the reference group and facilitator So start with simple tasks and little time three to four minutes To continue make sure people have time to interact even in a less structured way In the following table we have indicated the time intervals needed to interact effectively in the BOR based on our experience The actual time planned depends on the topic and task you assign and how clear simple and structured it is ONLINE INNOVATION 101 In particular this is a chance for introverts to have their say and for people from more and less disciplined cultures to interact together Number of people Per BOR Times In minutes 2 to 3 From 3 to 10 4 to 5 From 5 to 15 6 to 8 From 10 to 20 9 to 10 From 15 to 25 With groups of more than four people define a moderator per group to keep time and structure and report on the group s results when needed TIP Have the BORs scheme ready during the workshop and prepare the first set in advance Use broadcast messages to give necessary timing or instructions go around the rooms to facilitate the work 6 Use a star model facilitation Even if you have extended experience as a facilitator of inperson innovation processes you should rethink your facilitation style to be effective online Why Silence with people looking at the screen can become awkward and immediately divert attention to the reality in which people find themselves There can also be audio delays causing overlapping speech Suppose people talk freely with all microphones on In that case it creates much confusion TEN RULES FOR ONLINE INNOVATION

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Use also non verbal methods of communication In this way there can be many questions and comments among the group and the facilitator will decide what to bring to everyone s attention Ask for frequent feedback This is one method that works best online and allows you to get ideas reactions and moods quickly Use quick polls and surveys to promptly and efficiently collect group feedback Allow participants to share their feelings There are several ways to facilitate the emotional experience When you use a methodology which lasts only a few hours a short moment of sharing how do you feel can be enough You could ask to share an emoji on the video chat or share it 102 ONLINE INNOVATION connected joyful jolly rebellious unique worried empathetic energised happy 103 grateful Turn taking the facilitator calls the participants one at a time avoiding overlapping This is not saying that you should ban online horizontal conversations Instead it would be best if you facilitated discussions between participants to make them smoother For example you can ask one person in the group to answer a question or stimulate a comment by taking over the process 7 Engage participants emotionally An innovative mindset grows according to the team members focus and energy Without feeling emotions there s no energy for change and innovation Engaging online is more difficult because people don t breathe the same atmosphere never entirely in the same setting as would be the case with in person workshops Zoom fatigue is also a real phenomenon as we discussed in Chapter 1 linked to the difficulty of accessing non verbal language which causes stress in our brains People are engaging in multitasking activities checking emails or chat and being distracted by their environment as you read in the previous chapter It s easy to get overwhelmed by online tasks and tools switching from videoconferencing to other tools and back again How can you facilitate emotions supporting your change and motivate the elephant to focus its energy on the target on a simple mood board on your digital collaboration board If you are using a longer methodology we recommend spending more time to enable conversations about emotions and give them their rightful place in an innovation journey Use different tools to collect feedback in real time for example a quick Mentimeter survey to display answers in fun visual ways restless What are the best practices for doing this online TIP During the workshop especially if you are using a together alone technique which we discuss in chapter 4 keep the board chat open to facilitate non verbal interaction without going to the video conference chat Have a list of people s names available since you may not have all of them visible on the screen open minded engaged love and a disturbing environment with the unwanted side effect that introverts may never find their space to contribute if nobody gives them the floor What is star model facilitation about It means a centralized model in which interactions among people in the group are mainly the moderator s responsibility As a facilitator you have to direct communications to create a smooth and equally clear and neat flow brave daring curious Surprise and create a WOW effect You can do that by creating an immersive and personalized experience which enhances a sense of belonging Create an environment that combines functionality and beauty Activate the child side the repository of emotions through play Collaboration boards are a very suitable tool for this purpose where you can include cartoons images and videos or create virtual rooms with Wonder me Spatialchat or Butter to make people feel connected as explained in Chapter 4 Plan moments of informal exchange during the journey Plan informal moments during which people can talk over coffee or a glass of wine Get people to drop the cognitive part a bit and engage the body our emotion detector Creativity also needs a change of perspective looking from the outside rather than from the centre visualizing In an in person workshop the setting changes are also physical when you move from plenary to small groups in a horseshoe arrangement or around tables in small groups This is not the case online where people are sitting or standing but always looking at the screen and not moving Getting up and moving away from the computer makes everyone feel much more connected and positively affects wellbeing So you can ask people to connect by their phones and go for a walk together or ask them to get up from their chairs to pick up objects in the shortest possible time and show them to the group Use music as a togetherness enabler for energizers and informal moments When you know each other better you can even dance altogether Video off is not an option when trying to engage people TEN RULES FOR ONLINE INNOVATION

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TRY IT Daisuke Yukita senior interaction IDEO designer has created a Remote High Five system 5 We ve never tried it yet The author says that it tracks the participants hand positions through the computer s camera and plays clap sounds when your on screen hand high fives someone else s He states that Remote High Five is now one of the iconic moments of the workshop Check out the video on Vimeo com WOW TIP Start with tiny steps small movements of the face or the head in a mime 104 8 Manage the online time Forget in person time and enter another dimension Why In terms of fatigue one hour in person feels like two hours online so our remote workshops need to be shorter When taking our FORTH innovation methodology online we learned that eight hour online workshops were a disaster Time online waiting to do something is boring and has the immediate effect of getting people into multitasking reading emails and typing WhatsApp or WeChat messages The initial ten minutes of talking as introduction in an in person workshop with everyone together in a room can be only three minutes maximum online As people organize back toback meetings online you have to start and finish sharply on time and we strongly suggest you schedule the length of your online innovation workshops to a maximum of three hours It means that you might have to rethink your innovation process and redesign your workflow to include synchronous and asynchronous activities depending on the tools objectives the participants and their knowledge During synchronous online workshops the pace has to be faster because people interact less and multitask much more quickly than in person Plan short and frequent activities four to six exercises can be done in a three hour workshop divided into more straightforward five ten minute steps ONLINE INNOVATION Time is king and the agenda is the queen so be accurate to the minute In the online agenda you must also plan slack time for technical issues difficulties in using tools and transitions between tools and devices As you are dealing with humans you have to include the unexpected in your agenda Let s see how In Rule 1 we said that a buffer of 20 minutes should be left for additional tech issues let s say ten minutes per hour In concrete terms this means putting a few extra minutes for each task on the agenda If one person fails to complete a task the workshop slows down for everyone so include detailed explanations of how to use the tools in your agenda Switching from one tool to the next entering and exiting virtual rooms swiping from a conversation in Zoom to Miro and vice versa sharing the screen and even unmuting are all time consuming activities Consider these transitions in your schedule as well In our experience you need to add three to five minutes to each transition depending on the participants experience with the tools and the number of people present With eight people three minutes is sufficient but allow five minutes if you have more than fifteen people in the online workshop Have frequent breaks Take breaks more often than when you do in person workshops at least one break every 40 to 60 minutes because the rhythm is tight and people are engaged in short and frequent activities Timebox How often have you heard this word It gives you an idea of what you have to do to facilitate online Define timeboxes and get people to move from one to another Using shared timers that everyone can see is a great resource to keep activities to their planned duration You can find them on Miro or Mural When it looks like a hyper structured process reconsider the whole flow in the diary is smoother An innovation workshop couldn t be only a succession of timeboxed tasks Check the engagement activities from Rule 5 of this chapter and see how the magic comes true TIP Put activities on the agenda that you know you can skip without affecting results because they will also constitute a time buffer 9 Set clear instructions to direct the rider Do you remember the introduction story Direct the rider To ensure a seamless experience you need to be clear every step of the way Be redundant Say it make an example show it and repeat and explain how the final output will look Don t be afraid of over communication Write the instructions on the digital collaboration board as well as explained in Rule 5 Share your screen to show the necessary steps online and to avoid questions and interruptions 105 TEN RULES FOR ONLINE INNOVATION Let s take an example of one of the most useful techniques online voting It always takes more time than scheduled After all it is only a few clicks As soon as you start voting people ask you where the thumb up is because they don t see it in the bar at the bottom of the screen Participants in the online workshop who were not active need to refresh Someone will vote and close the screen without having clicked the done button The result is that often at the end of the given time some have voted others not So share the screen and show all the necessary clicks calmly You will save a lot of time and frustration on the part of your participants

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Show the outputs Share the canvasses the matrixes and the mind maps you need to use and explain how to do it practically How do I write on a post it How do I copy a link in the chat How do I add branches to mind maps Share the rules Depending on your workshop you can either communicate the three essential rules Video on mute on use the chat to communicate or send a complete document with proper online etiquette Choose all the options between We have collected and selected practices from which you can choose Depending on the countries culture and organisation you are working with you can decide how many items to include in your netiquette checklist We suggest you start with a maximum of six items to avoid the paralyzing effect of receiving a list of 20 rules Then if you see that you need more you can always update your list Here are some of the items you can have in your online meeting etiquette 2 Familiarise yourself with the tools you re going to be using Have a quick tour of the video chat or online whiteboard tool so you can be productive in the workshop 3 Call in from a quiet well lit location 4 Arrive on time if not a little early so you can iron out any audio visual equipment issues before starting 106 19 Please wait for the facilitator to give you the floor online it only takes two people overlapping to create confusion 6 Use a headset or earphones when possible to minimize echo and background noise 7 Turn off notification sounds also for the facilitator 8 Set microphones to mute when not speaking 20 Read what s in the chat so as to not repeat questions 9 Shut down other devices taking up bandwidth if possible to help ensure a stable connection 21 10 Turn webcams on whenever possible it s nice to see your face Though bear in mind that in low bandwidth environments turning off the camera can help with call quality 11 Keep the video chat open to interact with people 12 If you participate in the office with your colleagues be sure that each of you is connected with its PC 13 Use nonverbal means to indicate when you would like to speak for example raising your hand in your video conferencing software or using built in hand up features Read the agenda and the instructions beforehand and come to the meeting prepared During presentations or longer discussions try to add questions or thoughts to the chat channel and avoid interrupting Test your audio so you can be heard just after logging in CHART NETIQUETTE CHECKLIST 1 18 5 14 Respect break time to the minute 15 Be engaged Listen to whoever is speaking communicate in the chat channels and use the online collaboration tools 16 Close extra tabs unless necessary and remove distractions like email notifications 17 When speaking do so slowly and clearly Practice brevity whenever possible ONLINE INNOVATION Giving feedback nod and real thumbs up are signs that you are listening Source Adapted from Workshoplab https www workshoplab com blog online energizers set good online meeting etiquette AFTER Now that you have done an outstanding workshop keep up the energy and engagement of your participants and keep the pace up in the next stages 10 Move to action with the follow up An online experience is both short and intensive What happens after the workshop is just as important as the activities you have done during the workshop The innovation process cannot end at this stage you must review the work done gain more insight engage people for the asynchronous work between the workshops and get feedback to improve subsequent experience workshops Online follow up is more manageable than in person because all outputs are available in digital format which makes further use very easy Define virtual spaces to share resources Whether you are using a short or long process you need to 107 follow up to continue the discussion after the meeting is over to bring the action to life Find channels where you can continue the asynchronous work These can be a MS Teams channel or the digital boards you have collaborated on or with tools like Padlet and Trello Share the results and topics for discussion with the participants and share the video recording with those who could not make it to your workshop or other interested relevant stakeholders Download or screenshot all significant board outputs and put them in a shared space Update them on the progress of the asynchronous work showing screenshots Set up the board so that participants can retrace the workshop s flow whenever they return to it Be open to having an additional workshop to support people in using the tools It can be a 45 minute plenary meeting with the whole group or an optional workshop involving only those who feel they need more practice to participate It will speed up and smoothen your follow up process Keep a virtual water cooler open A virtual watercooler is a channel where people can stay connected after the end of the project learn and have fun It could be done via a MS Teams channel or with apps that you can add to your Slack like Donut Watercooler or even a WhatsApp group as we often do to make it extremely easy You just need to provide the space without facilitating it the more spontaneous the better Use the following chart to keep to the rules that are most important to your innovation process TEN RULES FOR ONLINE INNOVATION

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CHART RULES TECHNIQUES TOOLS MATRIX RULE WHY WHEN TECHNIQUES TOOLS RULE WHY WHEN TECHNIQUES TOOLS 1 Tech Onboarding workshop Because technology can make either your dreams or worst nightmares come true Always Use the chat function All tools used during your workshops 7 Engage participants emotionally Because emotions enable change and innovation When your innovation journey is longer than a three hour workshop Using questionnaires surveys Design a Virtual Room Use Music 2 Keep the board simple To encourage everyone to interact and make the innovation journey seamless When people use collaboration boards for the first time Design a virtual room Visualize Boardle Klaxoon Miro Mural Trello Howspace Wonder Me Butter Miro Mural Spatial Chat Spotify Agenda To surprise and create a WOW effect At the beginning of the journey Because workshops are shorter and you re less flexible Always 3 Send people real life stuff 8 Manage time more strictly online Sessionlab Miro Mural 4 Don t facilitate it alone Because you need to be focused on the process Always Co facilitation SessionLab Calendly 5 Let people interact freely in small groups online To give the opportunity to interact for more introverted participants and to have more informal conversations When the group is bigger than six people Break out rooms Zoom MS Teams Butter Wonder me Spatialchat 6 Use a star model facilitation in plenary settings 108 Wrap it in a charming way Post offices and express couriers Working synchronous and asynchronous Anonymous voting To be more inclusive and to speed the process When people don t know each other Questionnaires surveys Anonymous voting Bulk mode in Miro to generate ideas without Klaxoon Miro Mural Tscheck In distraction ONLINE INNOVATION Use Bulk mode in Miro to generate ideas without distraction 9 Set clear instructions To prevent people from interrupting the workshop with continuous requests Especially when people use tools for the first time Record videos to explain tasks or to instruct participants Loom Toonly SessionLab Speechelo 10 Follow up To keep energy and engagement high and move to action When you have asynchronous work Using questionnaires surveys Dropbox Google Form Howspace Mentimeter Miro Mural Padlet Slack Trello Working synchronous and asynchronous 109 TEN RULES FOR ONLINE INNOVATION

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KEY MESSAGES FROM THIS CHAPTER Online innovation is a new process with many potential pitfalls linked to technical issues you often can t control Having rules to follow makes the journey more straightforward for you and your participants 1 C Heat and D Heat Switch how to change things when change is hard Random House Business Books GB 2010 2 https print and play asmodee fun dixit 3 https www ideo com post method cards 4 https madeby sypartners com products superpowers carddeck variant 1098868541 5 https www ideo com blog how to get free and feel inspired whenworkshops are remote In setting your online environment you need to consider both the rational and the emotional sides to be effective Because of the lack of social interaction among people emotional engagement is challenging online so you need to use the right rules You cannot control technology so have a plan b c and d You can put each of the rules into practise with different tools and techniques You can find them in Chapters 3 and 4 choose the ones you feel most comfortable with To understand which steps are the most critical for you you have to experiment There are many ways to co create online with participants even if they have few technological skills Choose rules that allow you to do it quickly The simpler the better based on your participants technological skills and habits Calibrate the use of technology The possibilities are endless even in simplicity 110 ONLINE INNOVATION

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CONTENTS CHAPTER 7 P 114 INNOVATION METHODS CREATE COMMON P 130 4 BUSINESS MODEL CANVAS LEARNINGS P 130 WHAT IS THE BUSINESS MODEL CANVAS P 115 CHART OVERVIEW TEN ONLINE P 131 INNOVATION METHODS P 132 AND WHY USE IT ONLINE PROCESS BUSINESS MODEL CANVAS CHART ONLINE BUSINESS MODEL CANVAS STEPS TECHNIQUES AND OUTCOMES P 116 1 PROBLEM FRAMING P 116 WHAT IS PROBLEM FRAMING P 134 5 PRETOTYPING AND WHY USE IT P 134 WHAT IS PRETOTYPING AND WHY USE IT ONLINE PROBLEM FRAMING P 137 ONLINE PRETOTYPING CHART ONLINE PROBLEM FRAMING STEPS P 139 P 118 P 122 TECHNIQUES AND OUTCOMES P 123 P 123 P 124 P 140 CHART THE PRETOTYPE CANVAS WHAT IS THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE P 141 6 PURPOSE LAUNCHPAD DECK AND WHY USE IT P 141 WHAT IS PURPOSE LAUNCHPAD AND WHY 2 THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE DECK APPLYING THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE DECK ONLINE P 125 CHART ONLINE PRETOTYPING STEPS TECHNIQUES AND OUTCOMES USE IT P 143 CHART ONLINE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE THE PURPOSE LAUNCHPAD PROCESS ONLINE TECHNIQUES AND OUTCOMES P 126 3 LEAN STARTUP P 147 7 THE CIRCULAR DESIGN PROCESS P 147 WHAT IS THE CIRCULAR DESIGN PROCESS P 126 WHAT IS LEAN STARTUP AND WHY USE IT P 128 ONLINE LEAN SPRINT P 148 CHART ONLINE LEAN SPRINT STEPS P 148 P 129 AND WHY USE IT TECHNIQUES AND OUTCOMES THE ONLINE CIRCULAR DESIGN PROCESS CHART CASE STUDY THE MILAN FOOD POLICY P 149 KEY MESSAGES FROM THIS CHAPTER ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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INNOVATION METHODS CREATE COMMON LEARNINGS More elephants the blind men and an elephant The parable of the blind men and an elephant originated in the ancient Indian subcontinent from where it has been widely diffused It is a story of a group of blind men who have never come across an elephant before and who learn and conceptualise what the elephant is like by touching it Each blind man feels a different part of the elephant s body but only one part such as the side or the tusk They then describe the elephant based on their limited experience and their descriptions of the elephant are different from each other In some versions they come to suspect that the other person is dishonest and they come to blows The parable s moral is that humans tend to claim absolute truth based on their limited subjective experience as they ignore other people s limited subjective experiences which may be equally valid From a Wikipedia search for Blind men and an elephant Innovation requires a method to expand your perception of reality to develop many ideas to hold on when you feel lost on your journey to get feedback from customers and to co create in a structured way Innovation is a shared learning process from which its participants get an open mind and a greater awareness of the business the market the customers and even themselves Exchanging challenging and working together is the basis of the We innovation process as we like to call it instead of Innovation Quoting Gijs van Wulfen you can invent alone but you can only innovate together 114 Since there are no in person connections among the team when innovating online using structured methods helps to guide you keep the pace and monitor your progress on the innovation journey Remote working limits the exchange and cross pollination between individuals making serendipity difficult and creates obstacles against effective innovation processes And since we work remotely the innovation methods we use are also online Working remotely powerfully affects established organisations innovation processes The lack of in person connection gives more freedom flexibility and quality of life However you run the risk of anarchy Rigorous and structured methodologies will prevent that You cannot use innovation methods tout court without tailoring and adapting them to the online setting Innovating online means maintaining the creative power of each method in a remote setting It is more important to modify activities times and tools to keep the strength of a method intact than to remain faithful to it in an online setting You cannot copy a method from in person to online but you need to understand the essence of transforming and adapting it for online use culture and skills with the ability to deliver much more creative power Chapters 3 and 4 described tools and techniques to work synchronously and asynchronously to stay connected and to govern complex innovation processes Online innovation enhances iterative and fast paced methodologies The methods described below are iterative have rapid and repeated cycles and give continuous feedback From this point of view online methods empower these processes because they provide teams whether in a company or a startup with tools to collaborate simultaneously and rapidly share work immediately combine parts of the process asynchronously and moments of decision making and alignment synchronously Many startups already know this because their teams are dispersed worldwide but it represents a quantum leap for organisations to work in person You will find seven methodologies in this chapter The Lightning Decision Jam Design Sprint and the FORTH innovation method have dedicated chapters respectively Chapters 8 9 and 10 because we consider them very critical for online innovation CHART OVERVIEW TEN ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS DISCOVERY CXD IDEA GENERATION PROBLEM REFRAMING PRETOTYPE AND TEST DESIGN SPRINT PRETOTYPE LDJ LEAN START UP Using online methodologies allows you to control simultaneity and complexity and to stay more connected BUSINESS MODEL CANVAS FORTH With online methods you can work efficiently in different settings with tools that amplify and enhance people s skills by giving them the possibility to be creative in an easy and inspiring way With fewer costs and effort comes the opportunity to have more diversified teams in terms of experience ONLINE INNOVATION We have experienced directly and through the experience of other practitioners around the world that online innovation works and is consistent with a lean way of working We ve chosen ten online innovation methods that can bring you innovation in a structured rigorous way Three innovation methods for short online workshops Problem Framing the Customer Experience Deck CXD and the Lightning Decision Jam LDJ Two methods for online innovation sprints of a week or less Pretotyping and the Design Sprint Five methods for online innovation projects in which we feature the FORTH innovation method Lean Startup the Business Model Canvas the Purpose Launchpad and the Circular design process META METHODOLOGY WITH EXPLICIT SOCIAL IMPACT 115 THE PURPOSE LAUNCHPAD THE CIRCULAR PROCESS ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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All these methods have incorporated the principles of design thinking Design thinking is a multidisciplinary humancentred approach with at least three phases 1 Discovery by listening and observing 2 Idea Generation leading to out of the box ideas 3 Prototype and Testing of new solutions with users METHOD 1 PROBLEM FRAMING Don t use it if you quickly fall in love with solutions CXD Problem Framing and LDJ are more focused on the discovery phase Pretotype more on the pretotype and test phase while all the other methods embrace all the three phases Some of them are for startups or specific phases of a company such as Purpose Launchpad and Lean Sprint But they can very well be used by organisations that want to innovate products or services Others such as the CXD give insights into the way people within teams perceive their customers Some like the FORTH innovation methodology effectively boost an effective start of innovation The Purpose Launchpad and the Circular Process are meta methodologies combining various other methods to thrive social impact How is this chapter structured In this chapter you will find a brief overview of each method and why to use it As our focus is online innovation we explain the online process describing tools and techniques you need to apply to run any one of them successfully For each of the methods you will find a chart in which we list the method s steps the online techniques used the timeframe and the outcomes The listed steps are specific for each method We do not describe all the activities for example check ins energisers and breaks that are necessary for every online innovation process For this you can check Chapter 6 which gives you an overview of the ten rules you need to apply in all online innovation processes The Lightning Decision Jam the Design Sprint and FORTH are explained in Chapters 8 9 116 Problem Framing is a framework based on design thinking principles and methods used to understand define and prioritise complex business problems and help stakeholders make better decisions fast 2 and 10 Our focus is on how to apply the methods and facilitate them online maintaining their effectiveness If I had an hour to solve a problem I d spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and five minutes thinking about solutions This quote of Albert Einstein explains the 55 5 rule which is the superpower of problem framing What is Problem Framing and why use it Problem framing helps to define the right problem at the beginning of an innovation process Many of you experienced the situation in your own company or as a consultant that the problem you re trying to solve seems to not be the right one which you discovered only after spending time and money In business we have many examples of products or services not addressing the right problem This usually happens because we are doers instead of living the discomfort of addressing the problem we d start working toward a solution Additionally solutions are usually copies of our past successful experiences However it is not wise to assume that what worked in a certain situation in the past will work again in the future Thinking about our switch from in person to online collaboration for example the right question wasn t how to replicate methodologies using video conferencing but how to brainstorm at a distance while engaging people online Use it before any innovation process to determine whether a problem is relevant or not for the company and the market build alignment among the team over the problem and have a clear shared definition of the real issue you re going to work on The Problem Framing Power You can apply problem framing to attain alignment and a shared vision before an innovation process so that you may better explore a defined problem or explore the company s future vision The Challenge The challenge is to frame a real problem Don t stop at the first statement Try to reach the essence of the problem by asking yourself more Why questions Investigate your assumptions during the process and verify that your team is convinced about the outcome The three main phases are 1 Establish a business need The goal is to deliver a shared definition of the requirements in a factual statement 2 Contextualise the business and user perspective by gaining insights into how this problem affects your organisation and your customers 3 Reframe the Problem D Spradlin first explained the idea of problem framing in Harvard Business Review 1 The Design Sprint Academy then developed it as a preliminary step in running Design Sprints to ensure effective outcomes ONLINE INNOVATION The output is a clear and shared problem statement to start the ideation phase 117 The Slow Elevator Problem 3 Imagine this You are the owner of an office building and your tenants complain about the elevator It s old and slow and they often have to wait Several tenants are threatening to cancel their leases if you don t fix the problem When asked most people quickly identify some solutions replace the lift install a stronger motor or perhaps upgrade the algorithm that runs the lift These suggestions fall into what I call a solution space a cluster of solutions that share assumptions about what the problem is in this case the elevator is slow This framing is illustrated below PROBLEM FRAMING THE ELEVATOR IS TOO SLOW SOLUTION SPACE SOLUTION FINDING MAKE THE ELEVATOR FASTER INSTALL A NEW LIFT UPGRADE THE MOTOR IMPROVE THE ALGORITHM However when the problem is presented to building managers they suggest a much more elegant solution Put up mirrors next to the elevator This simple measure has proved wonderfully effective in reducing complaints because people tend to lose track of time when given something utterly fascinating to look at namely themselves ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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The mirror solution is particularly interesting because it is not a solution to the stated problem It doesn t make the elevator faster Instead it proposes a different understanding of the problem Note that the initial framing of the problem is not necessarily wrong Installing a new lift would probably work The point of reframing is not to find the real problem but rather to see if there is a better one to solve The very idea that a single root problem exists may be misleading problems are typically multicausal and can be addressed in many ways The elevator issue for example could be reframed as a peak demand problem too many people need the lift at the same time leading to a solution that focuses on spreading out the demand such as by staggering people s lunch breaks Identifying a different aspect of the problem can sometimes deliver radical improvement and even spark solutions to problems that have seemed intractable for decades Source Thomas Wedell Wedellsborg Are You Solving the Right Problems Reframing them can reveal unexpected solutions HBR January February 2017 Who should be involved in a problem framing workshop You should aim to include a diverse mix of relevant stakeholders in the company those who can make decisions afterward people who are bringing different perspectives and competencies those who are struggling or have been working for an extended period with the problem and people with a fresh view It s essential to have enough diversity of opinion as problem framing works best with different perspectives and when people don t drive straight to the solutions Both vision and expertise are needed 118 Online Problem Framing This methodology works exceptionally well online The advantages are that you can quickly connect relevant stakeholders with no travel costs and scheduling complications You can send in advance research or data should you need it for the internal or external analysis You have all the steps in a digital format And you can apply many of the online techniques as we ll explain later Which tools do you need Online Whiteboard tools for realtime collaboration You can use Miro or Mural to collaborate online in realtime with all participants These tools have handy features like digital post it notes voting and a timer And a great feature in Miro is the Bulk mode which allows participants to contribute individually without being distracted from what others are writing When preparing your board in advance follow the general rules on setting your board as mentioned in Chapter 6 You can also find a predefined template for Problem Framing in Miro and one for problem statement in Mural You can upload them and adapt them to your needs There s also a predefined template on Trello an easy collaboration board upon which the team can share ideas Videoconferencing for communicating During your workshops you can use a video conferencing tool We suggest Zoom or Butter These tools have break out rooms to split participants into smaller groups Collaboration in execution To follow up with the team you can use a tool like Slack which offers various communication options such as channels private groups and direct messaging You can share documents and files across teams and in a one on one format Also Google drive fits the purpose of sharing files ONLINE INNOVATION Another tool is Padlet where you can compile documents links and images with team members Tools for preparation and instruction In one possible set up among many you can use SessionLab to set your agenda and share it beforehand with your team Calendly to book the workshop with the team and Loom a video messaging tool to get your message across through instantly shareable videos about how to use the tools or to illustrate the steps Tools for making the workshop interactive You can use Tscheck in a simple tool to start a conversation on a personal level by asking questions or Mentimeter to do instant pools and Q As to make your online workshop interactive You can find a complete description of these tools in Chapter 3 The online duration of problem framing can vary enormously from a short 90 minute workshop to a six hour workshop divided into two sessions Here we explain the 90 minute to three hour process For the longer sessions you would spend the additional time going deeper into the contextualisation phase to better understand its issues and customers Problem framing can be divided into three phases to fit the online setting 1 Establish the business need 2 Contextualise it into the business and into the user perspective 3 Problem reframing 119 1 ESTABLISH THE BUSINESS NEED In this phase you have to understand what the needs of any given business are that you are prepared to address The goal is to deliver a shared definition of the requirements in a factual statement It is important that everybody is on board and that participants have both time to express their ideas and to discuss and challenge them You can divide this phase into four steps 1 Individual brainwriting on the business needs Participants think individually and get inspired by what others write 2 First problem framing The facilitator asks Why and How questions to get to the root of the problems transforming vague statements into more concrete ones 3 Affinity mapping The facilitator asks the group to cluster all the items into similar groups to see if the team can add more elements to the problem 4 Choosing criteria using for example the business impact effort matrix and then voting on it At the end of this phase you will have drafted a concrete problem statement 2 CONTEXTUALISE THE PROBLEM ON YOUR BUSINESS CUSTOMERS The two steps of this phase are 1 Understand the impact on your organisation Here you can use a great variety of tools like SWOT analysis or Business Model Canvas to answer the effects of the problem on your business and set a future vision You can do this by individual brainwriting to fill in the matrix or canvas ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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You can use brainwriting for the different steps of the Customer Journey Map Now you need to match the business and customers to see the overlap Use the insights gained to transform the problems into challenges with the How Might We questions The How Might We HMW question template is popular in Design Thinking The HMW questions should be specific and linked to what you learned during this phase Define them broad enough not to address the solution too small and positively draft the question after collecting all the HMW questions the team votes for the more relevant one CHART ONLINE PROBLEM FRAMING TECHNIQUES AND OUTCOMES 3 WRITE A PROBLEM STATEMENT Now it s time to reframe your problem using the top voted HMW question to write a problem statement There are two steps to take 1 Write problem statements Each person in the team writes a problem statement individually and then shares it with the team A good complete problem statement should contain four elements Who is having the problem What is the problem When is it happening what is the context Why is it important to solve why will we or our users care Please apply the 40 20 10 5 rule State your problem in 40 words Cut it down to 20 then to 10 and end up with a 5 word problem statement PHASE STEPS TEMPLATES ONLINE TECHNIQUES TIME 90 min 3 hours OUTCOMES 1 ESTABLISH THE NEED Brainwriting First framing Affinity Mapping Vote Together alone and Bulk mode for brainwriting Anonymous voting 15 to 30 minutes A shared definition of the needs in a concrete statement 2 CONTEXTUALISE THE PROBLEM EXPERIENCED BY YOUR BUSINESS CUSTOMERS Understand the organisation impact SWOT Business Model Canvas Customer Insights Protopersona Empathy map Customer Journey Map Lightning Demo Break out rooms to work on the different part of the templates Bulk mode Chat function 60 to 120 minutes Impact on the organisation Persona description Overlaps between the two 3 WRITE A PROBLEM STATEMENT Individual writing Voting Together alone to write the problem statement Anonymous voting 15 to 30 minutes 122 ONLINE INNOVATION A clear problem statement with a common language to share 2 Participants vote for the most relevant problem statement In the chart on previous page you can find the phases of problem framing with the techniques you can use online For a complete description of all techniques check Chapter 4 METHOD 2 THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE DECK Don t use this if you think that feelings are merely hairdressers chat What is the Customer Experience Deck and why use it The Customer Experience Deck CXD was created in 2019 by Jeremy Dean to help teams build a shared understanding of their customers 4 It s a simple nine step process to build your customers shared vision and start innovating the customer experience You can apply it to create a shared understanding of the client s needs and get insights on the critical elements of the desired customer experience and how you can work together to shape it You can then integrate it in other more structured methodologies in the FORTH innovation method in the Observe and Learn phase before the customer friction interviews or in the Business Model Canvas in the Customer relationship section Another way of using the CXD is to innovate internal practices and working starting from the customer experience So it s the first step in the discovery phase Afterwards use other online innovation methods to continue The CXD is a nine micro step process that leads a group to identify a customer segment they want to work with and 123 understand the customers desired and undesired feelings In the first seven steps participants individually address the question How do we want our customers to feel and how do we want them not to feel This question triggers a process of description discovery and sharing of the team s customer experience aiming to align the vision Through the detailed description of the emotions you want to elicit with your product or service you create a common language and gain valuable insights The Customer Experience Deck workshop must be attended both by people involved in the customer experience and others whose work is not related to it It is also essential that decision makers join in to follow up on the actions defined The first phase involves identifying a customer segment or proto persona on which to focus the trigger questions Individuals work in subgroups to choose the relevant emotions explain their vision share the facts and evidence upon which they base it and verify assumptions It ensures that there is alignment on the desired experience at the end of the workshop and how to detect it When the groups come back to the plenary workshop vote to identify the five top emotions they want to focus on in two areas the one they would like their customer to feel and the one they don t want their customers to feel In the next phase the team works on a canvas to identify the signals which detect emotions among customers and the actions and good practices to introduce You can complete the workshop by reconstructing the customer journey map to identify the three most important moments in your customer s journey or interaction with your business ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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The CXD Power The CXD can be a great starting point for developing innovation based on the client s needs It helps organisations to adopt a customer centric approach in all areas The Challenge CXD is a method of gaining insights into one s customers but on its own it is unlikely to trigger a process of innovation Keep the focus on the evidence the team has Don t let too many assumptions invalidate the process Invite people to ask customers directly Applying the Customer Experience Deck online You can apply CXD via a two to three hour online workshop depending on the group size That could be between 10 to 20 people if you re able to divide them into break out rooms If you are working with a large team and want to add the Customer Journey Map you need to run another 60 minute workshop the following day Tools for preparation and instruction You can use SessionLab to set your agenda It is not necessary to explain the process in advance because it is very simple and made to be entirely synchronous Tools for making the workshop interactive As with every innovation method making the workshop interactive requires an onboarding phase It should be concise and could encompass the storytelling of experiences with clients in different situations You can use Mentimeter for a quick poll In the following chart you can find the main steps and techniques for the Customer Experience Deck for each phase CHART ONLINE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE TECHNIQUES AND OUTCOMES PHASE STEPS ONLINE TECHNIQUES TIME 2 h 4 h 3h 1h OUTCOMES OUR CUSTOMERS IDENTIFY YOUR CUSTOMERS PERSONIFY Together alone to brainwriting in silence Anonymous voting to choose the customer segment 10 to 15 minutes The customer segment or the Protopersona is selected HOW DO WE WANT OUR CUSTOMERS TO FEEL PRIMARY FEELINGS FRINGE FEELINGS Participants split into break out rooms to sort out the related feeling cards Synchronous sharing with the large group Anonymous vote Chat function to communicate during the workshop 30 to 60 minutes Agreement on the top five primary feelings and top five fringe feelings the team or organisation wants customers to feel HOW DO WE WANT OUR CUSTOMERS NOT TO FEEL PRIMARY FEELINGS FRINGE FEELINGS Participants split into break out rooms to sort out the related feeling cards Synchronous sharing with the large group Anonymous vote Chat function to communicate during the workshop 30 to 60 minutes Agreement on the top five primary feelings and top five fringe feelings the team or organisation doesn t want your customers to feel CANVAS EMPATHY How do we know our customers are feeling this ACTIONS To help our customers feel insert feeling we need Participants split into break out rooms complete the Customer Experience Canvas Share synchronously with the large group Anonymous vote Chat function to communicate during the workshop 20 to 45 minutes CUSTOMER JOURNEY MAP The most important moment of the customer journey Ways to amplify positive feelings and remove the negative ones Participants work together alone writing the three most important moments in their customer journey of interaction with their business Choose cards on different journey steps Anonymous vote Synchronous work to ideate ways to amplify positive feelings and eliminate negative ones Chat function to communicate during the workshop 30 to 60 minutes Which tools do you need Online Whiteboard tools for realtime collaboration We use Miro to run the CXD but Mural works just as well to collaborate online in realtime On the board you need to upload the card and the canvas template then set up each phase at a different area of the board to allow sufficient space for participants to work on You can read general rules on how to set your whiteboard in Chapter 6 Videoconferencing for communicating As for the Problem Framing method you can use video conferencing tools with break out rooms as you need to divide participants into smaller groups Zoom or Butter work well 124 ONLINE INNOVATION 125 ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS Three most important moments of the Customer Journey and ideas to amplify the positive feelings

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METHOD 3 LEAN STARTUP Don t use it if you want to slow down and take your time What is Lean Startup and why use it Lean Startup is a methodology for developing businesses and products The Lean Startup method was originated in 2008 by Eric Ries 5 using his personal experiences adapting lean management and customer development principles to high tech startups The method combines experimentation iterative product releases and validated learning The Lean Startup method seeks to increase value producing practices during the earliest phases of a company to have a better chance of success It emphasises customer feedback over intuition and flexibility over planning The five principles of Lean Startups are IDEAS LEARN 126 BUILD DATA 1 Entrepreneurs are everywhere 2 Entrepreneurship is management 3 Validated learning 4 Innovation accounting 5 Build measure learn Lean Startup aims to shorten product development cycles and avoid developing a product nobody wants The Lean Startup method is not about cost it s about speed But how long it takes to go from an idea to a successful business will vary greatly among sectors Unlike typical yearlong product development cycles Lean Startup eliminates wasted time and resources by developing the product iteratively and incrementally The iterative feedback loop is a three step process neous clusters on the MVP identifying the relationship between improvements made to the product and the drivers of the growth model Based on the data it is decided whether to persevere with continuous improvements or to make a major change to test a new hypothesis PRODUCT MEASURE The Lean Startup Power In this method you learn by doing and what you learn comes from the most important source your market and customers The Challenge You always need to have a clear broad view you ll be pushed to explore as many directions as possible which might create chaos that is very hard to deal with for you for the development team for management and eventually even for your customers The Lean Startup process has four phases and is supported by the Lean Canvas a template designed and tested by Ash Mayura to guide and monitor the process In four phases the solution is developed in line with the customer problem and validated PROBLEM SOLUTION FIT 1 Understand the problem or better love the problem 2 Define the solution b Target customers and the early adopters c The unique value proposition It will be revised several times In the initial phase you must define the broad and specific scope not calibrated in the middle of the market to catch everyone d The solution to solve the problem for one or more target customers At this stage the solution does not have all the details of implementation e The channels of distribution f The revenue streams They already include price because it is an important element of the MVP validation defining the target customers g The cost structure with the current operational costs h Key metrics i The unfair advantage It s something that cannot be easily copied or bought by your competitors As you can imagine the canvas s design is also an iterative process so not every box has to be filled at the first shot when developing your idea In defining the solution the next step is to rank your business model to three types of risks Product Risks Customer Risks Market Risks Technical feasibility Customer Pain Level Ease of reach Market Size Price Gross Margins Assemble the Problem Team Solution Team Developing a minimum viable product MVP the version of a new product which allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort plays a crucial role in Lean Startup The goodness of the MVP is not measured by its efficiency but by its ability to generate learning The measure of a startup s progress is in fact learning The speed of execution serves to transform leap of faith assumptions into metrics to be validated rapidly The validation of the assumptions takes place through innovation accounting This method requires acquiring accurate data through feedback from cohorts homoge PRODUCT MARKET FIT 3 Validate qualitatively 4 Verify quantitatively a The problem a list of the three main problems and existing alternatives in other market segments Before moving on to Product Market Fit you formulate a falsifiable hypothesis a statement that can be proven wrong It means that it should be measurable and contains numbers Validate qualitatively and verify quantitatively In this method as in pretotyping there is no need to have a lot of quantitative data but to proceed by approximations Strong negative signals tell us to change something and positive signs urge ONLINE INNOVATION 127 ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS Based on the results of the validation and the lessons learned the process is reiterated The Lean Canvas 6 is a model adapted from the Business Model Canvas by Ash Mayura containing the following nine boxes

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us to continue to verify through quantitative data In the validation phase the most important element is to correlate the feedback to characteristics and features because the final product does not yet exist It is necessary to know in which direction to go Furthermore validation data must be accessible to all involved The validation process continues parallel to the development of the solution in an ongoing process Online Lean Sprint Although it was born for startups this methodology can be usefully applied to companies that need to innovate their offer The team must be diversified and include people with complementary experience skills and thinking attitudes The enthusiasts and the critics and above all the decision makers should all be involved publish a landing page and a video or an article explaining your offer There are also tools developed to help you design your pretotype and prototype Some examples described in Chapter 3 include Marvel which allows you to turn any sketch or image into an interactive prototype for an app or website and Toonly which is an animated explainer video creator that you can use to create simple videos to provide information on your solution and how it works When you need to test your ideas online and collect feedback from customers Google Forms allow you to do this in a simple and versatile way The various online phases models and techniques are described below from a remote Lean Startup team s perspective CHART ONLINE LEAN SPRINT STEPS TECHNIQUES AND OUTCOMES PHASE QUESTIONS STEPS MODEL TEMPLATES ONLINE TECNIQUES TOOLS TIME OUTCOMES PROBLEMSOLUTION FIT Do I have a problem worth solving Will they pay for it Can It be solved Understand the problem Define the solution Problem framing or Job To Be Done 7 Lean Canvas The ones used in Problem Framing Synchronous team brainwriting on each section of the canvas Together alone on the Unique Value Proposition Lightning Demo to collect data Leave the Canvas available so team members can add resources afterwards Visualise Two hour online workshop having the problem framing workshop Job To Be Done interviews Top three problems PROBLEMSOLUTION FIT Identify the riskiest parts Rank your business model to product risks customer risks and market risks Lean Canvas Synchronous work with break out rooms to identify the product customer and market risks Two hour online workshop Top three solutions PRODUCT MARKET FIT Have I built something people want Validate qualitatively Verify quantitatively Pretotype Problem Interview Solution Interview Dashboard Pretotyping Make a Video Virtual Room Every three to five days an online meeting to share results and iterate the model A continuous feedback loop with the customer Which tools do you need Online Whiteboard tools for realtime collaboration Use an online whiteboard tool like Miro or Mural to collaborate online with all the participants You need to prepare all your boards in advance and upload the templates you need for example the Lean Canvas Videoconferencing for communicating We already mentioned Zoom and Butter because they are easy to use and provide breakout rooms Collaboration in execution As mentioned at page 118 some useful tools to follow up with the team involved are Slack Google drive Dropbox and Padlet Tools for Prototyping and Testing Here you can use a great variety of tools like social media YouTube to make a video explaining your new product or service and Linkedin to 128 ONLINE INNOVATION 129 ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS Existing alternatives

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METHOD 4 BUSINESS MODEL CANVAS Don t use it if you want to think outside the nine boxes What is the Business Model Canvas and why use it The business model generation process is a well known methodology developed in the 2000s by Alexander Osterwalder 8 His best known tool is the Business Model Canvas BMC used to map business models and understand where the competitive advantages risks and opportunities lie It s applied to make better shared decisions on an everyday basis monitor the evolution of different areas of the model and make incremental changes in your offerings The well known nine blocks of a BMC are 1 Customer Segments You can have one or several For whom are we creating value 2 The Value Proposition The way an organisation solves customer problems and satisfies customer needs What value do we deliver to our customers 3 Channels The way an organisation delivers its value proposition through communications distribution and sales channels Through which channels can we reach our customer segments 4 Customer relationship The way the organisation communicates with the customers What type of relationship does each of our customer segments expect us to establish and maintain with them 5 Revenue streams The revenue streams generated by the value proposition For what value are our customers willing to pay 6 Key resources The resources are necessary to create and deliver the value proposition What key resources do our value propositions require 7 Key Activities What key activities do our value propositions require 130 8 Key partnerships Who are our key partners Who are our key suppliers 9 The Cost Structure The fixed and variable costs What are the most important costs inherent to our business The BMC is also a methodology to innovate a company s offer or business model because it allows us to identify specific areas from which to innovate There are four areas of the canvas from which innovation can spark 1 Resource driven when an organisation expands its business model using existing infrastructure or partnerships For example during the first phase of the pandemic Innova 9 an Italian startup from Brescia had the idea of installing 3D printed respiratory valves on Decathlon diving masks thus making up for the lack of respiratory machines Decathlon supported the company by providing the CAD model and supporting engineers to integrate the project in the best possible way 2 Offer driven when innovation starts from your offer For example schools in many countries have changed their teaching processes through online teaching because of Covid 19 3 Customer driven based on customer needs such as the apps created to manage queues at supermarkets where there were restricted entrances due to the pandemic s safety measure 4 Finance driven innovations driven by new revenue streams pricing mechanisms or reduced cost structure On a newspaper website the customer does not have to have a subscription anymore but can pay for each article he wants to read at a minimal fee invoiced immediately ONLINE INNOVATION The Business Model Process Power The BMC can be applied in a lot of ways for ideation for visual thinking or for scenario analysis Moreover the canvas itself can be integrated with other innovation methodologies In Problem Framing you can apply it in the initial phase of defining the problem to be solved In the Blue Ocean strategy you can use the canvas to identify which strategy to create value and not compete on costs The Challenge As the business model process is structured and integrates many models and tools you could get stuck in the analysis phase We suggest implementing it in an iterative way to build better versions of itself every time You define a new business model in five steps 1 Mobilise when you prepare create awareness and momentum defining the team 2 Understand when you research and analyse elements needed for your business model design 3 Design when you transform your ideas into a pretotype to validate them 4 Implement when you put into practice what you ve designed in your model 5 Manage when you adapt and modify your business model in response to market feedback There s no fixed duration It could take you a few hours a few days or a few weeks when you iterate the process The Business Model Process s output is a clear complete and shared canvas with nine essential elements of the new business model plus pretotypes or prototypes to be tested and clear and defined actions with the team on how to proceed 131 Online Business Model Canvas Process The Business Model Canvas process is already used online in the case of remote teams From this point of view all the ten techniques described in Chapter 4 can be applied because in the process there are moments of alignment and engagement of the team ideation visualisation and storytelling decision and design of the solution Tools You can use many of the tools already mentioned when explaining the previous methods on this chapter Online Whiteboard tools for realtime collaboration we suggest Miro or Mural On Boardle you can find a ready touse Mural Canvas template other templates are available in Miroverse by Miro Videoconferencing for communicating During your BMC workshops you can use a video conferencing tool providing break out rooms We suggest Zoom or Butter Collaboration in execution Slack Google drive Dropbox or Padlet work well Tools for preparation and instruction Use SessionLab to set your agenda and co create with co facilitators Calendly if you need to share your calendar with the team and Loom to make nice videos about how to use the tools or to illustrate the steps Tools for making the workshop interactive You can use Tscheck in a simple tool to start a conversation at a personal level by asking questions ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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Tools for Prototyping and Testing Here you can use a great variety of tools already mentioned on page 128 of this chapter social media to communicate your new offering tools developed to help you design your prototype and pretotype like Marvel and Toonly Canva to create graphical pretotype in an easy way Google Forms for when you need to test your ideas online and collect feedback from customers CHART ONLINE BUSINESS MODEL CANVAS STEPS TECHNIQUES AND OUTCOMES PHASE ACTIVITIES MODELS ONLINE TECHNIQUES TIME OUTCOMES Source our elaboration from A Osterwalder Y Pigneur Business Model Generation John Wiley Sons Inc DESIGN Brainstorm Prototype Test Select Business Model Canvas Business Model Patterns Ideation Visual Thinking Prototyping Pretotyping Scenarios Evaluating Business Models Strategy Managing Multiple Business Models Synchronous and Asynchronous brainstorming Anonymous voting Visualisation Break out rooms Together alone Two to threehour workshop New ideas Pretoptype Prototype IMPLEMENT Communicate and involve Execute Business Model Canvas Visual Thinking Storytelling Managing Multiple Business Models All the techniques explained in Chapter 4 are suitable for this phase It depends Business Model implementation MANAGE Scan the environment Continuously assess your business model Rejuvenate or rethink your model Align business models throughout the enterprise Manage synergies or conflicts between models Business Model Canvas Visual Thinking Scenarios Business Model Environment Evaluating Business Models All the techniques explained in Chapter 4 are suitable for this phase Ongoing An ongoing process of validation and adaption Hoboken New Jersey 2010 Page 255 265 PHASE ACTIVITIES MODELS ONLINE TECHNIQUES TIME OUTCOMES MOBILISE Frame project objectives Test preliminary business ideas Plan Assemble team Business Model Canvas Storytelling Problem framing Team and engagement building through synchronous work and engagement tools Visualisation for the storytelling phase Make videos to explain the process and the tools One to two hour workshop An energised innovation team Shared objectives methodology and tools Common language An engaging story Asynchronous work people collect and sharing data Synchronous collect learnings Break out rooms Lightning Demo It depends UNDERSTAND 132 Scan environment Study potential customers Interview experts Research what has already been tried Collect ideas and opinions Business Model Canvas Business Model Patterns Customer Insights Visual Thinking Scenarios Business Model Environment Evaluating Business Models ONLINE INNOVATION Shared learning on the market customers and technology New business model patterns 133 ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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METHOD 5 PRETOTYPING Don t use it if you want to rely on your dreams for a long time the reality check could be hard What is Pretotyping and why use it Pretotyping is a method to quickly and economically validate whether your idea is worth pursuing in your innovation process The word Pretotype is a neologism created by Alberto Savoia 10 It is a fake product or service you want to realise that simulates and precedes the real one The main reason to use it is to make sure you are building the right It before you build It right It aims to see if the market is interested in a product or service before investing too much time and resources in developing an innovative idea Pretotyping is also a way to test if you are suitable for the product that you possess the energy commitment and motivation in the case it happens to be a success The starting point of a pretotype process is that you have an idea and write it as a simple concept with a target customer and an ideal price Before investing much money in a real prototype and a launching campaign you collect feedback from your potential market by doing market experiments Pretotyping was initially developed at Google in 2010 Since then it has evolved by the continuous practice of many organisations and practitioners worldwide There s an online professional community 11 that is spreading and experimenting with the method developing tools to apply it and extending its scope to everyday life Instead of getting lost in thoughts and procrastinating you can also try to pretotype your habits before deciding whether they are the right ones as Saibelle Khaibeh says in the first episode of the official Pretotype podcast on Spotify 134 Let s start from the beginning In his lecture at Stanford 12 Alberto Savoia describes seven main elements 1 Obey the law of market failure as data show that most of the new ideas will fail in the market even if competently executed 2 Make sure you are building the right It before you built It right The right It is a product that if competently executed will have success 3 Don t get lost in thoughtland the land of opinion because opinions are biased and have no value without data 4 Trust only on Your DAta YODA Data collected yourself satisfy the criteria of freshness relevance trustworthiness and significance 5 Pretotype it Build a simple artefact or technique to collect YODA very quickly and inexpensively 6 Say it with numbers Concretely express your hypothesis for example X of Y market will do this 7 Think global test local Start as soon as possible to test and to get your first data The Pretotype Power The power of pretotipying is to reverse the classical approach from If we build it will you buy it to If you buy it we will build it You can do that by putting together intuition and math rules to get relevant data quickly and cheaply The Challenge One pretotype experiment is not enough to validate an idea depending on how much you have to invest you need to do at least three to five You also need to choose the right market in which to test the pretotype and to not make the pretotype phase last too long ONLINE INNOVATION Pretotyping is a five step process 1 Isolate the key assumption define what the premises of the new idea are The first step would be to write your idea in a simple statement for example The Magic Mirror displaying music news and the day s agenda Then it would help if you wrote a market engagement hypothesis for example In the morning instead of watching your phone or tablet while preparing yourself for the day you can have music news and your agenda written on your mirror so when you brush your teeth shave or apply makeup you can comfortably read it We suppose this is the output of using the problem framing methodology a design sprint or divergent idea generation phase and a convergent phase where people chose the ideas refined the concept and put it down transparently 2 Make your market engagement hypothesis concrete and verifiable by clear and quantifiable assumptions You need to transform this market engagement hypothesis into numbers and a specific testable market hypothesis the XYZ hypothesis This is a tricky step because it s not easy to preview your market share So what you need to do is to identify the minimum percentage of the market you need to make your product worth developing Accordingly write your XYZ hypothesis this way At least X of Y market will do Z For example At least 10 of people with a two bathroom house will buy a mirror with a display for 100 euros How can this be tested it in the world Check out the next phase 135 3 Hypozoom think about how you might test locally quickly and inexpensively while staying true Hypozoom means to zoom in on your potential market until you find a representative XYZ on a smaller scale that you can test quickly and more comfortably with participants not being your friends and family For example At least 10 of the people living in San Siro Milan will buy a 100 euros magic mirror In this way you can collect data that satisfy the criteria of freshness relevance trustworthiness and significance At this point you have the market hypothesis and you should find an easy quick and effective way of testing with a pretotype 4 Choose a type of pretotype Plan it Test it In this phase you choose the best technique to validate the data and build the pretotype costs and time There are different types of pretotyping techniques depending on the product service or target audience you can find them in the book The Right It and choose the most suitable one for you The crucial point here is that when you think of a technique you have to evaluate so called skin in the game an engagement action made by your potential client that shows interest in the product and validates your hypothesis That s the critical point together with the XYZ hypothesis of this method because almost everyone is so in love with their ideas and doesn t like having them disconfirmed by others That s why when pretotyping the facilitator will explicitly ask the group to think about skin in the game concrete actions of you and your future customers What are examples of skin in the game Give a personal email address or phone number give time and attention pre order something provide money to buy something right now introduce the pretotype in your offer and share with clients The most valuable skin in the game actions ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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Smart Nutrition Scale Smart Scale works with Alexa to offer hands free instant access to nutritional information for thousands of ingredients and food based on weight Paired with an Echo Show you can also view nutritional information at a glance Alexa remembers your frequently used foods and defaults to those items Simply say Alexa ask Smart Scale how much sugar is in these blueberries or Alexa ask Smart Scale to weigh 200 calories of blueberries would be giving money to have the product as Tesla customers did to ensure they will have a model Still it could also be considered valuable to provide a real email address a telephone number or giving time to talk about the product or even show them to your client Thumbs up or down likes and smiling faces on social media are not relevant as these reactions conversion rates are unproven Amazon s Build It how to get skin in the game from future customers Build It is a brilliant example of pretotyping from the world s e commerce leader Amazon announced that periodically they would present some concepts asking customers which they want to see built It not only requests an opinion to enter the program but also that you should also put skin in the game by pre ordering it If a concept reaches its pre order goal in 30 days Amazon will build it and those who pre ordered it will be among the first to get their hands on it at a special price Customers will be charged if and when the product ships If the pre order goal is not met the product will not be built and people won t be charged It s low risk high reward and a whole lot of fun Below you will find two examples from their first day edition Smart Sticky Note Printer Using voice to print technology this hands free smart sticky note printer that works with Alexa makes it easy to print your shopping lists to do lists reminders calendar events or fun items like puzzles All you have to do is ask The printer uses thermal technology so it never needs ink or toner and paper rolls are easy to refill 136 to remain objective in interpreting the results The best way is to compare them with the group that designed the product and the pretotype and with someone else in the company As Alberto Savoia quotes Reid Hoffman the founder of LinkedIn said If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product you ve launched too late Pretotyping is used to obtain the rapid validation of your hypotheses It is an iterative method so be ready to repeat it change features attributes turn it inside out and use all the creative techniques that can be useful to adjust it after the first results The exciting thing is that you do this after you have your relevant data from the market Source www aboutamazon com Pretotyping amazon gift cards Here we go I joined Amazon as a data engineer on the gift card team It bothered me that gift cards and the emotions attached had such a short lifespan After claiming the balance the gift card had no use I had an idea I chugged a coffee and grabbed a stack of builder tools napkins straws and scrap paper After a couple of hours I had the pretotype you see A napkin as a book and a folded napkin as a bookmark gift card saying Keep reading Love Mom and I was embarrassed But I stopped random people in random buildings for feedback over the next hour to get my go no go data People loved it I had the right It 5 Analyse the data make tweaks repeat the process The last phase of the method is data analysis You can do it by rating the feedback you had from your sample in terms of skin in the game intensity from the zero value opinion or comments on social media to a small value validated email 1 point a cash deposit 50 points or a real paid order 250 points Time is also considered a way of putting skin in the game because people s time is precious The basic idea here is that quality data connected to your hypothesis and linked to engaged potential customers are infinitely more valuable than a tremendous amount of data with no skin in the game At the end of the process you put your data on a TRI meter The Right It meter to interpret the data you collect as objectively as possible This is a five scale metric for the likelihood of success varying from very unlikely 10 to very likely 90 At this point you have to look at the results of the pretotyping experiment and place them on the ladder according to whether they are far below your hypothesis in line or far above Since it is not a question of applying a mathematical formula it is crucial ONLINE INNOVATION Within months we launched our new Gift marks in five countries and were awarded two patents They are still available I truly believe innovation can be paralysed due to fear of embarrassment How many ideas never become something anything tangible Are they all terrible ideas or are we too scared to take that first step 137 Source LinkedIn post by Farzad Darouian Principal Product Manager Data Engineering Core Inventor and Patent Holder ex Amazon 13 Online Pretotyping Let s take the pretotyping process online The team consist of those who came up with the idea and all those who can present elements to falsify it Therefore mix experts in technology market segment product service people with a higher vision of the business and people from other departments and business areas For a startup this is more difficult because the whole team is firmly committed to the cause Still you can decide to invite some outsiders in some of the phases for example the one when you perform hypozoom or when you analyse the results of the first experiments and put them in a TRI meter In applying this method you can use all the online innovation techniques described in Chapter 4 to work and co create together ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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Tools for making the workshop interactive like Tscheck in or Mentimeter Here you find a way to go through the different steps If you re pretotyping inside a company share the approach method Online Whiteboard tools for realtime collaboration mentioned on page 118 of this chapter for example in Boardle you can find a predefined template for pretotyping made on Mural see the box the pretotype Canvas Tools for Prototyping and Testing mentioned on page of this chapter like YouTube Linkedin Marvel Toonly Canva and Google forms ONLINE PRETOTYPING STEPS TECHNIQUES AND OUTCOMES Videoconferencing for communicating with break out rooms like Zoom or Butter The online steps could be done both in synchronous and asynchronous ways as shown in the picture Which tools do you need Collaboration in execution like Slack Google drive Dropbox Padlet PHASE QUESTIONS STEPS MODEL TEMPLATES ONLINE TECHNIQUES TIME OUTCOMES TURN AN IDEA INTO AN OBJECTIVE XYZ WORKSHOP Formulate the XYZ hypothesis Hypozoom to formulate an XYZ PRETOTYPE CANVAS see box in this chapter Working synchronously Asynchronous vote the XYZ hypothesis Working in small groups in break out rooms Lightning Demo to collect data to formulate the hypothesis One to two hours Make a market engagement hypothesis that is concrete and verifiable by clear and quantifiable assumptions Define the pretotype technique Set up the pretotype Define the skin inthe game Basic Pretotype techniques Asynchronous work Making Videos to show how the pretotype works 30 to 60 minutes A pretotype to collect YODA with skin in thegame Asynchronous workgroups in competition to gain quicker and more relevant YODA It depends on how long it takes to build a pretotype and get data that makes sense YODA Break out rooms where subgroups share the YODA they have and decide where to put it in the meter Two hours Go for it Drop it Tweak it What is your X of Y market that will do Z something at a certain price PRETOTYPE PRETOTYPING PROCESS GO FOR IT IDEA MEH Output of Ideation process or other innovation methods XYZ WORKSHOP TRI METER WORKSHOP Which pretotype best suits my experiment PRETOTYPE EXPERIMENT PRETOTYPING EXPERIMENTS Experiment Experiment Experiment Are customers buying it SYNCHRONOUS ASYNCHRONOUS SYNCHRONOUS TRI meter DROP IT TWEAK IT 138 techniques and tools upfront Collect concerns to understand which phases you need to focus on most ONLINE INNOVATION How likely is it that this pretotype experiment would generate this data 139 TRI Meter WORKSHOP Share YODA Put it into the TRI meter Decide TRI Meter ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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We Interviewed Chris Callaghan UX Director at McCann Manchester who designed a Canvas to go through the different phases of the pretotype method You can use it since it is on Boardle 14 He taught it to a remote team of 20 students at Hyper Island Manchester in a two hour workshop where students designed a set of pretotypes to be tested in the following hours Immediately following the workshop one group of students launched a pretotype with the fake door pretotyping method They used Facebook ads to drive people to a landing page with sign up as a measure of interest CHART THE PRETOTYPE CANVAS In the Canvas below you can see the phases and how he divided them into chunks and timebox As you can see boxes are pretty short Although it was an educational setting when developing real pretotypes it seems like an oxymoron time should be short because the hypothesis is a first guess something that makes sense to your business but not necessarily the result of an extended analysis and research process Chris divided the team into subgroups of four each of which developed a different idea going through the phases When they were in subgroups they briefly discussed the assignment then the plenary shared the results to be put on the canvas So at the end of the workshop each group had a ready to test pretotype One of the students challenges in the room was to think about the pretotype to develop This may require additional time and asynchronous thinking in a dedicated pretotype ideation phase 140 ONLINE INNOVATION 141 METHOD 6 PURPOSE LAUNCHPAD Don t use it if you think the purpose is a buzzword What is Purpose Launchpad and why use it Purpose Launchpad is an open methodology and a mindset to generate and evolve early stage initiatives into purposedriven organisations to make a significant difference It was developed by Francisco Palao with the input of more than 150 contributors around the world 15 It was designed to help people build purpose driven organisations and evolve their mindsets to become explorers who will discover the right path to create a new organisation business product or service that will make a positive impact in the world It works for startups or teams with an early stage idea It is also applicable to established organisations that want to transform themselves into purpose driven organisations It is a metamethodology meaning that it includes many innovation frameworks and methods like design thinking design sprints agile and scrum It s like having a toolkit with all the tools inside and you only take certain tools when applicable depending on the situation within the organisation The Purpose Launchpad is a holistic approach meaning that you work on eight interconnected key areas Purpose People Customer Abundance Viability Processes Product and Metrics There is no clear linear order of development It is however true that one should not move on to the next stage without having evolved all of the key eight areas They don t necessarily evolve in the order of appearance in the spiral diagram The assessment might show that for example Viability is further developed than People and Customer In such a case focussing on the People and Customer axes in the next sprints is advisable to help evolve all axes evenly outward on the radar The reason to do this is to ensure that it ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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ET R PE S M PR O DU CT CU S TOM E R 3 The central component is a Sprint Each sprint begins with an assessment The sprint focus is a result of the assessment If your score is very good on product but low in the customer area you will run a design thinking process talking to customers assessing the pains and the gains Based on the assessment you determine the methodology If you score low on people your sprint will focus on this using the Team Canvas to create insights into the organisation s gaps PR O CE C VI A B IL I TY 143 N ES SE S AB U ONLINE INNOVATION IC E 142 The Purpose Launchpad mentor determines the required focus points backlog items and what framework might be useful in the upcoming sprint trying to create a perfect circle and making the circle bigger and bigger all the time Then you start a new iterative process on the eight areas of the model The goal is to evolve each of the eight areas of the launchpad and grow the initiative and organisation from Exploration to Evaluation to the exponential impact phase The Purpose Launchpad Process Online This Purpose Launchpad process has been designed for online innovation It does not have a fixed timeframe nor are there fixed scheduled workshops It is dependent on the stage that your initiative is in the skillset and mindset of your people and the need of the project based on the regular Purpose Launchpad Assessments by the mentor Depending on all these factors it can take weeks months or longer to evolve your initiative and organisation towards exponential growth The Purpose Launchpad can be applied as a set of principles tools or a structured iterative process This makes the method highly flexible and perfect for online innovation The team meets with the mentor regularly often weekly Depending on the progress and need the team can move bi weekly during the Evaluation and Impact phase of the Purpose Launchpad process The process starts with a kick off workshop The mentor facilitates the team through a series of tools and activities designed to help the team define the initiative s Massive Transformative Purpose and find alignment around the individual and organisational values PU R P O S E PL There are four key components in the process of Purpose Launchpad It is an iterative model which means that you might have to pivot your product and or business model numerous times on your journey to growth The insights you gain by the use of the components will help you ensure validated growth Exploration focused on finding the key elements of the initiative Evaluation focused on evaluating the key hypotheses of the initiative Impact focused on growing the organisation to maximise its impact in the world O The Challenge It is new for many organisations to operate with a larger purpose in mind Most organisations have designed all of their processes around profit and loss not positively impacting the world Even our economic models measure progress based on revenues and cost 2 Then the team goes through the online assessment made up of 24 questions covering all the eight interconnected key areas The assessment outcome is outlined on a radar graph with a score for each of those eight key areas The overall outcome of the graph will also indicate the evolutionary stage you are currently in There are three evolutionary stages 4 After the first sprint you can complete the first Purpose Launchpad Scorecard when you measure the eight areas of actions to be done to evolve It is a scorecard and dashboard managed by the certified Purpose Launchpad mentor where you measure each sprint s progress It is a central component during each online mentoring meeting between the team and the mentor The progress is not measured based on completion of the backlog tasks but based on how much you have learned during each of the backlog steps and which new insights you have gained Every week you monitor the scorecard progress visualised in graphs The Purpose Launchpad Board provides the mentor and the organisation with valuable insight into how to help rapidly evolve the team and organisation as a whole as the people are a critical element in the initiative s successful growth After closing every sprint before opening a new one you check the mood among the team N The Purpose Launchpad Power The Purpose Launchpad aims at transforming team culture and making a positive impact on the world So it not only innovates products services or business models but also evolves a team culture It combines the power of scrum and sprints with other proven methods and frameworks such as design thinking Lean Startup and customer development processes embracing complexity while keeping things together at the same time 1 The first phase is to understand the so called Massive Transformation Purpose of the initiative Such a Purpose covers what your team and organisation want to bring to the world and how you and your organisation would like to affect the world in a positive way like TED s Ideas Worth Spreading A D is not a false sense of viability An organisation might be successfully selling products giving them the belief that they ve obtained a successful value proposition and business model Still until this is validated against the pains gains and needs of both the internal organisation the wider community and the potential customers it remains a hypothesis To ensure successful long term viability and growth and prevent a possible crash and burn scenario when going mainstream evolution takes place along all the axes In each evolutionary phase Explore Evaluation and Impact different tools and strategies are applied along each of the eight key areas At the start of the process the mentor and team agree on a fixed meeting time during which they will close the running sprint and open a new one This is usually on a weekly basis and at the beginning of the week During this meeting varying from one to one and a half hours the team updates the mentor on their progress of the backlog items assigned to them by the mentor The insights are measured and recorded on the Purpose Launchpad Board the mentor closes the current sprint and opens it based on a new ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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Purpose Launchpad Assessment performed by the mentor During the sprints the team members work asynchronously with the mentor On a need basis additional training masterclasses or coaching workshops on the provided tools and frameworks are scheduled during which one or more of the backlog items are covered under the mentor s guidance We interviewed Michael Smits a Dutch Certified Purpose Launchpad Mentor about this methodology s online experience them grow But it is also the purpose of the method itself as it is equally important that the process helps to evolve the initiative to exponential growth as it is to realise exponential growth among the team and its team members Which tools do you need Depending on the skillset and current way of working of the team I decide to use templates I have prepared in Google Docs Slides and Sheets or when the team has worked with tools like Miro before I set up collaboration boards for them in which they can work on the different templates method s power as a structured iterative process towards growth and impact I recommend committing a year to it because it is not just about the transformation of product and services After one year you ll start to see the real priceless value the evolution and transformation of the team and its team members Often this is already visible after a month or two but after one year the mindset shift will have created ripples throughout the organisation learning and growth along all of the eight key areas Usually they start to experience that it works after four to five weeks That s when the mind shift starts to happen and you can gradually work towards the setup with weekly mentoring meetings Purpose Launchpad evolution of a startup in education The evolution of a startup in education is visualised by means of the outcome of each assessment The organisation had an idea of what they wanted to do but had no idea where to start I helped them clarify their purpose values and even their Moonshot Mission and Vision even though this is not critical since they were clearly still in the Exploration phase They had done a lot of groundwork but much of it was are hypotheses until validated with real customers and stakeholders How does the Purpose Launchpad process work After facilitating the definition of the Purpose and Values I generally work with the team on the alignment of their strengths and facilitate the appointment of a team coordinator who is responsible for organising teamwork during the sprints and mobilising the team to prepare efficient updates for the mentor during their recurring mentoring meetings Some teams are more autonomous than others some need more guidance If needed I provide them with additional help either by providing additional tools setting up templates for them or providing them with self learn resources This is not always enough and a team might require additional training and coaching In such cases I assign the coordinator the task to coordinate and schedule the required additional workshops with the team I try to help them as much as I can as it is also part of my purpose to help What about time Is it different in an online setting In the Purpose Launchpad there s not a predefined timelapse and because you don t have fixed workshops or activities you can easily adapt to the online shift Ideally an organisation adopts the Purpose Launchpad as their agile workflow process forever as it is as far as I know the most comprehensive methodology thus far And you do not have to apply it continuously as a rigid iterative process However I recommend using the Sprint framework embedded in it even if you run two or three week sprints But if you do not want to you can also apply the purpose launchpad as a set of principles or a framework with the different tools the mentor provides you However if you want to experience the How does the process work for established organisations In an established organisation it is often different compared to startups You often have to deal with a set way of working scheduling meetings and already established internal processes The same rule applies there If the organisation wants to experience the method s true power they should commit to it for at least one year However you can already achieve great results by applying the method as a set of principles of a framework under the mentor s guidance You don t have to do it the startup way Besides in my experience in an established organisation people generally are much more stuck in their day to day They often need to be accompanied a little more if you want to achieve the maximum feasible growth They tend to especially in the beginning treat the backlog items like tasks when the key element is not about completion but about maximising learning and gaining insights You take the next steps and develop your innovation further based on those learnings and insights It takes you from an inside out approach to an outside in approach Customer value customer experiences and even employee value and experiences are designed and developed based on continuous and real conversations and learnings from the customer and other stakeholders It is not so evident in most organisations Also often the project tends to be one of the many other tasks the team members have That too is not beneficial but a reality So in such cases I tend to schedule workshops with the team to facilitate amplified 144 ONLINE INNOVATION 145 Who is this online Purpose Launchpad method for It s for those that believe in empowering their employees and colleagues who believe in strengthening collaboration seek alignment in values and believe they are in business to contribute to society and advance humanity and life as a whole It s for those organisations that believe in autonomous teams and wish to transform into a purpose driven exponential organisation For communication with the teams Michael always has an easy and quick communication channel open with them like a WhatsApp or Slack channel A smaller team not as familiar with the different tools and principles like design thinking customer development et cetera will move slower in the beginning but from experience will create traction quite quickly as they tend to develop the right entrepreneurial mindset quicker than teams who are accustomed to work in set ways already In the box below there s an example of the evolution path of a startup in education The pictures show an overview of their evolution in a couple of weeks from the Exploration to the Evaluation phase They are not further evolving with real paying customers early adopters so the methodology does help to move quickly towards experimenting with paying customers and all of the development is done with hardly any investment That s the power of this methodology because you are almost co creating with customers and the community This startup in education was mentored by Michael Smits a certified Purpose Launchpad Mentor ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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PL Explore Phase STARTUP IN EDUCATION PURPOSE PURPOSE 3 METRICS 2 5 PEOPLE METRICS PEOPLE 2 5 METRICS 2 5 2 2 1 5 1 5 1 5 1 1 1 0 5 CUSTOMER PROCESS ABUNDANCE CUSTOMER PROCESS ABUNDANCE PRODUCT CUSTOMER PROCESS ABUNDANCE SUSTAINABILITY VISABILITY VISABILITY Before Purpose Workshop Start of Sprint 1 Start of Sprint 2 PURPOSE PURPOSE PURPOSE METRICS 2 5 METRICS METRICS PEOPLE 2 5 2 5 2 2 2 1 5 1 5 1 5 1 1 1 0 5 0 5 PRODUCT CUSTOMER PROCESS ABUNDANCE VISABILITY Start of Sprint 3 Challenges Make sure that people are aligned on the circular economy principles and definitions Make sure you as a facilitator understand the why and for what of the single methods to pick the right one Go quickly into the first loop using learning loops rapid prototyping and circular buy in to validate your circular innovation early What is the Circular Design process and why use it The Circular Design Process is a meta methodology The aim is to innovate products that reflect the principles of the circular economy It is a design thinking process specialising in creating circular design products services and business models originated by IDEO and the Ellen Macarthur Foundation Premises of the methodology are that pressure to sell has led to a disregard for products environmental impact resulting in the need to extract more and more resources from the planet increasing waste worsening pollution and consumerist behaviour The European Commission estimated that 80 of a product s environmental impact is determined during its design stage 17 According to journalist Richard Girling we throw away 80 of what we purchase within six months of buying it 18 3 3 PEOPLE Don t use it if you think that we have endless resources on our planet PEOPLE 0 5 PRODUCT 3 over the world and therefore the possibility to work remotely is of great value 3 2 0 5 METHOD 7 THE CIRCULAR DESIGN PROCESS 16 PURPOSE 3 PRODUCT 146 PL Evaluation Phase PEOPLE 0 5 PRODUCT CUSTOMER PROCESS ABUNDANCE SUSTAINABILITY Start of Sprint 4 ONLINE INNOVATION PRODUCT CUSTOMER PROCESS ABUNDANCE VISABILITY Start of Sprint 5 McKinsey and Company have estimated the economic benefit of moving towards a closed loop economy by examining the following durable goods industries in the European Union The automotive sector and other transport machinery and equipment furniture radio TV and communication medical precision and optical equipment and finally office machinery and computers By studying these industries they found that the circular economy represents a net materials cost savings opportunity of US 340 to 380 billion per year World Economic Forum 2014 p 20 19 The circular design process has a butterfly shape showing that instead of ending the product lifecycle in the landfill four loops can be used in the following order reuse refurbish remanufacture and recycle The circular design process comprises four stages and incorporates approaches such as design thinking and humancentred design Understand Get to know the user and the system Define Put into words the design challenge and your intention as a designer Make Ideate design and prototype as many iterations and versions as you can Release Launch your design into the wild and build your narrative create loyalty in customers and deepen investment from stakeholders by telling a compelling story The Circular Design Process Power This aims to solve local problems but with a large scale impact The process uses expertise and experience from all For each of the four phases there are six methods with templates available on the Circular Design Guide adapted to the Circular economy principles In addition to these twentyfour there are four advanced ones concerning the use of materials The process may last from a couple of days to a month It depends on the output you want to design It s an iterative process so many loops will be taken to develop learning and the right output 147 ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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BIOLOGICAL TECHNICAL ENERGY RECYCLE REFURBISH PRODUCTION REUSE USE SHARE WASTE LANDFILL and Google Forms you can prepare prototypes for simple tests In addition to these you can also use tools for prototyping and design including YouTube videos CHART CASE STUDY The Milan Food Policy The need Every second the equivalent of six garbage trucks of edible food is wasted globally Less than 2 of the valuable nutrients in food by products and human waste are recovered for productive use in cities The modern food system is degrading and unhealthy but cities could hold the key to changing this The solution The Municipality of Milan and Fondazione Cariplo has taken a bold new strategic approach to support a new food system by developing the Milan Food Policy a tool to support the city s food industry players to manage food related challenges In this chapter we have presented you with seven methodologies to innovate online Because of their massive impact we are great fans of the Lightning Decision Jam the Design Sprint and the FORTH innovation method and we dedicate separate chapters to them We start by introducing the Lightning Decision Jam to you in Chapter 8 KEY MESSAGES FROM THIS CHAPTER Innovation methods create common learnings Using online methodologies allows you to control simultaneity and contemporaneity and to stay more connected Because there s no in person connection among the online team use structured and rigorous methods to keep pace and monitor your results Source Ellen Mcarthur foundation The Online Circular Design Process In the Circular Design toolkit 20 you will find many templates for the innovation journey s four phases Each phase can be implemented online It is an iterative process so it is important to be quick with the first release use online techniques to engage What makes the Milan Food Policy circular Through local procurement developing logistics for distributing surplus food and valorising discarded organic material Milan is making the most of its food resources while supporting the regeneration of natural systems The benefits By working with local public and private organisations and supporting innovation Milan has seen important reductions in food waste and the associated costs Through awareness raising and capacity building local organisations involved with food are also able to evolve and benefit from this positive shift Which tools do you need The online techniques can all be used depending on the methods you use and the same can be said of the tools Digital whiteboards Miro Mural Klaxoon work fine and to get connected Zoom or Butter make sense Loom and SessionLab help to prepare the workshops And with Canva Source www ellenmacarthurfoundation org case studies the milanfood policy CHART Case study The Milan Food Policy BOX 148 ONLINE INNOVATION You cannot use in person innovation methods tout court without tailoring and adapting to the online setting Online innovation enhances iterative and fast paced methodologies Don t use a method just because of the method itself Match the purpose of your initiative and your organisation s characteristics with the superpower and benefits of the online methods presented 149 1 Dwayne Spradlin Are You Solving the Right Problem HBR September 2012 2 https designsprint academy about problem framing 3 Thomas Wedell Wedellsborg Are You Solving the Right Problems Reframing them can reveal unexpected solutions HBR January February 2017 4 https www ridersandelephants com thecustomerexperiencedeck 5 Eric Ries The Lean Startup Penguin Random House UK 2011 6 Ash Mayura Running Lean O Really Media Inc California 2012 7 JTBD It s a method to understand customer behaviours by focusing on the job a specific product should do for a customer instead of on the product Clayton Christensen first used the name in an HBR article describing a fast food chain wanting to improve milkshake sales 8 A Osterwalder Y Pigneur Business Model Generation John Wiley Sons Inc Hoboken New Jersey 2010 9 Innova is a heterogeneous team of engineers designers and communication experts who collect ideas from all sectors and turn them into concrete objects https www industriaitaliana it isinnova stampa 3d di valvole perrespiratori polmonari componenti meccanici e 10 Alberto Savoia The right It why so many ideas Fail and How to Make Sure Yours Succeed Harpers Collins Publishers New York 2019 11 You can find interesting discussions videos and experiments on pretotyping on the following social media outlets the YouTube Channel The Right it Video Lessons by Alberto Savoia Linkedin group Pretotyping Professionals ignited by Robert Skrobe the Spotify channel The official Pretotyping Podcast by Jonathan Sun and Robert Strobe 12 You can watch the full lecture on YouTube at https www youtube com watch v 3sUozPcH4fY 13 https www linkedin com posts farzaddarouian_pretoypingbeembarassed activity 6765359977457696768 1n41 14 The template has been designed on MURAL and you can find it on Boardle https www boardle io boards 222 15 https www purposelaunchpad com 16 https www ellenmacarthurfoundation org 17 http www buildup eu sites default files content Brochure EcodesignYour Future 15022012 pdf 18 Rubbish Dirt On Our Hands and Crisis Ahead 0th Edition by Richard Girling 19 Ministry of food and agriculture of Denmark Best Practice Examples of Circular Business Models 20 https www circulardesignguide com ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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CHART OVERVIEW OF THE NINE STEPS OF THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM STEP 9 MAKE SOLUTIONS ACTIONABLE 10 MINUTES 12 MINUTES Overview of the 9 steps of the Lightning Decision Jam Minutes in black 60 minutes session Minutes in blue 90 minutes session STEP 8 DECIDE WHICH SOLUTION TO EXECUTE 10 MINUTES 12 MINUTES STEP 7 PRIORITISE SOLUTIONS 6 MINUTES 11 MINUTES STEP 6 IDEATE SOLUTIONS 7 MINUTES 15 MINUTES STEP 5 REFRAME THE PROBLEM 4 MINUTES 8 MINUTES STEP 4 PRIORITISE PROBLEMS 6 MINUTES 11 MINUTES STEP 3 CAPTURE PROBLEMS AND CHALENGES 6 MINUTES 8 MINUTES STEP 2 START POSITIVE 6 MINUTES 8 MINUTES STEP 1 DEFINE THE GOAL 5 MINUTES 5 MINUTES 152 One of the main obstacles for innovation in organisations is that there s a lot of unstructured discussion on it with unclear outcomes Instead follow a structured method that leads to more ideas decisions and clear action steps with internal support A process that helps you to start DOING things The Lightning Decision Jam LDJ 1 is an excellent method to get your team in action mode It is a fast exercise it eliminates discussion it allows all team members to contribute leading to tangible action steps to get started NOW ONLINE INNOVATION WHAT IS THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM WHY RUN A LIGHTNING DECISION JAM The Lightning Decision Jam LDJ is a 60 to 90 minute exercise generating solutions to a problem you face with a product or service for trying to come up with new product features to solve a problem within a team or process any problem you can imagine It helps to identify problems and challenges participants in the workshop have in mind It gives the organisation insights into what employees see happening And it triggers them to come up with ideas to solve those problems and above that generate action steps to start testing solutions directly No writing memos no reports and no plans but clear measurable activities that will give insights into what works and what doesn t So it is about taking action fast That is why the process is called Lightning Decision Jam it is fast like lightning and it is aimed at gathering input from all participants to make decisions In a fast changing world you must adapt to quickly changing circumstances You simply can t spend days on extensive conversations and discussions if you want to make progress The Lightning Decision Jam significantly speeds up decisionmaking processes especially those concerning innovation The key to successful innovation is to start DOING things instead of just talking As Gijs van Wulfen describes it Innovation is doing new things or things in a new way which means no one knows beforehand what will work The only way to find out is to come up with solutions and turn them into small experiments so you can start testing in practice The process can also help familiarise those new to innovation to the characteristic way of working and thinking needed to be successful having no discussions and everyone can contribute So it is not about those with the loudest voice getting the most attention but group work where all personalities can give their input and share their ideas Since the Lightning Decision Jam is a process of only 60 to 90 minutes it is very easy to try without risk As soon as participants experience working in a very structured way with short timeboxed activities most of them if not all will see the power of it This opens the door to more extensive online innovation methods like the Design Sprint and the FORTH innovation method described in Chapters 9 and 10 153 The highly structured process of the LDJ is aimed at coming up with a lot of solutions fast especially very creative ones or those that may have been overlooked for years By using the impact effort selection matrix deciding on which idea s to put forward becomes a straightforward exercise After identifying the best solution s the workshop ends with a shortlist of clear action steps with names of those responsible to take those steps and a timeline for executing them So no meetings with open ends and just a wall full of post it notes with ideas that have not been curated No unclarity on the next steps The LDJ sets you and your team in action mode WHO IS THE PROCESS FOR The Lightning Decision Jam can be used in any type of organisation Whether you work in or with a five person company or a multinational corporation this exercise is useful in any workshop where you want to put an end to useless unstructured discussions and want to kick start innovation THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM

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The ideal team size for the process is three to eight people If you have more participants break them into smaller groups and work through the same process simultaneously For this you can use the break out rooms feature of a videoconferencing tool like Zoom or Butter Ensure that the facilitator jumps in and out of each break out room regularly to make sure participants are making progress and do not get caught up in extensive conversations or discussions It is advisable to have one or more co facilitators who can moderate a group next to a tech facilitator The process can also be used to familiarise people with the way online collaboration and especially innovating remotely can be done It will help develop a positive mindset in your way of working and the fact that innovation can easily be done online This may open the doors for more intensive online innovation methods and processes mentioned in Appendix 2 where we give you an overview of online innovation methods Running a Lightning Decision Jam is a relatively simple way for a facilitator to build experience for running innovation workshops online It helps you get familiar with the tools used the types of processes and how they are run best taking into account that it is all about having a clear and structured process with timeboxed workshops each aimed at specific outcomes and decisions to be made Last but not least an LDJ is very helpful for aligning a team Especially now that more people work remotely chances are higher for miscommunication and it is harder to keep track of what everybody is doing 154 FOR WHAT TOPICS CAN THE LDJ BE USED Whether you need new innovative ideas for improving your office environment or to decide on improvements in an existing product or service the Lightning Decision Jam can be used for a wide range of topics For your inspiration here is a list of topics you could think of Improving the office environment Making working from home more personal or human Improving a product service experience or business model Finding new revenue streams Increasing the number of visitors to the website Improving internal collaboration Eliminating redundant processes across teams This is just a shortlist to trigger your ideas about topics to use Whether you want to work on an internal problem a simple or a more complex problem if you want to make decisions fast the LDJ is your method We appreciate the fact that more complex problems require more time than 60 to 90 minutes to be solved There is no magic to this method that makes issues with a high degree of complexity simpler But it does help to make your journey towards solutions simple You can break down a complex problem into smaller chunks first and run an LDJ on each chunk After running the method once you have experimented with the action steps you can run a next LDJ to make an inventory of barriers and problems faced in the experiment to come up with solutions to the most important issues ONLINE INNOVATION Everything should be made as simple as possible But not simpler Albert Einstein CHART OUTPUTS OF A LIGHTNING DECISION JAM RUNNING A LIGHTNING DECISION JAM WILL BRING YOU THE FOLLOWING OUTPUTS 1 An inventory of problems prioritised by the participants 2 Solutions to solve the top voted problem 3 Decisions made about which solution to test first 4 Action steps to start an experiment with the top voted solution 5 An overview of next best solutions to try if the prioritised solution doesn t work in the experiment TRY IT YOURSELF Since the Lightning Decision Jam is a relatively simple process it is a great process to try yourself You can easily schedule it in an already planned meeting so it doesn t eat up extra time for your team On the other hand since you can run the process in 60 to 90 minutes it should not be hard to find a gap in your team s agenda to schedule an LDJ 155 To help you on your way below you find a full description of the nine steps of the process It is your guideline to follow for your workshop So there is no reason NOT to start today Just plan a workshop with your colleagues or team and try out the method CHART SIX TIPS FOR RUNNING A SUCCESSFUL LIGHTNING DECISION JAM 1 Be strict on timing Participants may feel limited now and then but the timeboxed steps force them to decide even though those decisions may sometimes be based on gut feel But that is better than making no decisions at all isn t it 2 No discussions Make sure to manage expectations before you start The strict timing and silent way of working help to avoid discussions and endless conversations 3 Run the workshop with teams of three to eight people Do you have a bigger team Then work in break out rooms and have a co facilitator to help manage the teams in their break out rooms THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM

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4 Work together alone To allow every participant to contribute and to avoid discussions it is essential to let everyone work individually in a timeboxed workshop when generating input This means working in silence When time is up participants can read the input of others By anonymous voting everyone can express their preferences BEFORE YOU START 5 Claim your role as facilitator Your team or colleagues may be new to you facilitating a workshop like this Make clear that you take on this role for the outcome Alternatively you can consider asking someone else who is not in your team or not in your organisation to facilitate or hire a professional innovation facilitator Online whiteboard tools for realtime collaboration Online whiteboard tools like Miro or Mural as you read in Chapter 3 are great to collaborate online in realtime with all the participants These tools have very useful features like digital post it notes voting and a timer If you don t want to introduce new tools yet be creative and use a collaboration tool you are familiar with for example Google Slides A great feature in Miro is the so called Bulk Mode which allows participants to contribute individually without being distracted from what others are writing which improves the principle of working together alone 6 Start DOING it Since getting started is the most important just try out the Lightning Decision Jam yourself For the first time you can start with a low risk easy topic just to experience the method THE NINE STEPS OF THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM The Lightning Decision Jam contains nine steps We will describe each step to be your guide to run a workshop yourself If you want to familiarise yourself with the method it is recommended to schedule a workshop with your team on a low risk topic as a try out 156 Facilitator Make one of the team members the facilitator or reach out to an external facilitator to moderate the workshop The advantage of having an external facilitator is that this person has no interest in the workshop outcomes at all which helps to eliminate politics and company culture in the process Videoconferencing for communication For communication during your workshop you can use a videoconferencing tool like Zoom or Butter With these tools it is very easy to make break out rooms which is recommended if you have a bigger group more than eight participants since you can make smaller teams easily If you use Miro as your online whiteboard you can also use its built in video conferencing feature You can use Microsoft Teams too Your choice may depend on company policy or restrictions Prepare your online whiteboard Prepare a whiteboard in Miro or Mural with areas for participants to work in You need the following areas as channels private groups and direct messaging As with email you can share documents and files across teams and in a one on one format CHART OVERVIEW OF THE NINE STEPS AND WHAT YOU NEED PER STEP STEP 1 STEP 2 STEP 3 STEP 4 STEP 5 STEP 6 STEP 7 STEP 8 STEP 9 DEFINE THE GOAL START POSITIVE CAPTURE PROBLEMS AND CHALENGES PRIORITISE PROBLEMS REFRAME THE PROBLEM IDEATE SOLUTIONS PRIORITISE SOLUTIONS DECIDE WHICH SOLUTION TO EXECUTE MAKE SOLUTIONS ACTIONABLE An area on a digital whiteboard like Mural or Miro to state the goal of the workshop A picture of a sailboat An ideation area per participant to write input individually on digital post its An ideation area per participant to write input individually on digital post its this can be next to the area used in Step 2 An area on the whiteboard to copy the prioritised post its from Step 3 too A big post it with the reframed problem for the brainstorm An ideation area per participant to write solutions individually on digital post its An area on the whiteboard to copy the prioritised post its from Step 6 too The impacteffort matrix for stating the prioritised solutions An area to write action steps and when the steps will be executed and who is responsible Collaboration in execution For a follow up with the team involved in the solution s execution phase you may use a tool like Slack This is a communication medium that is positioned as an alternative to email Slack offers various options of communication such ONLINE INNOVATION 157 THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM

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Please note that we have added our suggested number of minutes to take for the specific action with each step The first number of minutes mentioned in green is for a 60 minute LDJ the second number in blue is for a 90 minute LDJ Where there is a number of minutes mentioned in the description of a particular step it s based on a 60 minute workshop You can adjust the timing if your workshop runs 90 minutes STEP 1 DEFINE THE GOAL 5 MINUTES 5 MINUTES At the start of the workshop introduce the topic or goal to the participants Why are we here today Goals can be anything increasing the number of visitors to the website reducing the number of errors made in a specific process increasing revenue et cetera In Steps 2 and 3 start using the sailboat picture The upper part above the wavy line that represents the waterline represents Step 2 having the wind in the sail where you identify what is going well What is moving us forward towards our goal Use the bottom part with the anchor What is holding us back in step 3 for defining challenges and problems STEP 2 START POSITIVE 6 MINUTES 8 MINUTES Instead of starting to identify challenges or problems start with an inventory of what is going well around the chosen topic This helps to get participants in a positive mood and to share successes It is also a nice warm up for the workshop After two minutes let all participants put their post its on the sailboat picture in the above the water area Then every participant will present their positive aspects to the group Also here applies the rule no discussion just listen It s okay to ask a clarifying question if something is not clear but make sure you don t end up in a discussion Each participant writes down individually in silence and without discussion all the successes he or she can think of Make sure to write each topic on a new post it note Encourage everyone to write down as many topics as they can There is no right or wrong it is all about getting everyone s thoughts out there When working with an online collaboration tool like Miro or Mural all participants can work simultaneously on the same whiteboard TIP ask everyone to use the same colour post it notes no worries if people still use another colour since with one click you can change the colour of the sticky notes afterwards The standard soft yellow colour is advisable since it doesn t stand out The reason for using the same colour is that you want all input to be neutral and anonymous ONLINE INNOVATION 6 MINUTES 8 MINUTES In this step everyone writes frustrations barriers concerns mistakes and problems regarding the topic Again it is all about writing in silence and one topic per post it note Encourage all participants to write as many things as they can think of there is no right or wrong After this step the positive sticky notes will not be used anymore They have done their job you created a positive vibe for moving forward and everyone is warmed up for the rest of the workshop Since there may be people reluctant to write negative things to encourage everyone to contribute this time make sure there is a safe way for all participants to do so Give everyone their spot on the online whiteboard or when using Miro use Bulk Mode again Let everyone wait to bring over their written post its to the under water area of the sailboat picture or click done when using the sailboat Encourage everyone to use the same light yellow post its again to make the input anonymous To focus and not get distracted by what others are writing on the online whiteboard you can either prepare a workspace for each participant when they zoom in on their workspace they don t see what others are writing or when using Miro participants can use the so called Bulk Mode Using this you cannot see what others are writing since the board will be covered with a blank screen When you click done all your input will appear on the board in separate post it notes 158 STEP 3 CAPTURE PROBLEMS AND CHALLENGES 159 THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM

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How triggers your brain to find solutions Might means there may be more possible solutions and it says we are going to try to solve the problem but we don t know yet if we will succeed We are looking for new ways to solve it which implies we will be running experiments to find out if a solution works We says that we are collaborating to be inspired by the other participants and build upon each other s ideas This time don t ask participants to read out their post its since some may feel they are attacking someone Let the post its speak for themselves As the facilitator read through the post its and take out any doubles If in doubt ask in the group who has written the post its and agree on which to take out STEP 4 PRIORITISE PROBLEMS 6 MINUTES 11 MINUTES Now ask everybody to vote for the problems they think are the most relevant to solve only vote for the negatives NOT for the positives To do this all participants get three votes This can be either green dots small circle shapes all in the same colour on the online whiteboard or using the powerful voting feature in Miro or Mural Using this feature makes the voting the most anonymous This can be very helpful since participants are not being influenced by what others are voting for they can t see who is voting for what problem Besides that it avoids participants being reluctant to vote for a specific problem if everyone else can see them Everybody can vote for three different sticky notes but they can also put all three votes on the one they think is the most relevant They can again vote for the sticky notes they wrote themselves Now prioritise the post its that were voted for in a triangle shape with the post it s with the most votes at the top STEP 5 REFRAME THE PROBLEM 4 MINUTES 8 MINUTES In this step reframe the problem with the most votes into a challenging question that triggers ideas The moderator can do this but if you have a bit more time for your Lightning Decision Jam you can ask participants to reframe individually and vote for the best question the same way as the voting for prioritising problems is done Here is an example Let s say the top voted problem was It is hard to keep in touch with our team when working remotely If we reframe this into an HMW question it could be How might we improve the team spirit when working remotely Now the problem has been reframed into a question that participants can find solutions for STEP 6 IDEATE SOLUTIONS 7 MINUTES 15 MINUTES In this step you are going to brainstorm solutions to the HMW question Before you start make sure the HMW question is visible for all participants for example by placing it at the top of the area on your online whiteboard where you will put the sticky notes with solutions This is important since you want to make sure everyone is thinking of solutions for the same HWM question As in the previous steps ask participants to write their solutions in silence Participants can again work on a separate part of the whiteboard or use Bulk Mode The focus is on quantity over quality make this clear to all participants When brainstorming our brain tends to judge an idea instantly We don t want that at this stage of the process Every good idea starts with many ideas so postponement of judgement is essential You can curate later If you have the time in your workshop you can address more than one problem from the priority list It is advisable to limit this to the ones on the top of the triangle with the most votes and ignore the ones that only had one vote since otherwise you will lose voting and prioritising effectiveness We advise you to work on no more than three to five topics to keep the workshop s energy up Problems that are not chosen in the workshop can stay on the online whiteboard to look at in the next workshop Make sure solutions are written in simple clear language and keep it short and concise Participants will not present their solutions since the ones presented best can get the most attraction when voting 161 THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM After five minutes ask everyone to place their sticky notes in the brainstorm area on the whiteboard without any discussion There is no need to sort them just make sure all solutions are visible As a facilitator check if there are any doubles If so ask the group who has written those post its to agree on which one s to take out Phrase the challenge as a so called How Might We HMW question The reason is that these three words have an important meaning in a process like this 160 ONLINE INNOVATION

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6 MINUTES 11 MINUTES Now do a voting session again Give all participants five votes As during the voting workshop for problems you can use small circle shaped coloured dots in Miro or Mural or use the voting feature When the time is up organise the post its in the same way as done with the problems while ignoring all post its with only one vote You will end up with something like SOLUTION 3 SOLUTION 2 SOLUTION 5 In the Lightning Decision Jam we use the so called ImpactEffort Matrix In this matrix we use the horizontal Effort axis and the vertical Impact axis Impact means to what extent we think the solution will solve the problem from not at all to completely Effort describes how much time and work we think it will take to execute the solution from very little to a lot SOLUTION 8 SOLUTION 7 The Impact Effort Matrix helps make sure you use execution time efficiently It will help you gain insight into what solution to implement right away which might evolve into a more significant project and what idea s should be kept on the shelf for later use Now it is time to start using the matrix Take the top voted solutions the five to eight solutions with the most votes and pick the one with the most votes if there is more than one on the top work from left to right so start with the one at the top left Now put it in the middle of the matrix Start with Impact and ask the participants if the post it should be higher or lower on the axis Make sure not to end up in long conversations or discussions Remember you are looking for new solutions that you need to try out Based on practice you will know if it works or not So trust your gut and common sense at this point in the process when putting the post its on the matrix SOLUTION 4 Please note the following two things The exact position on the axis is not the most important it is about what quadrant the post it is in This exercise will become easier as soon as there is one post it on the matrix since from that point onwards you have something to compare the next post its to STEP 8 DECIDE WHICH SOLUTION TO EXECUTE 10 MINUTES 12 MINUTES This step is crucial for success Many brainstorming workshops end with a lot of ideas but no decisions on what solution s will be executed who will do it or when it will be done 162 SOLUTION 7 163 SOLUTION 6 SOLUTION 3 SOLUTION 8 SOLUTION 5 EFFORT After putting the last post it on the matrix it will look something like this The green quadrant is the sweet spot here are the solutions that have the most impact and are expected to take the least amount of effort to implement These can be tested and executed quickly In the top right quadrant are the solutions that will have high impact and take more effort to execute At the bottom right are the solutions to leave for now EFFORT ONLINE INNOVATION SOLUTION 4 SOLUTION 2 Now do the same for Effort ask the participants if the post it should go more to the left or the right IMPACT SOLUTION 6 To make a decision you don t want to end up in a conversation or discussion where someone is trying to convince others to go for a specific solution What you want is to compare the solutions to see which one has the biggest chance for success To do this you want to use variables against which you can measure each idea IMPACT STEP 7 PRIORITISE SOLUTIONS THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM

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SOLUTION 7 IMPACT MAKE A PROJECT SOLUTION 6 SOLUTION 2 MAKE A TASK SOLUTION 3 SOLUTION 8 FORGET SOLUTION 5 EFFORT these take a lot of effort to execute and have a low impact On the bottom left quadrant are solutions that take low effort to execute and have a low impact These could be valuable to look into but are probably easy to turn into tasks for someone to do Please note that the solution s with the most impact and the lowest effort the green area are NOT necessarily the ones with the most votes This shows that this matrix helps make neutral decisions where the influence of individual preferences is reduced to a minimum solutions are compared to objective variables 164 shared through internal platforms like an Intranet a filesharing platform or a private YouTube channel The Lightning Decision Jam s last step is defining what actions should be taken for the solutions in the sweet spot Take the solutions in this quadrant and ask the participants to come up with three action steps for testing each solution You can ask the person who wrote the post it to suggest these action steps or all participants can write individually so the team can then vote for the key steps Keep this simple and don t overthink you don t have to execute the whole solution from day one A prototype is enough for testing Keeping it small will be easier to start executing and if something doesn t work it is easy to pivot Make sure the first step is something that can be done easily right after the Lightning Decision Jam This keeps the fire burning The action steps should be actionable within one or two weeks after the workshop Once you have decided on the action steps assign one participant to each step responsible for the execution either alone or in collaboration with other team members The most important thing is to take small steps to find what works and what not as soon as possible The sooner you can start sharing successes in your organisation the better If something works you can roll it out on a larger scale 10 MINUTES 12 MINUTES SOLUTION 4 DO NOW STEP 9 MAKE SOLUTIONS ACTIONABLE Let s look at an example The HMW question we formulated was How might we improve the team spirit when working remotely A solution in the sweet spot may have been to ask team members who live relatively close to each other to meet in person and drink coffee or go for a walk This is easy to execute Another solution may be organising a weekly online caf on a set day and time in the week Everyone brings their drinks and snacks and can chat about anything but work With many people joining you can create break out rooms with specific themes participants can join free of choice This is something you can organise quickly by sending invitation emails and setting up an online workshop in a tool that allows using break out rooms like Zoom or Butter A bit more effort but relatively easy to prototype is making a weekly radio show for the whole organisation with interviews with employees or experts in the industry a word from the CEO and personal stories from colleagues The show can be ONLINE INNOVATION AFTER THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM barriers with which they need help These check ins can be short online meetings about 10 to 15 minutes Alternatively you can make a workspace in an online collaboration tool like Slack After the one or two week experiment you can get the team back together in a new Lightning Decision Jam and run it exactly like the first one Only this time the topic is about the results of the last LDJ What went well What is moving us forward and what barriers or problems did you encounter What is holding us back This way you keep the process alive and you can create new experiments which in the end will bring you to an implemented end solution or you decide to pivot or leave a solution behind based on results To make the team s efforts worthwhile it is important to keep track of the execution Schedule short check ins when everyone working on an experiment shares what they have done what the results are and if they encountered any THINGS THAT WENT WELL LIGHTNING DECISION JAM EXECUTE ACTION STEPS THINGS HOLDING US BACK 165 NEW LDJ ABOUT PRIORITIZED NEW PROBLEMS THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM ETC

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If a solution proves to not work then it isn t that hard to abandon it since you didn t spend too much time and perhaps money on it yet Just pick the next best solution from the Impact Effort Matrix and start testing it And don t forget it is better to get started and fail fast than to do nothing at all Experimenting like this means some things will work and others won t You will only find out by DOING In the next chapter we share with you another effective fast method to help you innovate It s the Design Sprint that will take you five days from a challenge to a tested prototype KEY MESSAGES FROM THIS CHAPTER Use the Lightning Decision Jam to identify the participants problems on their minds and define the most important problem to solve in 60 to 90 minutes 1 The Lightning Decision Jam is a process developed by AJ Smart a Global Innovation and Product Design Agency based in Berlin https ajsmart com ldj In this chapter we have made some minor changes to the original process The most important output of an LDJ is actionable steps that can be executed right away Be strict in facilitation the timeboxed exercises are aimed at avoiding discussions LIGHTNING DECISION JAM 166 EXECUTE ACTION STEPS SOLUTION DOESN T WORK PICK NEXT BEST SOLUTION ONLINE INNOVATION EXECUTE ACTION STEPS ETC The Lightning Decision Jam is a relatively simple way for a facilitator to build experience for running innovation workshops online The process can also familiarise people with online collaboration for innovation which can help get buy in for a bigger online innovation project 167 THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM

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A Design Sprint is an innovation process for validating ideas and solving significant challenges It involves various techniques included in the process that depending on the format can span between three to five days This chapter will explore the five day version of the sprint covering each day to allow you to gain a solid understanding of how you can apply this within your organisation or with your clients WHAT IS THE DESIGN SPRINT In his book How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days the creator of the Design Sprint Jake Knapp described the Design Sprint Process as The greatest hits of business strategy innovation behavioural science and more All packaged into a step by step process that any team can follow 1 A Design Sprint is a time boxed five stage process that has design thinking as its foundation It aims to reduce the risk of bringing a new product service or feature to the market The process helps teams to define clear goals validate assumptions and agree on a road map that the product will take before starting development The process aims to address strategic issues using interdisciplinary rapid prototyping and useability testing 170 The high level five day process is defined below Understand Discover the business opportunity the audience the competition and the value proposition and define success metrics Diverge Explore develop and iterate creative ways of solving the problem regardless of feasibility Converge Identify ideas that fit the next product cycle and explore them in further detail through storyboarding Prototype Design and prepare prototypes that are tested with people Test Conduct 1 1 usability testing with five to six people from the product s primary target audience Ask good questions Former Google Ventures design partner Jake Knapp devised the planning sprint process for Google in 2010 He drew inspiration from such areas as Google s development culture and IDEO s design thinking workshops 1 In design sprints teams work on problems and goals differently than when siloed within the product development departments in the traditional waterfall process A carefully selected team from across the organisation focuses on themselves They manage their time to systematically collaborate and define a user problem to test a possible solution within five days Sprints are also integral to agile development Self organised crossfunctional teams work to supply short term deliverables and improve quality while keeping a careful watch on current user needs and any changing circumstances 1 The primary value of sprints is the speed at which design teams can concentrate on key objectives and come up with validated ideas quickly Under time boxed conditions team members work first to know these then progressively ideate critique and fine tune their way towards a testable prototype Eliminating distractions is vital to the current process and ONLINE INNOVATION therefore the intense specialisation in specific user needs and goals involves dedicated time away from regular everyday business Since the planning sprint process is streamlined and enables teams to supply deliverables and ensure or discard users assumptions quickly it helps to keep costs down WHY SHOULD WE RUN A DESIGN SPRINT We have all been in a brainstorming session where we developed thousands of ideas selected our preferred option and then started thinking about how we could develop it This usually takes considerable time to ideate prioritise discuss and then develop but the question is How do you know if this is something that your customers would want This is why the design sprint was developed to cut down the time it takes to validate a business idea with customers compared to the traditional innovation process outlined at the start of this paragraph Good ideas that are a real world success are hard to find as they face an uncertain road in their development journey This is the case whether the organisation has just started or is mature in its approach We need to answer questions such as where and how should we focus our efforts With whom should we test the product and who should be part of the development team The design sprint looks to shortcut the endless debate cycles in organisations and compresses months of work into a single week Think of the design sprint as a time machine for your product development process It allows organisations to engage warp speed to enable your customers to see your product in a tangible form display what your product will do and gauge reactions without wasting both time and money along the way 1 171 The online form of the design sprint was developed ahead of its time and was a pioneer in online innovation development Agencies such as AJ Smart 2 in Germany in partnership with Jake Knapp pushed the boundaries further and adapted the process to suit the online form using tools such as Miro Mural and Zoom to name a few While online communities have developed around the methodology it truly has a global presence all aided by online forms This global presence has developed different design sprint forms from a short three day sprint to the traditional five day process and variations have further developed the methodology There are now strategy sprints brand sprints service sprints but underneath they are all designed around the initial method that Jake Knapp developed in 2010 To be very clear in our approach we will focus on the five day design sprint focusing on the method s online delivery covering everything including pre sprint set up and focus points throughout the week of the sprint We set up each day differently depending on your time commitments and the guidelines you use and of course this may vary how you approach it yourself But the high level goals of each day are that we map out the problem on Monday and pick an important place to start On Tuesday we sketch our solutions on paper On Wednesday we review and make decisions based on the pre defined sprint questions and then turn our ideas into testable hypotheses On Thursday we hand over the prototype s development to the designers who build a realistic example of our concept Finally on Friday we test with our selected users to gain their feedback 3 Before we get into each day of the process we need to look at why you would run an online design sprint when compared to an in person event THE DESIGN SPRINT

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CHART THE DESIGN SPRINT PROCESS START AT THE END ASK THE EXPERTS TARGET MAP REMIX IMPROVE RUMBLE STORYBOARD SKETCH ADVANTAGES OF AN ONLINE DESIGN SPRINT Both online and in person design sprints have their advantages and challenges Still as this is a book about online innovation we will focus on the benefits and challenges of the online form and how you can mitigate them DECIDE LEARN PROTOTYPE TEST flexibilities saving time and money Using online tools you can work in synchronous and asynchronous forms and access individuals with a global perspective This also aids in recruiting user testers using platforms such as UserTesting com you can access a massive pool of testers that you wouldn t have access to if you were to recruit in person It doesn t matter where you are Your development team is spread globally and you usually would book expensive flights and pay hotel bills and expenses This is where online design sprints add in both Contributing ideas is easier faster and more anonymous Online design sprints allow the participants to focus on coming up with ideas without the pressure of being seen to put them on the board In tools such as Miro you can write your thoughts on your digital post it notes in anonymous form using the bulk upload function This allows the participants to feel less pressure to take ownership of the idea at this stage 172 ONLINE INNOVATION The below are taken from The Ultimate Guide to Remote Design Sprints 2 The sessions tend to be more focused and quicker In person sessions are great and can lead to great conversations essential for team building Although this can come as a distraction in the session people might be late returning to the room breaks slip et cetera The online sessions are more focused on the session s output and because it is facilitated it can make managing the group harder compared to in person sessions Last you don t need any particular area for innovation We have all arrived at an innovation session to be presented with a cold dark room that leaves both the facilitator and the participants feeling less than inspired Using digital tools allows us to remove this constraint by using a bright fast digital board and other communication tools Another factor is the Covid 19 pandemic more and more companies are looking to reduce their office space leading to a lack of suitable meeting rooms Again online design sprints lessen this problem So these are some of the advantages of running an online design sprint but what are the challenges that we need to face and ensure that we mitigate CHALLENGES OF AN ONLINE DESIGN SPRINT Although online design sprints were a pioneer of online innovation there is still a learning curve that needs to be reduced As we have discussed in this book running an online session can be challenging and hard work become a challenge Managing multiple time zones is very demanding and identifying suitable times is also a challenge Tools such as World Time Buddy www worldtimebuddy com help mitigate this but you need to be aware of setting up a session 2 Lower engagement and lack of interpersonal dynamics A bond develops when people are in the same room and we can read body language As discussed in previous chapters the lack of such a bond online can be mitigated but it s essential to keep the team focused as the internet does have thousands of distractions that can ruin the session s flow Technical issues This can make or break your session and can lead to the process becoming frustrating and counterproductive Always ensure that you have had a run through with the participants before the sessions to ensure that all systems such as online whiteboards and video conferencing tools work with the organisation It s also essential that you take time to ensure that everyone has a level of understanding of how to use the tools and again this should be a focal point before the session Working remotely can feel strange at first It can feel strange when you start an online design sprint people are so used to working in the same location using post it notes and other physical materials that it can feel like a big step to move to the digital form But using the right collaboration tools is outlined in this book and the onboarding process will help the individuals quickly become used to the new environment 2 Working across different time zones Although as outlined an online design sprint makes it easier to include your team from anywhere in the world this does 173 THE DESIGN SPRINT

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SO HOW DO YOU RUN A SUCCESSFUL ONLINE DESIGN SPRINT Running an online design sprint comes down to understanding four primary areas of focus These are preparation onboarding using the right tools and running the session We will cover each in turn to allow you to gain a good actionable understanding First we need to ensure that we have prepared correctly for the session and onboarded the participants to help with the session s future success The preparation stage is vital for everything to run smoothly and it allows you to focus your time on actually running a session Set up your workspace As discussed in previous chapters numerous tools can run an online design sprint one of the most critical elements that you need to ensure you have covered The digital space can be confusing and this applies to running your session If you are running the session we would strongly suggest that you invest in two screens as this helps to ensure that you can see the digital boards and all the participants We use one screen for the board and the other for the participants This allows you to read the room better check if someone looks confused or distracted or is having technical problems We would also suggest getting a timer as you will need this to keep the time of the exercises in the workshop to ensure you manage to fit everything in As this book has suggested you can use specific tools for different types of actions that you are looking to apply When running a design sprint we would suggest that you use the below 174 Miro Miro is a cloud based collaboration tool It features a digital whiteboard on which you can go from ideation to execution on an infinite canvas It s scalable includes more than a hundred pre built templates and works cross device Together with Mural it s one of today s most popular and trusted tools to create together online There is a free version for you to try and ready made design sprint boards for you to start with Refer to Chapter 3 to understand more about this Zoom Zoom also described in Chapter 3 is a cloud based videoconferencing tool that allows you to set up virtual video and audio conferencing It has a chat option as well as screensharing break out rooms and other collaborative capabilities For more interaction there is the option to do an online poll Zoom has the Gallery View mode that allows you to see every person on the call at once the participants to help them with an understanding of tools and the techniques used in the design sprint Refer to Chapter 3 again to understand more about Loom Google Forms Google Forms is a tool for conducting online surveys and is completely free of charge All the information gathered with the survey is automatically recorded in an Excel spreadsheet in real time When you need to test your ideas online and collect feedback from customers Google Forms allows you to do so in a simple and versatile way For a full breakdown of these tools plus many more please check the toolkit in Appendix 1 Loom Loom is a video messaging tool that helps you get your message across through instantly shareable videos With Loom you can record your camera microphone and desktop simultaneously This allows you to record simple messages to Set up your Miro board The whiteboard will become the session s focal point so we need to ensure we take the time to prepare this for the sprint You can create ad hoc beautiful templates but if you are new to running a design sprint you should use one of the design sprints templates available in Miro You will find the official design sprint template 5 that Jake Knapp has approved for use across the different platforms The board contains all the activities you will be running over the next five days with detailed instructions to focus on running the session If you create your board we recommend that you create a separate frame for each exercise and for each part of the workshop to aid the participants visual appearance and understanding 2 Not only does this allow you to structure your workshop clearly but it also allows the participants to feel a sense of accomplishment as they move through the frames Digital whiteboards like Miro include several important features that you will be using in your workshops Examples ONLINE INNOVATION 175 Calendly Calendly is an app offering you a versatile set of features that allow you to schedule one on one appointments group events and team meetings There is a free version available This is great to book the sessions for each day and to provide recurring meetings As the design sprint team has a number of participants using a tool such as Calendly allows you to arrange a suitable time for all meetings customer testing and other aspects You can find more on Calendly in Appendix 1 would be brainstorming ideas voting for your preferred options and grouping your post it notes to see patterns They are the workshop s heart and soul so you want to be sure to have spent time ensuring your board is right for your workshop Video conferencing Zoom is our preferred choice as a video conferencing medium this is mainly due to the ease of use and the ability to run break out rooms which is a key function of your session Ensure that you have checked your zoom account before the workshop as the basic account only allows for a 40 minute session and recording Therefore you will need to upgrade to the premium package option to record the whole session When you do run the session encourage participants to switch on their webcams and share their video This will help you to see if engagement is low or if any of the participants seem confused It will also encourage the participants to work from a quiet place instead of just dialling in and muting while driving This is a common misconception of online workshops people still think they are in a meeting where they can join from anywhere Having the camera on will allow you and the other stakeholders to monitor this A bonus is that you will have more fun when you see each other For example Zoom offers virtual backgrounds which can lighten the mood at the start of an online workshop Onboarding You have set up your workspace and are nearly ready to run your workshop but you mustn t forget the onboarding stage The onboarding of participants is essential if you want your session to run as smoothly as possible We cannot emphasise the importance of this step enough it can make a huge difference to your session success THE DESIGN SPRINT

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There are two main functions of onboarding first to ensure the participants understand what will happen when and where et cetera and to ensure that all participants are set up correctly for the sprint During the onboarding your role is a combination of a pilot and a flight attendant on a passenger plane Similarly to a pilot you run technical checks and ensure that everything is going according to plan On top of that you welcome the participants on board make sure they feel comfortable and know what they can expect just like a flight attendant would Give them an overview of the design sprint 2 Yes we know that you know what the design sprint is but there is a good chance that the participants will not have heard of it and will need to be briefed Provide a high level overview of the process what s included on each day and what to expect This will reduce the participants anxiety and allow them to be more focused on the actual workshop instead of second guessing what it is This can be part of a wider group conference call to brief everyone to save time before the session Brief the participants on your Miro board The worst thing that can happen on the day of the design sprint is that no one knows how to use the Miro board Therefore we always suggest that you book in some time with each person in the sprint to run through the Miro board and outline the key features This will allow you to answer any questions fix any technical issues and get them accustomed to the board 2 A tip is to include in your board an area where the participants can enter their name details and any emoji of a topic of their choice This is important because it addresses two functions First you get their details on the board allowing others to read these before the session Second it enables the participants to use the other functions of the board in preparation for the workshop Last send the meeting invitation and links to the board and zoom You are nearly ready to start the design sprint you understand the problem you want to solve and you have completed the preparation and onboarding It s now time to discuss the dates of the design sprint with the main stakeholder and then send out the meeting invitations using Calendly Outlook Gmail et cetera to ensure everyone is aware of the plan accordingly Brief the participants on Zoom Ensure that the participants can check that Zoom is working correctly and their microphones are compatible with their system We always state that during the session the participants should find a comfortable quiet place either in their home or in the office where they can focus on the workshop and the microphone picks up no background noise You want to have a minimal number of distractions in the session therefore strongly enforce this 176 Workshop timing In general we recommend keeping remote workshops shorter than their in person counterparts Sitting in front of a screen is surprisingly exhausting and after a while it gets tough to stay focused We always limit them to a maximum duration of four hours per session this includes breaks and an overtime buffer so realistically you should be able to finish earlier A couple of natural breaking points in the workshop structure make sense to end the session and continue the next morning 2 So it s now time for the sprint itself ONLINE INNOVATION THE ACTUAL SPRINT Superpowers Again similar to the above ask the participants to write their name who their superhero is and their own superpower This could be something like they are very good at team building listening coming up with new ideas or the like We tend to find this exercise allows the participants to open up MONDAY 30 circles Create 30 circles on the Miro board and ask the participants to fill the circles with as many images as possible These could be any image or you can give them a theme such as football teams or movie stars When the time is up ask them to explain their pictures and look for any patterns Patterns could be that everyone drew a similar image with the same look and feel et cetera This is an excellent way to get the conversation going in the meeting Following your discussions with the internal decision maker all invitations have been sent out to run the sprint from Monday to Friday Monday is to hold a series of structured conversations to build a foundation and a focus for the sprint week The structure allows the team to boot up as much information as possible 1 while preventing the usual meandering conversations On Monday you will be covering your long term goal then you go on to map the challenge In the afternoon you will ask the experts within your company or your client s company to share what they know about the challenge Lastly you pick a target on the map of a problem you can solve in one week It s always good to start any session with a warmup exercise It is a great way to make people feel at ease and to break the ice It also performs a second function allowing the participants to get used to the Miro board We always ask them to find a GIF image of how they feel at the start of the meeting as this gets them used to the board and allows the facilitator to gauge the mood in the room You can use lots of different warmup exercises depending on your personal preference I have a few which I like to use My first job We ask participants to write on post it notes their name their first job and what they learned that they still use today This normally creates a good welcoming environment and reduces the session anxiety for the participants and it can create a laugh which is always good 177 Catch the basketball Everyone switches on their camera and unmutes the facilitator starts by saying one and saying the person s name who is going to catch the ball They pretend to catch and shout two and so on If someone says a different number we start the whole process again It s amazing when we play this that we struggle to get into double figures but again it provides a great ice breaker for the group and generates plenty of laughter as we try to get into double figures As we said there are numerous types of warmup exercises and what you choose is up to you although you should ensure it works well online and that you can potentially use the board because it will give the participants more time to play around with the board as they start to get used to it The Design Sprint The first exercise we start with is called Start at the End this places the team in a time machine to think about the future 1 THE DESIGN SPRINT

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We want the team to step outside their current thinking and focus on questions such as What will have improved about your business due to this project This is important as it makes it more concrete in the participant s mind and sets them up for the long term goal s critical exercise could go wrong It s time to jump back into the time machine and look at a future where you haven t met your long term goal What went wrong Why didn t the project or product work Why didn t customers like it This is where the sprint questions come in The Long Term Goal The long term goal answers at the very beginning the ultimate question the team is trying to answer in a more formal manner we ask the team the below questions 1 Why are we doing this project Where do we want to be six months a year or even five years from now Now that you have your long term goal which is super optimistic ambitious and motivating it s time to think about what List your sprint questions As a team you will need to think about the potential roadblocks or reasons for failure It s important to get the team thinking to prompt them to think about this constructively We normally do this by setting the scene and asking open ended questions such as If we were to hit our goal what must be true If we could jump into the future and the project failed what were the reasons for this and How will we define success A vital part of this is rephrasing the assumptions into a set of questions that will allow us to record the answers more concisely and use them for reference when we start other exercises in the sprint This is an important mindset shift as it turns the assumptions from worry to a more engaging challenge for the participants To do this we use the reframing question Can we when outlining our assumptions on the Miro board This instigates the mindset shift Here s an example Assumption We struggle to build trust making the project fail Re phrased Can we build trust with new customers The process allows us to think about the biggest risks to the project which forms the basis of our sprint and during the review at the end of the sprint we go back to these questions to determine if we have answered them throughout the process Using the sprint questions at the start of the process the team has to face its fears and worries but this allows these to be defined early in the process Once the team has written their sprint questions we vote on these and select the top three to take forward in the process 178 ONLINE INNOVATION This can and will lead to discussion within the sprint team and ensure that you take your time to listen to the various viewpoints so that everyone has been heard and has had their points listened to Examples of long term goals for Zoom our video conferencing tool could be Bring a great online video experience to new customers or Be seen as the go to app for video conferencing When completing your long term goal ensure that you are ambitious reflecting your team s ethos and future aspirations once the team has written them on a digital post it note and placed it at the top of the board This will allow it to be seen throughout the sprint to remind you why you are doing this The goal doesn t have to be 100 perfect or accurate If you find that the discussion is taking too long ensure that you stop and use the long term goal that has been discussed You don t want to impact the rest of the sprint agenda Do inform the team that the rest of the day s activities will help form a more concrete goal that you can carry throughout the sprint Ask the expert questions It s now time to interview experts from your organisation and your client s organisation as a team The design sprint is a collection of project team members who may or may not have the domain expertise required Therefore it s important that we understand the company s vision what projects they have run before and how things work It s about becoming curious acting in the manner of a reporter diving into details that will help us in the sprint There are certain methods for interviewing experts although we prefer to interview the expert with the team engaged and each person can take turns asking specific questions This leads to free flowing conversations which can unearth some real nuggets of information that we can take forward 1 When interviewing outside experts only ask questions closely related to their expertise as this will allow them time to be maximised and provide more reliable information to be gained We need to remember that each sprint and challenge is unique and the questions asked will vary depending on this Try to keep the conversation flowing and please do improvise as you go along or double down on certain topics An excellent method for extracting information is using the five Ws and an H method This stands for Who What When Where Why and How This is so powerful because it is a pro ven formula for obtaining the complete story of a subject and due to its nature it allows for easy structuring of questions Examples of this type of questing are 179 Who is it about What happened When did it take place Where did it take place Why did it happen How did it happen To ensure that the answers are as factual as possible and as you can see from the example the questions are openended Avoid closed questions that can be answered by a simple yes or no because this can lead to weak insights which will hamper your project Each expert interview should take between 15 to 30 minutes and due to the tight time constraints I recommend not going over As the interview is being conducted the team should be taking notes in the form of How Might We questions Using How Might We Questions The How Might We or HMW questions are fundamental to the design thinking method and the design sprint methodology The method allows the sprint team to record their insights from the expert interviews reframing the insights and pain points as a series of questions to create a framework for resolving challenges As a facilitator it s important to explain how the HMW method works and inform the team that they are looking for opportunities and not solutions This method is so powerful that it creates a mindset shift in the team Like we discussed in the previous chapter on the Lightning Decision Jam the Google guide 6 to HMW questions breaks it down as How guides team members to believe the answer is out there Might lets team members know their HMW statement might or might not work and either possibility is okay And We reminds team members that the design sprint is about teamwork and building on each other s ideas Come up with as many HMW post it notes as possible and encourage little self editing of what is said Now that you have captured loads of HMW notes it s time to think about THE DESIGN SPRINT

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prioritising these Select a maximum of ten HMW s from your Miro board and as a team organise them into similar groups Once you have columns of similar notes you can place a post it at the column s head to categorise this list Example headers could be Operations Sales or Marketing Now the team votes on both the HMW question and the category and the top voted are taken forward to the next step of the process The User Journey Map The journey mapping exercise enables the team to understand the process from the customer s viewpoint identify touchpoints and visualise the user s journey from start to finish It s important to remember that this is to map out the As Is process Please think of the journey map as a simplified process that the user takes that it s not about detail more about understanding the overall process and this will allow the team to target an area of the map to focus the sprint on How you start the map depends on where you are in your product cycle If you are running a new product sprint you may want to explore a certain user journey from start to finish If you have an existing product and are further along in the cycle you may start your journey map when the user is first introduced to your product searching for your product or when they are onboarding and or setting up an account The secret to mapping is to keep it simple you don t want to get bogged down in every element s detail because this will draw the process out and confuse the participants Several steps can be used to complete this exercise Jake Knapp suggests in his book Sprint How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days 1 the below steps are the most important List the actors on the left of the map The actors are all the important users that interact with your product These can be customers internal stakeholders or whoever is the best using the current process Write the ending on the right It s much easier to write down the start and finish of a process so ensure everyone agrees on how it ends before you move on to the middle of the map Words and arrows in between Remember this is a simple map so you do not want masses of detail it doesn t have to be a masterpiece The mapping exercise was developed when used for in person workshops to mitigate any lack drawing expertise It s easier with the online environment as you can quickly draw lines arrows and type words into Miro Keep the steps simple The map should have between five and fifteen steps If there are any more than this the map will become too complicated and you should work towards making this simpler It s a team exercise Don t let just one person come up with the map Yes someone needs to start the process but once it s defined there should be some discussion to ensure this reflects the user journey you are trying to capture The decider gets the final say And yes it s a team exercise but we need to ensure that we have a decider to confirm that they are happy to proceed with the map you have produced Therefore once the exercise is complete get them to agree to move on to the next step You have had a busy day so far you have defined your long term goal and you have outlined the questions you need to be answered your sprint questions You have met with experts from the domain and completed the mapping exercise You still have one last exercise to consider for the day picking a target on the map to explore 180 ONLINE INNOVATION 181 START MIDDLE END GUEST BOOKS ROOM CHECK IN CHECK OUT HOUSEKEEPING PREPARES ROOM DAILY CLEANING STRIPS ROOM FOR NEXT GUEST Pick a target This method allows the team to focus on a specific map area where the topic is the most critical to be accurate You need to ensure that you select this correctly Otherwise the direction of the sprint will be misplaced leading to a poor result and process You need to think of this as finding the point in the customer journey that is most critical to get right Although we advise that the decider decides on the point of focus Jake Knapp 3 does suggest that there are other techniques to use to come to a decision Remember this dictates the rest of the sprint the focus of the sketches and the prototype so ensure you take some time to decide Techniques that can be used 4 Ask the decider This is usually the best course of action because there tends to be less discussion As you have covered a lot of ground today the decider will be updated with everything and should be able to identify the area fairly easily Use an anonymous vote Ask everyone to vote on an area that they feel is the most important and review the results This will allow the decider to understand the rest of the team s viewpoints and make a more informed decision However I would always use option one with speed and ask the decider to decide on this 1 Once the decider has chosen a target look back at the sprint questions and ensure that one or more is in line with the chosen target You have completed the long term goal the sprint questions conducted the expert interviews drawn a map and now selected the sprint target Tomorrow we will be covering the lightning demos and the sketching exercises TUESDAY So you have rested from the previous day and it s now time to get into solutions This is a day that can lead to many anxieties for the participants and you must mitigate them early in the day The design sprint s beauty is that you do not need to be great designers illustrators or writers It s about being inclusive and allowing everyone to contribute in their way to the process Today you will start with the Lightning demo exercise which helps the participants review existing ideas take inspiration and look at ways of bringing them into their ideas for the process Then everyone will complete a 4 part sketch an offline exercise and upload them to the Miro board THE DESIGN SPRINT

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The Lightning demo The secret to getting inspired is to look outside your current business or environment for examples of things that encourage you The light demo exercise 1 further asks each participant to think of a product or service they can bring into the workshop to inspire the complete team to remove their blinders It s built around the premise of building inspiration so that we can design more innovative concepts The three steps that we would advise to follow are 1 Consider and list robust solutions from a range of companies and industries Encourage participants to also look at their own organisation 2 Give everyone 25 minutes to carry out their research and to place their ideas on the Miro board 3 Once the research has been finished limit each lightning demo to three minutes That goes fast It s an excellent idea to set a timer for both exercises The creative process can lead to extra conversations and the participants taking longer to find more and more examples You can also use Lightning demos from videos advertising et cetera and any links should be inserted into the Miro board Before starting the demos assign someone to take notes on Miro about each idea s key points Another technique is to make a quick drawing of the inspiring component write a simple headline above it and note the source underneath You don t have to decide which ideas should be discarded or are worth remixing or improving at this stage You can figure that out later when you sketch For now don t make decisions and don t debate Just capture anything that might be useful Once the exercise is over you will have a Miro board full of inspiration In a normal design sprint you would have between 10 and 20 ideas listed This should be enough to gain 182 some good insights and allow the creative juices to flow before going into the 4 part sketch exercise 4 part sketch In the sketch phase the team slowly builds up the level and detail of their drawings This is similar to athletes They would warm up before running a marathon and we approach this in the same manner The participants generate and share a broad range of ideas from both outside perspectives and the lightning demo exercise in the sketch stage Start with simply reviewing the lightning demos the ideas discussed and then review the sprint questions Then begin to doodle simple drawings which are rough solutions to the sprint questions you have come up with It s now time to speed up your creative mind and use crazy 8s to generate rapid variations of your solution Last bring it together to design the solution sketch Notes This is the first technique to use to start the sketching process and it s straightforward This is the process of reviewing what s been generated collecting thoughts and preparing to sketch ideas based on the knowledge and opportunities shared in the design sprint so far This is important because you have covered a lot of ground and you need to allow the team to be relaxed and able to translate their ideas into visual form Set a time limit of 20 minutes to complete notes 6 Crazy 8s This is a fast sketching technique that challenges the participants to sketch eight distinct ideas in just eight minutes Its focus is to push people past their first idea which is usually the least innovative and generate variations Realise that ideas do not have to be perfect this exercise is about pushing your creative levers further to develop some great and not so great solutions We ask each participant to come up with eight variations of their initial idea in eight minutes This pushes the participants past their first idea to sketch their minds Solution sketch Each participant focuses more time on the one idea they are most interested in It s okay to sketch a new idea or a mix of ideas and also you can include any of the other participant s ideas The main purpose of this is to develop a solution that we feel is the best solution to the sprint s challenge The sketch should include three pieces of A4 paper with a frame on each page outlining how a user would use the product or service 6 When completing the solution sketch make it self explanatory and keep it anonymous because we don t want this to influence the next stage Include words in the drawing and finally give it a catchy title Once everyone has finished their designs ask them to upload these to the Miro board so on Wednesday you can focus on deciding what you are going to include in the final design Ideas Now that the participants have completed their review it s time to start bringing this together Each person will draw and write down their rough ideas doodles diagrams and other thoughts they feel are relevant This should be a messy creative process so do not try to be perfect get stuff down on paper We usually set a time limit of 20 minutes for this exercise 6 ONLINE INNOVATION 183 WEDNESDAY Today is all about deciding what will be in the final prototype several techniques can be used to determine this and we will explore them here You will be critiquing each solution using the lens of the long term goal set on the first day Once you have completed this step it s time to move to storyboarding the prototype and passing the design to the team that will develop it Decide In his book Sprint Jake Knapp states that the decision stage is one of the most difficult and something that he has refined while developing the process 1 The decide stage contains five steps that allow a decision to be made constructively Each participant will share their Solution Sketch and the team will find consensus on a single idea through decision making exercises The final direction will aim to address the long term goal and prototype direction Jake Knapp states the process is as follows 1 1 Art Museum a Put the solution sketches in Miro from each person 2 Heat map a Everyone reviews all the solutions in silence and uses dot stickers to mark interesting parts of each design 3 Speed critique a Everyone has three minutes to discuss the highlights of the designs using post it notes to capture ideas 4 Straw poll a Each person chooses one solution and votes on their favourite elements of each design using Miro 5 Supervote a The decider makes the final decision by placing a large red sticker on the solution that is decided THE DESIGN SPRINT

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After the above process you may find that you want to include elements of different designs into one prototype or if you have more than one winning solution which I wouldn t recommend test both with your customers If this is the case discuss it and bring together the important elements again with the decider making the final vote On to the storyboard Storyboard The storyboard connects each of the solution concepts to map each step of the experience you want to test It s important as this will be handed to the team that will be building the prototype and it makes most sense for all concerned The focus should be on what needs to be built for testing with users on the final day Storyboarding can be a challenging element of the design sprint both for the facilitator and the participants So far you have not worried too much about getting into the fine detail only ensuring that you have covered everything needed I would advise against jumping right into a storyboard as a blank screen can intimate the participants Instead start with an exercise called User Test Flow The purpose of this is to write out at a high level the basic steps that will be included in the storyboard When you complete the mapping exercise it s easier to think of a start and endpoint As the diagram above explains you break this down into four post it notes and outline on each note what the user will see This could be a welcome screen a newsletter or a social media post etc Once everyone has completed this exercise vote on the best flow Next following this exercise take the voted for user test flow and convert this into a storyboard The storyboard contains 184 around ten to fifteen frames of the user interactions within your product service and process Always start the process by outlining how the user found out about your product and the result This exercise can take over an hour depending on the level of detail but it s important to remember the below points when completing it from Sprint Work with what you have Include enough detail The decider decides Keep the story to fifteen minutes or less Once you have designed your board the workshop element of the design sprint is over You have covered a lot and your designs are now ready for the final two days which we will cover briefly THURSDAY interactive prototype with a few simple clicks and you can share the URL with your user testers A great feature of Figma is its ability to import a library of pre made templates such as IOS and Android screens to add to the prototype s real feel There are a few simple rules we should follow when building a prototype 1 You can prototype anything 2 Prototypes are disposable 3 Build just enough to learn 4 The prototype must appear real I mentioned prototyping a presentation and you may be wondering how this appears real It depends on what you are prototyping If you are prototyping a sales document or an advertising campaign for example then a presentation using PowerPoint or Keynote will be sufficient Prototype The developer s job is to build a high fidelity prototype using an application like Figma to develop an interactive testable prototype We say developers but it may be the case that your prototype will take the form of a presentation that the team members will complete Although usually the storyboard is passed to a developer to build the final design Time is tight on Thursday as you only have one day before the user testing This is why the storyboard is so important if the developer always asks questions this will delay the design s implementation The tool of choice for digital prototyping is Figma 7 Figma is a graphical web based tool that allows various people to work on a single file You can share the prototype with your client and team to get real time feedback Figma lets you create an FRIDAY ONLINE INNOVATION 185 Once you have completed your interviews the team needs to review the feedback and look for good and bad patterns in the prototype and concept Another important element is to refer back to the sprint questions and ask Did we achieve what we set out to do After accruing the insights the team can disband and celebrate a sprint completed and they can build on learning further in future tests The design sprint is a versatile and innovative process that allows teams to devise and test a concept with real users in five days This chapter was only an introduction to the method and I would refer to the sources outlined to explore further The next chapter will describe how you can ideate new products services business models processes and customer experiences 100 online with the FORTH innovation method Last we will be testing the prototype with real users to identify any useability problems and determine the user s feedback on the product prototype This can be conducted remotely using Zoom Google Meet or if you want to invest in a dedicated platform then Usertesting com is my preferred choice Online user testing is more convenient and increases the chances of accessing a larger pool of candidates that you can recruit Interviewing users is outside this book s scope but you want to ensure that the users match your target customer and record the session using the Loom tool This will allow the team to review the tests afterwards to gain the greatest level of learning 3 THE DESIGN SPRINT

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KEY MESSAGES FROM THIS CHAPTER The Design Sprint is focused on the user Its entire process is user centred It is built on a solid understanding of the user wants and needs and seeks to validate ideas directly from your target users Making a Design Sprint is a team sport This means there are less back and forth discussions and fewer silos which can delay implementing this innovation process The Design Sprint is fast and efficient It forces you to focus and work towards building a validated prototype in five days Learn fast fail fast The sprint allows you to focus on your clear goals to make decisions quickly This means that instead of taking months your team can determine the desirability of your product very quickly which allows you too then iterate quicker 1 Knapp J Zeratsky J and Kowitz B 2016 Sprint How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days Simon and Schuster 2 AJ Smart 2020 The Ultimate Guide to Remote Design Sprints Retriever from https ajsmart com remotedesignsprints 3 Knapp 2020 The Remote Design Sprint Guide Retriever from https www thesprintbook com remote 4 Sprint stories 2020 Seven Tips for the First Ever Design Sprint of a Company Retriever from https sprintstories com 7 tips for the first ever design sprintof a company 16682b307c1c 5 Cruchon 2020 The Official Remote Design Sprint Template Retriever from https www mural co templates the official remote designsprint template 6 Google 2020 The Design Sprint Kit Retriever from https designsprintkit withgoogle com 7 Figma 2020 Design Retriever from https www figma com design The contents of this chapter have been taken from the below sources to pull together different perspectives on this method All credit goes to the leading authorities outlined below 186 ONLINE INNOVATION

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FORTH is the innovation methodology that unites us as writers of this book We are all certified online FORTH innovation facilitators and part of the FORTH family of over 250 innovation managers project leaders and facilitators worldwide WHAT IS THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD FORTH is a method that helps organisations to become innovative by generating mini new business cases and empowering team members with an innovative mindset in a 12 week online process The method was created in 2005 by the global keynote speaker and innovation authority Gijs van Wulfen In 2013 he published The Innovation Expedition also BIS Publishers which became a worldwide innovation bestseller that has been translated into nine languages the innovation journey should start now what you should you be looking for and how innovation success is defined Furthermore you achieve full buy in from all stakeholders from the beginning plan the journey engage a team and kick off the expedition In Observe and Learn you get the blinders off of all participants and reach out to customers to understand their needs and customer frictions In Raise Ideas you generate a lot upwards of a thousand ideas online and convert the 15 best ones into concepts With real customer feedback you improve the concepts in Test Ideas In the final phase Homecoming you transform the three to five best concepts into mini new business cases You end the journey with a decision that will be transferred into the organisations innovation funnel of the three to five mini new business cases FORTH is an acronym It stands for the five phases of this method Full Steam Ahead is about preparing yourself for a real innovation expedition That means understanding why F O R T H 190 ONLINE INNOVATION CHART THE FORTH INNOVATION METHODOLOGY FULL STEAM AHEAD OBSERVE AND LEARN RAISE IDEAS TEST IDEAS HOMECOMING 191 THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD

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WHY DO A FORTH INNOVATION JOURNEY The world is changing fast The Covid 19 years have disrupted sectors businesses and their business models products and services Even when everybody is talking about being agile and having a purpose that does not mean that organisations act alike There are two modus operandi in companies Operational excellence meaning focus on exploitation efficiency and stepwise growth by improvement and innovation excellence focussing on exploration and jump wise growth by breakthrough The first one secures survival today and the other survival tomorrow These modi operandi require a different approach and mindset No failing versus fast failing certainty versus uncertainty minimal budgets versus investing tight planning and control versus iterative experimenting In our experience most companies focus solely on operational excellence which creates a huge risk because the culture and the people unlearn to cope with high uncertainties take risks and accept failure as valuable learning experiences Covid 19 had a massive impact on some sectors as we discussed extensively in Chapter 1 In the chart below you see that airports and airlines business models were hit hard when the number of flights collapsed That is a huge challenge in itself But most airports and airlines applied only operational excellence Changing their mindset and speeding up innovating their business is sure to be a major turnaround as we will notice in practice That s when applying the FORTH innovation method makes real sense We say FORTH makes the old elephants dance again 192 CHART EXPLORE VS EXPLOIT MODE Source Alex Osterwalder EXPLORE CHART COMMERCIAL FLIGHTS IN THE EU IN 2020 AND 2021 change compared with the same month of previous year Source Eurocontrol EXPLOIT JAN 0 8 Search and breakthrough High FOCUS UNCERTAINTY Efficiency and growth FINANCIAL PHILOSOPHY Safe haven with steady returns and dividends Iterative experimentation embracing speed faillure learning and rapid adaption CULTURE PROCESSES Linear execution embracing planning precitability and manimal faillure CULTURE PROCESSES Managers who are strong at organizing and planning and can design efficient processes to deliver on time and budget ONLINE INNOVATION APRIL 91 2 Low Venture capital style risk taking expecting few outsized winners Explorers who excel in uncertainty are strong at pattern recognition and can navigate between big pictures and details MARCH 44 1 MAY 89 8 JUNE 84 2 Gijs van Wulfen originated the FORTH methodology having the operational excellence only in mind of all organisations whose markets get disrupted and suddenly need to innovate their offerings and organisation With a clear structure and smooth process FORTH secures the buy in of all stakeholders while delivering three to five innovative mini new business cases and a team with an innovation excellence mindset again The re invention story of FORTH innovation facilitator Florian As an innovation consultant and facilitator in the pre Covid 19 era I facilitated in person workshops and training When Covid 19 hit all my orders for the whole year got cancelled in less than a week I was devastated and did not know what to do like probably a lot of you For a few days I just enjoyed nothing to do anymore And at the same time I was paralysed by the shock of not knowing what will happen next 193 JULY 63 5 AUG 53 4 SEPT 58 7 OCT 61 6 NOV 68 3 DEC 66 9 JAN 68 1 As a father of two little kids being away from home made me feel missing out on them every day And as an introverted person the full day in person workshops are very exhausting to me So I thought that changing my business could be an opportunity I love technology so I spent the next two months experimenting with tools and methods around digital innovation workshops almost 24 7 Less than three months later I was back in business with a clear focus on doing innovation online only which gave me much more energy My learning I love to share with you is to try to see opportunities in a crisis Realise that are you able to change And use your strengths and the ones of your organisation to pivot and find new ways of delivering value to customers THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD

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THE FORTH POWER Founder of the FORTH innovation method Gijs van Wulfen worked as a marketer in the food sector and later as a consultancy firm strategy consultant He experienced all the frustrations at the fuzzy front end of innovation himself being faced with undecisive leaders not knowing in which direction to lead their organisations The main problem for why the start of innovation is so hard is not the creative process as such No It s the lack of buy in and commitment of managers rejecting change Design thinking alone would not solve the problem For him it was crystal clear that you have to combine design thinking with business thinking to secure that new innovative business cases will be adopted by the business environment and are transformed into real products services or business models When he designed the FORTH innovation method in 2005 he wanted to Take away the fear of making a big jump Give the deciders and participants a secure and understandable path Give the participants the feeling of making progress at any moment of the journey Give the deciders opportunities to steer without interfering with the process dramatically Reduce the risk of uncertainty for everyone Get full buy in and commitment of the deciders all along the total process Increase the success rate of new concepts launched on the market Florian learned the hard way I discovered the FORTH innovation method in 2016 when I became an independent innovation consultant I was looking for something to structure innovation I thought But what I was looking for was something that unites the R D and the business side 194 Before becoming independent I was engaged in product development projects and worked on ideas in the industry s fuzzy front end I had to learn the hard way what it means if you do not get the buy in and the deciders commitment My team and I had excellent new solutions that made so much sense at least from my perspective but they were all turned down of customer frictions and current innovation opportunities They also raise ideas and give feedback throughout the whole process By allowing them to fill in additional requirements for the MNBCs and being a godfather while the teams create the MNBCs the risk of uncertainty will be reduced and they can select the best ones as all relevant information is available That secures the commitment and increases the adoption rate of the delivered business cases in the regular product development stage gated process Only later did I realise I was so ignorant because I never asked the leaders of my company about their perspective and what they think or what they were looking for So there never was a link between my organisation s business needs and the creative process of finding new solutions And that s how I have experienced personally that FORTH really helps you Because you will share buy in and commitment from the deciders through the whole journey leading to tangible innovative outcomes The main catch is the by catch and the by catch is the main catch Kees van Zijderveld when CEO of ESKA an industrial firm producing solid cardboard said to Gijs after finishing a FORTH innovation journey Gijs the maincatch of FORTH is the by catch and the by catch is the main catch Gijs asked What do you mean Kees And he replied We engaged on a FORTH innovation journey as our company needs to innovate drastically as our main markets like books office binders and board games are on their decline And FORTH delivered results as we came home with five solid new business cases of which one could be implemented directly But in the end I consider this as a by catch What I even value more is that the ten men that enrolled as core team all made a huge personal development They learned how to explore postponing their judgment They talked to customers They learned to ideate new ideas and to make concepts They made new business cases I have seen those men change during our FORTH innovation journey You not only have an innovation programme it s also a culture change programme And Gijs asked Kees if I would have come to you six months ago and told you I have this wonderful culture change programme Would you have Integrating all these elements made FORTH a very structured clear and understandable innovation process with a clear time frame delivering three to five innovative mini new business cases MNBC Each of the short 23 workshops of the online version of FORTH have tangible outcomes which are the next workshop s input That secures constant progress in small steps and prevents shortcuts that lead nowhere By drafting an innovation assignment at the beginning of the process a clear and common understanding is generated as is the buy in of the deciders All decisions that will be made during the expedition are based on this assignment It is the North Star of the FORTH Journey The project sponsor and the rest of the steering committee join the so called extended team by which all deciders are involved in the process and contribute themselves They also get a deep understanding ONLINE INNOVATION 195 adopted it No of course not Kees answered Culture change programmes never deliver results Who is the FORTH Innovation Process for With its structured framework and focus on all stakeholders buy in FORTH is suitable for organisations that got stuck in operational excellence Besides them the methodology is also used very successfully by innovative companies that want to lead their markets filling their innovation pipelines with new innovative offerings We recommend FORTH for midsize and large organisations It suits all areas and sectors It has been successfully implemented in healthcare fastmoving consumer goods the construction sector the chemical industry the ICT sector high technology industry the energy sector the telecom sector the financial sector the non profit sector universities and even governments FORTH is focused on making old elephants dance again That is why the process incorporates the buy in of the decision makers That makes the process last for 12 weeks which is longer than such startup methods as Lean Startup or a Design Sprint up to five days These methods are focused on a single idea or issue and require an innovative mindset from the start For what topics can the method be used On the one hand we recommend FORTH for any kind of innovation It does not matter if you are looking for a new service product process customer experience or business model Or if it is for a tech social or frugal innovation We even use FORTH to costovate organisations combining costsaving while wowing customers with new offerings On the other hand FORTH is a 12 week culture change program where at the end of the journey the innovation team has an open and innovative mindset and has improved their skills THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD

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Initially in 2005 FORTH was created to help organisations with new products and services Over time it was also used to innovate business models and customer experiences Nowadays being used worldwide it is also used to innovate internal processes and have a cultural impact The outcomes of a FORTH expedition Implementing a FORTH innovation journey will ultimately deliver for you and your organisation the following ten outcomes during the process 1 A clear and shared understanding of the goal of the innovation journey with the innovation assignment 2 Potential target groups identified 3 Six to ten innovation opportunities with valuable insights 4 An understanding of the most relevant customer frictions connecting to customers 5 An inspired team with their blinders off 6 Five hundred to a thousand ideas 7 Twelve to fifteen tested and improved new concepts 8 Three to five mini new business cases 9 A final selection of mini new business cases adopted for development 10 An open minded team sparking a culture of innovation Taking FORTH online The FORTH innovation method is a best practice innovation method and has been proven worldwide in in person workshops When Covid 19 forced almost the whole world into the first lockdown a group of more than twenty FORTH facilitators decided on Coenie Middel s initiative a FORTH facilitator from South Africa supported by Gijs van Wulfen to go online The case and innovation assignment we chose focussed on generating three to five innovative solutions that significantly reduce the estimated negative impact of Covid 19 on society by 50 You can imagine that our first version of FORTH online was a rough and bumpy journey as 196 we just copied exactly online what made the method so successful in person We made all the beginner s mistakes ourselves and that s why we could write this book and finetune FORTH online as a smooth running online methodology with 23 short online workshops in 12 weeks generating the same deliverables as the in person version the other hand if people were to meet in person we would need to consider a jet lag as well In our online FORTH innovation project with Philip Morris International we had a core team from Europe and an extended team member from the USA He had to be up at 5 o clock in the morning which was not optimal for him very stable has good audio and video quality allows break out rooms and has good facilitator rights like mute unmute everybody and bring everybody back from break out rooms For customer feedback on the concepts any kind of survey tools like Google Forms or Typeform can be used The advantages of an Online FORTH process As FORTH focuses on midsize and large organisations the participants are primarily in different countries Online it does not matter where you are With a few mouse clicks the whole team is working together saving over the entire journey many days of travel time and ten thousand euros for flights and accommodation apart from the environmental benefits Another advantage is that working online on collaboration platforms helps more introverted people They can contribute their ideas and be heard without being pushed on stage or talked over on Miro which we use for FORTH by the extroverts by writing in bulk mode using the anonymous voting function and using the board s round the clock availability asynchronously As everybody is working on the same board simultaneously and votes are done with a simple click it saves a lot of time and speeds up the innovation process Using asynchronous and synchronous work helps make the workshops shorter and populated with the most relevant issues Everything that can be done alone could also be done asynchronously But the limit of transferring tasks to asynchronous work is the engagement and commitment of the participants That s why we start with a very low impact part of asynchronous work and gradually increase it over the course of the FORTH journey As we described earlier natural engagement online is lower than it is in person because participants are in their environment and have their second and third screen That s why the FORTH online workshops are created to be highly engaging and rules are set to limit distraction STEP 1 FULL STEAM AHEAD Technical issues are the enormous risk of any online workshop and so it is for an online project with FORTH If the internet breaks down the power goes off or tools are not allowed to be used it s over and done The first phase of the FORTH Journey is Full Steam Ahead Here it is about getting ready for the journey It has two parts We meet with all relevant deciders before the real start of the online expedition to get a clear and shared understanding about the innovation assignment and stakeholder buy in and to compose the team for the journey In this pre phase it might happen that the journey fails to start because there is not sufficient buy in from the decider side The biggest challenge is the lack of personal interaction of course The coffee corner or water cooler moments or a little chat with your neighbour that s not possible We are all missing these moments The tools set up for a FORTH online expedition For the online FORTH we use the online collaboration platform Miro When we took the FORTH process online we found this to be the best match Miro and significant features like the mindmap and voting tools helped us make the online FORTH process easy fast and straightforward The FORTH process now has fully designed Miro templates and agendas for all of the 23 workshops The templates are well designed easy to understand and follow the FORTH process The challenges of an online FORTH process International teams can work across different time zones So the time slots might not be optimal for everyone For one it s early morning and for another it is already evening But on For our facilitator agendas we use SessionLab That helped us to easily co design the workshops and make changes in an instant For videoconferencing we prefer Zoom because it is ONLINE INNOVATION 197 THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD

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The second part of Full Steam Ahead is kicking off the journey in four short workshops The main focus is on team alignment and identifying and choosing innovation opportunities to explore in the next phase Deliverables There are two significant deliverables The departure document consists of the innovation assignment the innovation team and the FORTH workshop planning The departure document is like a project charter The innovation assignment describes the goal why they are innovating what they are looking for for whom and where and when it should be on the market and the success criteria that the new offerings need to be accepted and transferred into the internal innovation development process After drafting the innovation assignment a project sponsor and a project leader are chosen They are responsible for setting up the innovation team In this stage look for a diverse multidisciplinary team in age department experience sex attitude and personality An ideal team consists of six to ten people This core team is supplemented by the extended team who are the members of a steering committee that in FORTH also takes part in this journey to get their buy in Part of the departure document is the planning of the FORTH journey Because it is a journey of 12 weeks with 23 workshops and many people it has to be planned properly When everything is set the journey can begin Additionally doing it online we have to arrange some IT related activities What video conferencing tool will we use Is it Miro compliant or do we have to find alternatives Does everybody have the right computer and equipment like a camera microphone and stable internet connection available 198 The second major deliverable of the phase Full Steam Ahead is six to ten innovation opportunities depending on the core team s size because each core team member will pick one innovation opportunity to explore in the next phase Observe and Learn The deliverables are the end products of the following four workshops Workshop 1 Innovation Focus workshop This is one of the most relevant workshops in the whole FORTH Journey All relevant deciders are present And the goal is to get a clear and common understanding of the innovation assignment and their buy in From our experience we recommend not more than eight relevant deciders for this online workshop otherwise it could get too messy The workshop structure is straightforward You bring all deciders to the Miro template you are using and ask them six questions 1 Why do you want to innovate now 2 What are you looking for 3 Who is the target group 4 Where in which region do we focus 5 When do you want to introduce it 6 What are the criteria the innovations have to meet Each question is answered on an online post it by each decider and most of the time the answers will vary Now it is the facilitator s task to draw a clear conclusion and everybody agrees on it This process is repeated for all questions so in the end we have answered all questions and have the buy in from everyone on a clear concise assignment Facilitating and handling the deciders and drafting a conclusion that gets their buy in within a minimal timeframe is demanding ONLINE INNOVATION Workshop 2 Team Introduction workshop The team kickoff workshop is the first time the core team meets The purpose is to build trust within the team by getting to know each other better personally and professionally Even before they start the journey all team members get invited to a welcome whiteboard on Miro With an introduction video you help them get familiar with the tool before starting the workshop We learned that people need to get familiar with the online tools otherwise they cannot concentrate on the content Start the workshop with personal connections getting to know each other Do some exercises to gain a feeling of trust with the new team and the facilitators In the in person version we always have a wonderful dinner together afterwards And after a night in the bar together the team has connected Online it is more difficult We learned that getting the team to bond takes much longer online and is more difficult than in very structured and time boxed workshops That s why we integrated FORTH Caf s which are virtual meetings outside the workshops with no agenda Just time to get to know each other better and talk about whatever you like without facilitation that provide great opportunity to realise the innovation assignment Before the workshop the project sponsor and project leader together with us as facilitators agree on four major topics relevant to fulfil the innovation assignment At the beginning of the workshop we split the team into four groups and all participants fill out a mind map on one of the four topics In the second step we ask them to generate innovation opportunities inspired by their mind map Out of the huge amount of innovation opportunities we let every group pick their favourite ten The top 40 participants in the plenum choose the top six to ten innovation opportunities with anonymous voting in Miro that makes this decision process fast simple and democratic The last step in this workshop is that core team members select and adopt one innovation opportunity to explore in the next phase Observe and Learn STEP 2 OBSERVE AND LEARN Workshop 3 Kickoff workshop After the core team workshop we facilitate the official Kickoff In the beginning the core team and the extended team get to know each other with some short networking in break out rooms Then the project sponsor and project leader explain the background and the goal of the journey They present their innovation assignment and the project leader answers questions In the end they describe the online FORTH process and the activities for the next 12 weeks Observe and Learn with four workshops is in our experience the most undervalued and underestimated phase of the process Its purpose is to get the operational excellence blinders off and get new insights on opportunities new learnings on trends and technology and understand customer needs and pain points It is undervalued because most people like to skip or shorten it They do not see the value before doing it It is underestimated because new ideas are not coming from old information New ideas are sparked by new insights and learnings outside your comfort zone and are inspired by understanding customers and their customer frictions Workshop 4 Innovation Opportunities The goal of the innovation opportunities workshop is to select the most relevant innovation opportunities It includes subjects themes technologies trends areas or target groups You can tackle this issue in two ways online but also offline The first option is a method Use structured methods like FORTH or Design Sprint where the steps are clear and all are essential for an effective outcome Trust the process of proven 199 THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD

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best practices is here the most valuable reply When you want solid outcomes apply the process as it is meant to be The second option is learning by doing When deciders are so focused on their existing ideas or believe they know what their customers want you could suggest a design sprint see Chapter 9 You will get customer feedback on one solution in less than a week And either they were right or they were wrong Both outcomes are huge learnings When they were right they got already one new product or service ideated and checked And they implement FORTH for exploring more or they are happy and focus on implanting one idea When they fail they learned the hard way they didn t understand their customers and started a FORTH with a thorough Observe and Learn phase We know our customers and what their pain points are Let s skip Observe and Learn and start directly generating new ideas CEO We Know It All Corporation Ltd The major deliverables are the top innovation opportunities and top customer frictions The top innovation opportunities are the most relevant insights that the team discovered during their two weeks According to the innovation assignment the top customer frictions are the most relevant customer pain points the team gathered during the customer interviews CHART OBSERVE AND LEARN Workshop 5 Discovery Preparation workshop Most participants are not used to collecting insights and doing customer interviews This workshop is meant to help the team get started and understand what they need to do and where on the Miro board to document the information they gather They get to learn the concept of customer frictions and explore how to identify them Workshop 6 Customer Frictions The Customer frictions workshop aims to gain insights from customers by interviewing customers by the core team We recommend that the interview be conducted by two people and either record the interview or have all the other participants witness it but with their own cameras and microphones turned off That sounds like a waste of time but it is not Each team member has a different background different personality and different experience We learned that they also hear and interpret things differently We are looking for so called customer frictions in the interviews which as described is a need or desire that is not fulfilled because of an obstacle Customer friction I am _____ I need _____ But _____ 200 ONLINE INNOVATION 201 Workshops 7 and 8 Observe and Learn workshops The two Observe and Learn workshops are when each core team member shares his or her thoughts on the innovation opportunity with the total team The big advantage online is that all information all gathered insights and all customer frictions are accessible at any time We facilitate sharing workshops for two reasons First each core team member has his stage for a couple of minutes to present what he found out That gives him the possibility to be visible to the participating deciders and it also puts pressure on them to do their research and have something meaningful to present The second reason is that the extended team understands the findings and insights and gets their blinders off too At the second Observe and Learn sharing workshop we will also select the top customer frictions and highlight the top innovation opportunities according to the innovation assignment After gathering a lot of new insights we continue with the next phase THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD

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STEP 3 RAISE IDEAS CHART THE BRAINSTORM PROCESS e uc DIVERG E n 1 I In Raise Ideas we generate in six workshops as many ideas as possible select the best ones and draft and improve twelve to fifteen concrete concepts The brainstorm has two parts The diverging stage where five hundred plus ideas are generated features two workshops First of all we transform an innovation assignment into an ideation assignment without restricting criteria and conditions The second part converging focusses on selecting the best ideas and converting them into concept statements This part contains four workshops All selection decisions are based on fulfilling the innovation assignment 2 ire sp n I d tro 3 rate ne as Ge ide 0 50 0 4 12 d an a p ide s u o e n Gr oos tio c ch ire d 4 12 6 uce e v od ati s Pr ov ept n in onc c 7 nt s e t es p r P nce co E VERG CON 30 5 uce s od a Pr ide ap m d in m CHART RAISE IDEAS 8 ate e u v al ati s Ev ov ept n in onc c 9 p ra W up S TR 202 UC TU ONLINE INNOVATION RE D B RAINSTO I RM N G Workshop 9 The Braindump The ideation workshop s goal of Raising Ideas is to harvest all ideas that popped up in the minds of the participants during Observe and Learn Before starting specific ideation methods to make participants think from a different perspective or focus on a specific problem we apply a so called braindump We ask the participants to write down all ideas they have in their mind For this goal we open up an ideation spacetemplate on Miro already a few days before the actual start of Raise Ideas While participants are still in the Observe and Learn mode they can write down all the ideas they already have on the ideation space template where a personal ideation spot is created for everyone At the actual workshop we also offer at the beginning a short moment to fill their 203 personal ideation space to make sure everybody contributes Then starts generating and sharing new ideas building on the ideas of others In groups in break out rooms we ask one person to start reading out her ideas and have the others listening and creating new ideas Afterwards everybody has time to read in silence through the other groups ideas to get even more inspiration Workshop 10 Ideation Workshop After the braindump workshop you sometimes get the feedback that people think it makes no sense to do another ideation workshop because there are already so many ideas They are so wrong But that is what you need When participants have no more ideas in their minds they are ready to generate more by applying design thinking techniques In the ideation workshop we use specific ideation methods to force the participants to take a different perspective or focus on a specific issue We also use the technique together alone where everybody works on the same task but in silence on their own intensively for this workshop We form groups that generate together solutions on a specific topic or question We designed on the Miro template specific spots for each ideation technique So in each group everybody can see what the other group members are writing That helps people elaborate on others ideas and save time because we do not need to share ideas reading them out loud in the group We recommend that you start with customer frictions In groups participants are asked to generate ideas on how to solve specific relevant customer friction Depending on the innovation assignment the company and the readiness of the participants we use two to four other ideation methods like SCAMPER What Would Apple Do Comic Book Hero or Silly Things For all the methods we use the technique together alone THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD

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At the end of the ideation session we have at least five hundred and often more than a thousand ideas The last point on the agenda is to give the participants homework for the next 48 hours We ask them to select their two favourite ideas Two out of a thousand Without clustering without affinity diagram Yes this has no benefit That s why we give people time and space on their own to scan through all the ideas They need to develop one evolutionary idea meaning a quite feasible idea that sounds good and one revolutionary idea suggesting an excellent attractive solution whose feasibility is relatively low We differentiate because otherwise people like to pick only the feasible ones Workshop 11 Making Idea Directions Did you ever experience that the level of detail of ideas varies a lot The solution in the FORTH process is called the idea direction workshop It comes right after every participant has chosen his two favourite ideas The goal is to bring all ideas to a similar level of detail a level where the idea is both focused and has the potential to fulfil the criteria innovation assignment In this workshop each participant creates an idea direction for their selected ideas We give them a hint What is the direction behind that idea Example of making idea directions Assume you are in a FORTH innovation process creating new digital offerings in the fashion sector Your two selected top ideas are a web store and a top 100 black dresses web store The first one is far too vague The second idea is far too detailed resulting in a small opportunity The recommended idea direction for both could be a top 100 fashion web store Now it has a focus and has the potential to fulfil the innovation assignment 204 At the end of the idea direction workshop 20 to 40 idea directions have been drafted and you select according to the innovation assignment the best 12 to 15 idea directions CHART MAKING RATING AND IMPROVING CONCEPTS Workshop 12 Concept Making Workshop In the concept making workshop we transform the idea directions into tangible concept statements But before we do this we diverge again in the converging process making mindmaps for every idea direction first All participants have to answer for each of the chosen 12 to 15 idea directions four questions about 1 the target group 2 the offering product service 3 the business model and 4 how to it in a mindmap It has the advantage that we collect the whole group s knowledge and insights on all 12 to 15 idea directions In this process we work asynchronously in between the ideal direction and the concept making workshop Workshop 13 Concept Presentation and Rating Next each concept statement is evaluated by all participants on the criteria of the innovation assignment For this workshop the extended team is also on board Each concept is not pitched It s just read out loud Otherwise the best sales pitch would win instead of the best concept Then everybody rates the concept by writing a top what they like most and a tip what they dislike and they will rate it with the anonymous voting function in Miro on the main criteria of the innovation assignment At the end of the workshop we will have ranked all concepts and everybody shares tips to make them better Workshop 14 Concept Improvement The concepts are now improved based on the received feedback in a workshop It could be done asynchronously But our experience teaches us that it is more valuable for the participants when there is a fixed blocked time slot in their calendar instead of finding a common time slot with their partner on short term notice At the end of Raise Ideas we have now generated 12 to 15 improved concepts ready to be tested by customers As first step in the workshop we create pairs They decided on their own which mindmap they pick to work out as a concept statement Normally with 10 to 20 people in the workshop every pair works out one or two concepts in around 30 minutes until all the mindmaps of the top idea directions are transformed into concepts We use break out sessions with everybody working on the same board STEP 4 TEST IDEAS A concept consists of four parts 1 The concept name 2 The customer friction that the concept solves 3 The offering with a description of the new solution the benefits and the business model 4 A catchy slogan In Test Ideas we test in four workshops all concepts with customers improve them again according to the feedback and select the three to five best ones according to the innovation assignment Workshop 15 Customer Interviews or Surveys We can get customer feedback either with online interviews of individual customers or send out a simple online survey to customers We recommend to perform individual online interviews for business to business settings to get a good ONLINE INNOVATION 205 THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD

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impression of how customers evaluate new ideas It s qualitative market research where understanding why people like or dislike the concept is more important than having a huge number of responses We try to get each concept evaluated by ten people from the relevant target group for that specific concept Workshop 16 Presenting Customer Feedback In this workshop we share the feedback with the core team and the extended team It helps everyone in the team to understand better how customers perceive the concepts We get feedback on all concepts on the following seven aspects 1 Is customer friction recognised 2 Is the concept clear 3 Is the concept attractive 4 Does the concept match the brand name or company 5 How does it rate overall on a 1 to 10 scale 6 What do customers like about the concept 7 What do customers dislike about the concept Workshop 18 Concept Assessment This last workshop of the Test Ideas is a crucial one as we make your final selection of three to five improved concepts that will be worked out as mini new business cases Each concept is evaluated on both feasibility and attractiveness according to the innovation assignment It s of the utmost importance that both the core and extended team fully understand the concepts Therefore between the improvement workshop and the assessment workshop all participants get the task to reread all improved concepts independently The first step in this workshop itself is answering the questions so all participants have a clear understanding of all concepts CHART CONCEPT ASSESSMENT Workshop 17 Concept Improvement Like in the first improvement workshop workshop 14 the core team improves all concepts now based on customers feedback We make pairs where one person is the founder of the concept and match her with another person who was not involved in drafting the original concept bringing in fresh blood At the end of this workshop we have 12 to 15 improved tested concepts ready for the innovation team s final assessment ONLINE INNOVATION CHART HOMECOMING STEP 5 HOMECOMING The last phase of the FORTH innovation process Homecoming transforms the top three to five concepts into mini new business cases MNBC in five workshops A connecting design thinks of the last phases with business thinking again The mini new business cases contain all information deciders need to decide which ones to adopt develop and introduce Pre defined pairs from the core team will each select a concept to work out as a business case Extended team members will get the responsibility to be a godfather for at least one MNBC They support their team with input and feedback during the three week process In these three weeks we have three mini new business case workshops where the progress of the business cases is presented and assessed by the core team It s an exciting moment where there s often a clear distinction between the top concepts and the bad ones Some participants see their darlings killed 206 You will assess the concepts both on attractiveness and feasibility Compose two teams Team Attractiveness and Team Feasibility The attractiveness team consists of participants from marketing sales finance and the c suite of course They rate all concepts on the attractiveness according to the innovation assignment For the feasibility team we invite people from R D production ICT buying finance and the c suite They rate all concept on feasibility After both groups are done combine their ratings in a feasibility attractiveness matrix So it is simple to see which three to five concepts make sense according to the innovation assignment The project sponsor and project leader may use their wildcard to select a concept they favour and deselect one from the original top three to five concepts Three to five mini new business cases A management decision on which new business cases are to be adopted An open minded innovation team ready to be ambassadors to spark innovation in the rest of the organisation FORTH lets old elephants dance again Deliverables Coming home at the end of our online expedition creates three major deliverables Workshop 19 Mini New Business Case Introduction We start the MNBC introduction workshop by reflecting on the chosen concepts and explain what will happen in the next three weeks Each pre defined pair will choose one business case and together they explore all the elements of a 207 THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD

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1 THIS IS THE CUSTOMER FRICTION 2 THIS IS OUR NEW CONCEPT 3 THIS IS THE BENEFIT FOR THE CUSTOMER 4 WE CAN PRODUCE IT 5 THIS IS WHAT WE GET 6 WE WILL CONTINUE IN THIS WAY WHAT IS THE SITUATION TARGET GROUP WHY WILL THE CUSTOMER CHOOSE THIS CONCEPT FEASIBILITY POTENTIAL TURNOVER WHY PROCEED WHAT IS THE NEED DESCRIPTION OF THE NEW CONCEPT POTENTIAL PARTNERS FOR CO CREATION POTENTIAL MARGIN AND PROFITS WHAT ARE THE UNCERTAINTIES NEXT STEPS IN THE DEVELOPMENT PROCESS FURTHER COSTS FOR DEVELOPMENT NEXT STEPS TEAM WHO ARE OUR COMPETITORS WHAT IS THE FRICTION NEW TO US NEW TO THE MARKET NEW TO THE WORLD NEW CONCEPT FOR AN EXISTING OR NEW MARKET WHAT S OUR POSITIONING HOW WAS OUR CONCEPT RATED IN TESTS PLANNING COSTS CHART 6 MINI NEW BUSINESS CASE SHEETS good business case for innovation which you can read in the chart with the six mini new business case sheets We recommend to invite a business controller from the organisation helping the teams with the right financial estimations and calculations For this workshop we transfer our workspace from Miro to typical presentation software like Powerpoint or Keynote so the mini new business cases are drafted within the ICT environment of the organisation itself them to already write their questions during the presentation so directly after the presentation the presenters can answer them directly After that we ask all participants to give one Top compliment and one Tip advice to the team We have good experience with the possibility to engage people during and directly after each presentation We ask Workshop 23 End Presentation workshop For the final online workshop in the FORTH innovation all MNBCs are presented to the whole innovation team and top management Most who have been on the online journey themselves as extended team members will decide which concepts will be transferred into the internal innovation funnel to be developed The deciders have to commit themselves to make a decision right after the presentation in the workshop And they can because they were able to define the requirements in the MNBCs and were godfathers of them A decision in the workshop is relevant for two reasons First of all it prevents time from being wasted to start the development process The second reason is to 208 ONLINE INNOVATION Workshops 20 to 22 MNBC Progress workshops These three progress workshops serve three purposes 1 Sharing the progress and content within the core team 2 Receiving valuable feedback from other team members 3 Learning how to present the MNBC in 20 minutes at the end presentation honour the innovation team s work and end the online FORTH process The online MNBC presentations are as practised in 20 minute slots with a Q A session of five to ten minutes right after each presentation You can benefit from having a break after every two presentations After the last presentation the top managers gathered to get in a break out room for 30 minutes to make their final selection As a facilitator we help them when needed to make sure there is a concrete result at the end In the main meeting afterwards the project sponsor explains and motivates their decision to the team To make that last workshop a magical moment we send all participants and decision makers a physical snack box containing for example popcorn for the final presentation and a bottle of champagne to celebrate the success of the online FORTH innovation journey 209 KEY MESSAGES FROM THIS CHAPTER An online FORTH innovation process makes sense for midsize and large international organisations with an ambitious innovation challenge FORTH is used online and in person to generate new products services business models processes and customer experiences The FORTH power makes this innovation method one of a kind proving itself in an online setting as a best practice The online framework of 23 short workshops the clear process and the ready made online templates make it easy to use and easy to understand for all innovation team participants Because you get new ideas only after getting new insights the ideation phase is in the middle of a FORTH project after getting the blinders off in Observe and Learn FORTH online delivers concrete tangible outcomes with three to five mini new business cases A FORTH online process sparks a culture for innovation and lets old elephants dance again Sources https ec europa eu eurostat documents 4187653 11571495 EU TW COMMERCIAL FLIGHT jpg 24 02 2021 THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD

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Working from home or from anywhere is here to stay considering the enthusiasm This means that online innovation is also here to stay and will accomplish spectacular growth Soon we will move from 2D platforms for collaboration to 3D tools with AR VR At least that is our prediction For now both offline and online innovation have their merits And whether we innovate online or in person we have to compensate for the disadvantages of the option chosen In this final chapter we will merge both ways of innovating into one hybrid innovation And we will apply our hybrid innovation to the FORTH innovation methodology giving new insights into which workshops and activities to do in person or online There is still a lot of potential to improve in the way we innovate The innovation process from idea to market itself is still full of pitfalls and inefficiencies Stage Gate founder Robert Cooper shows that for every seven new product ideas about four enter development one and a half are launched and only one succeeds 1 A study by Stevens and Burley gives even more disastrous ratios Their study shows it takes three thousand raw ideas to come up with one successful product 2 This means that enormous amounts of enthusiasm energy time and financial resources are spent in the innovation process without direct returns Innovation of course is a learning process full of experimenting and trial and error where you can t always expect to get things right the first time You learn an awful lot from all the iterations in a new concept which pays off in other projects or your daily business But do you accept wasting more than 85 of your time and money on innovation We see enormous potential for improvement Online innovation processes deliver excellent results too Online innovation with collaboration whiteboards work the practice has been proven Of course a lot of the innovations ideated last year have not been developed and launched yet But taking into account the reviews of the users of online innovation processes you can conclude that they work pretty well Our practice is the FORTH innovation expedition we implemented completely online with Philip Morris in supporting them to ideate new smoke free products As you can read in the chart Luca Rossi their vice president of product research and consumable development states the magic of the FORTH method online is that it lays out a structured roadmap implementing 25 online workshops via Microsoft Teams and Miro with templates and tools with a very clear timeline that kept both the discipline and inspiration high He was not only very satisfied with the process itself but also with the results stating besides delivering six disruptive new business cases with new to the world technology applications FORTH created a from idea tomarket perspective among our R D people working together across departments in a completely new way The project was rated 8 4 on a scale of 10 by all the participants When facilitating FORTH offline we get evaluations with the same score between 8 and 9 on a 10 point scale Other FORTH facilitators applying the methodology get the same results So after taking our offline innovation method online in 2020 we can conclude it works CHART RECOMMENDATION FOR THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD 100 ONLINE Online is here to stay Is working from home or being able to work from anywhere here to stay The answer is a clear YES As you can see in the chart below in polls among professionals on LinkedIn 3 an overwhelming 70 of more than 8 000 people answered yes Seventy seven percent feel more productive at home than in the office and 74 said they feel more entrepreneurial than before The Covid 19 crisis and consequent lockdowns have changed the way we work Working remotely in teams will be a common good as will be innovating 100 online Would you be open to working from home permanently Yes 70 No 30 8 388 votes Do you feel you re more productive while working from home or less productive More productive 77 Less productive 23 11 187 votes Has remote work brought out the hustler in you more grit initiative creativity Are you feeling more entrepeneurial than before Yes 74 No 26 4 681 votes 212 ONLINE INNOVATION 213 HYBRID INNOVATION THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

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Four benefits of innovating online As you read in previous chapters innovating online gives us new insights into the way we can innovate in our organisations And while practising it we discovered four benefits of online innovation over offline innovation processes Information is always accessible The online collaboration boards with all the insights customer frictions ideas concepts test results and new business cases are always accessible for the whole team It s convenient when you want to add something check it or change it It provides individual flexibility Now that collaboration boards are online people can work on them asynchronously instead of performing all activities in the workshop and the rest of the team which gives you flexibility as a participant It s easy to apply When you work together with others from all over the country continent or even all over the globe innovating entirely online is an easy way to create together while being in different time zones It s easy to share All the insights customer frictions ideas concepts test results and new business cases are digital which means it s very easy to share with someone else As you saw in the phase of testing concepts with customers this is quite handy using for example Google Forms or when you want to share the process or the results with others within the organisation hard to share emotions and get into a group flow with a high energy wave of excitement in your team We are very glad that many new tools are emerging for virtual meetings which are powered by augmented reality and or virtual reality In these virtual spaces designed as actual rooms our lifelike avatar talks moves and interacts mirroring in person collaborative sessions It looks very promising as it might increase our engagement and help us experience magical moments online together The AR VR tool Spatial brings people together for hangouts team planning and brainstorms in 3D based on AR VR technology headsets like Quest Nreal HoloLens and Magic Leap Spatial enables you to sit next to others from across the world It feels like science fiction because your lifelike 3D avatar interacts like an in person collaborative session Your monitor and your hands are your mouse expressing and sharing ideas with whiteboarding notes and photos Spatial officially supports 30 participants in VR with an additional 20 joining from the browser spectator mode At the end of 2020 they introduced their Augmented Reality app for iOS and Android which runs on almost any current generation of mobile devices You hold up your phone and you are an active part of any virtual meeting and see lifelike avatars of co workers right in your living room New AR VR tools will help create magical moments online Although online workshops have these advantages the Achilles heel is the participants low engagement making it MeetinVR is another app with great avatars and a great user interface inside and outside VR Besides that it has interactive elements that increase engagement in meetings It s easy to pick up a pen and produce a writing surface of your own chosen size and colour starting to brainstorm while holding it in your hand Then you take the post it or paper and quickly snap it to a wall It increases engagement and that s the Achilles heel of online workshops now with online collaboration platforms in 2D 214 ONLINE INNOVATION These online benefits make innovation easier and the innovation process more efficient VISPA also launched a tool for remote collaboration in 3D virtual spaces The participants can move freely through a 3D environment and interact with all workshop elements they encounter answer questions generate ideas vote the best one and give feedback The advantage is that VISPA creates interaction between people which provides you with a real workshop feeling After the real time workshop you can go back to the room show it to other colleagues or stakeholders and elaborate on the original workshop outcomes Sparked by the Covid 19 crisis a lot of VR apps became available Next to the three mentioned we found a long list of others like Virtualist Glue FrameVR BigScreen VR Rumii Mozilla Hubs AltSpace and Rec Room Immersed We are pretty confident that further evolution of these AR VR tools will help us create group flow with a high energy wave of excitement in our online workshops in the near future The future of innovation projects is hybrid What will the future of innovation projects look like Will we all go back to in person workshops with the original 3M post its because we miss personal contact with our team Innovation project acti vities Aligning people Gathering information Discovering customer insights members and the excitement of group flow Or will we keep innovating online from home or from anywhere behind our laptop or iPad without traveling In our vision we combine the best of both the online and offline world which leads to hybrid innovation projects Working remotely in innovation teams will be the common good So innovating 100 online will be the starting point as the benefits of innovating online are quite clear it s easy efficient and flexible At this point however the lack of personal connection missing joint experience of emotions and low likelihood of getting into a group flow using online tools make us choose for some offline workshops for reasons of effectiveness In choosing which activities and workshops to do online or offline we will match them with the benefits of each way of innovating in the next chart Do we choose efficiency of online working or do we need offline workshops effectiveness That s the question Sharing information Ideating Testing Improving ONLINE efficiency OFFLINE effectiveness 215 HYBRID INNOVATION THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS Deciding

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As you can see in this chart we choose to gather information share information test concepts and improve them online for sake of efficiency To align people on the innovation team and to decide which concepts to develop we prefer the effectiveness of offline workshops These two activities can be done or should be done both offline and online First of all there s a very important activity of discovering customer insights Because a great innovation is a new solution for relevant customer friction this activity is crucial for every innovation project s success Discovering customer insights always focuses on finding out WHY people prefer what they prefer and do what they do When you have clients all over the world it s efficient to do it online When you have millions of customers like in consumer goods or services it s also efficient to do it online But I have experienced myself many times that you get better insights offline while visiting customers live Making real contact with them leads most of the time to a more open attitude deeper conversations and as a consequence better customer insights So when you work in mass markets consider doing both visiting a small selection of customers live and interviewing a large selection of customers online Then we have the ideating of new ideas We have great experience in facilitating ideation for more than 250 innovation projects offline And our structured way of ideation leads to great results with often more than a thousand ideas in a workshop In those ideation sessions you can feel moments of great energy in the room when people share their ideas and build upon others ideas Interestingly enough we also get in our online brainstorms more than a thousand ideas as you can see in this chart So getting quality by quantity is possible both online and offline 216 CHART 1256 IDEAS GENERATED ONLINE You can see feel and hear the team s enthusiasm energy and the WoW emotions driving the offline ideation process The big difference with working online is that you can t experience this with the present collaboration whiteboards and video conferencing tools while ideating online Ideating with an innovation team of twenty or more people is an experience offline often in a special venue in the middle of nowhere It s a moment of togetherness where people connect share emotions and celebrate together which greatly impacts their relations not only during the innovation project but also beyond that An experience like it is not feasible yet online we prefer to organise the ideating activity as a live event Online ideation on collaboration whiteboards like Mural or Miro has five valuable extra benefits we experienced in our innovation projects 1 As you ideate online in silence the ideation process empowers more introverted and reflective personalities 2 ll ideas are easy to read as they are typed instead of being handwritten on post its ONLINE INNOVATION 3 The voting features of tools like Miro are much quicker than the alternative to mark the post its you prefer with dots and counting all the dots by hand 4 Since all ideas are digitally stored on the online whiteboard you can easily access them later for review 5 Sharing ideas with others within the organisation is very easy CHART THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD For reasons of togetherness group flow sharing positive emotions we prefer ideating in a live event But because online tools empower more reflective and introverted people and have excellent voting features we suggest ideating in a live set up using online collaboration boards Another advantage is that all ideas are digitised making it easy to reflect on them later and share them within your organisation A Hybrid Innovation process in practice To see how the hybrid model works in practice we apply it to the FORTH innovation methodology presented to you in Chapter 10 We use as a starting point the original set up of the methodology which at its origin was facilitated 100 offline As you know the methodology depicted as an innovation journey consists of 15 workshops in five phases Full Steam Ahead Observe and Learn Raise Ideas and Test Ideas We will discuss each workshop and its character to determine whether to facilitate it offline or online In this way you may learn the reasons behind it and you will be able to apply it to the methodologies you use online yourself 1 Innovation Focus workshop In the innovation focus workshop a small group of decisionmakers discusses and determines the assignment for the innovation journey They know each other very well and for the sake of efficiency this could very well take place online 2 Core Team Introduction Meeting The core team introduction meeting takes place the night before the kickoff It s the moment when the members of the innovation team meet for the first time Because the goal is to get better acquainted and build teams it should come as no surprise that we prefer to facilitate this offline 3 Kickoff workshop At the kickoff workshop the whole team meets for the first time The innovation assignment is discussed and the team brainstorms innovation opportunities to be explored in the 217 HYBRID INNOVATION THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

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next step Observe and Learn For team building and motivational reasons it makes the most sense to facilitate this workshop offline 4 Explore Preparation workshop The Explore Preparation workshop is an instruction workshop with the core team to empower them to start discovering For efficiency you can do it online 5 Exploring Trends and Technology Exploring Trends and Technology is an individual activity for core team members For efficiency this can take place very well 100 online You might invite subject matter experts as guest speakers in Observe and Learn workshops where the information is shared with the total team 6 Discovering Customer Frictions Discovering customer insights is a very important and inspiring activity of the core team It can be facilitated in online personal interviews with customers or online group discussions with customers Of course it s efficient to facilitate it online It might be wise to take it offline in some cases which we will discuss later in this chapter 7 Exploring Innovation Opportunities Individually each core team member explores one innovation opportunity to learn the ins and outs which could be well done online 9 New Product Brainstorm As we call it these days the new product brainstorm or ideation workshop is an offline two day workshop and five shorter online three hour workshops You know it works either way For togetherness group flow and sharing positive emotions we prefer ideating offline using an online collaboration platform like Miro 14 End Presentation Core team members are gathered to present the mini new business cases to the decision making managers deciding on the spot which of the business cases they will take into development in their regular R D stage gated process Of course for togetherness and sharing positive emotions at the end of a real innovation expedition we prefer an offline event 10 First Concept Improvement workshop Based on the tops and tips of the initial concepts we improve all of them in this first concept improvement workshop with the core team for which an online setting would work great 15 Concept Transfer workshop After the FORTH project is officially finished we facilitate another workshop to transfer the concept from the ideating FORTH team to the development team which could be done online for the sake of efficiency 11 Concept Testing In concept testing we test the concept statements among potential target groups to see how they resonate and get input to make them better Concept testing works fine online However when you are working business to business you might also consider personal interviews offline to pay individual customers more regard if that resonates with them In the following chart you will see the hybrid FORTH innovation process overview with all the workshops just described It becomes instantly clear that in the 15 week journey there are three touch points with the total team in live workshops at the kick off at the ideation workshop and at the end presentation All the other activities and workshops can be facilitated efficiently and effectively online 12 Second Concept Improvement workshop Based on the customer feedback the total team will improve all concepts and choose the final three to five improved concepts to be worked out as a mini new business case For efficiency an online workshop will do the job fine 8 Four Observe and Learn workshops In Observe and Learn workshops the core team shares information on the opportunities trends technology and customer insights with the total team It works excellently to do this online and is efficient in this way too 13 Four Mini New Business Case workshops In pairs the core team members transform the concept into a mini new business case In four mini new business case workshops they share their work in progress while getting tops and tips from the other core team members Doing this online works great 218 ONLINE INNOVATION Innovating 100 online really works we have experienced And this experience we just shared with you Hybrid innovation projects mixing online and offline events combine the best of both worlds and are effective and efficient New VR AR tools will enable us to interact better and experience more emotions online to increase our innovation effectiveness Whenever online offline or hybrid we wish you wonderful innovation expeditions 1 Robert G Cooper Winning at New Products Basic Books New York 2011 p 18 2 Stevens G A and Burley J 3000 Raw Ideas 1 Commercial Success May June 1997 research Technology Management Vol 40 3 pp 17 27 3 Ryan Holmes December 2020 https medium com the helm i asked 1 7 million people about remote work heres what theysaid 6e1235c1e005 CHART THE HYBRID FORTH INNOVATION PROCESS NEXT PAGE Depending on your sector and your innovation assignment discovering customer insights and concept testing might be taken live to enhance the team s impact on the clients interviewed This could be when you re innovating in a businessto business setting supplying tools to Wind Energy Farms and you want to understand the user behaviour Watching Wind turbines being repaired live would add substantial value to interviewing repair professionals online 219 HYBRID INNOVATION THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

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This toolkit lays out 25 online tools for you to kick start your innovation workshops and projects 100 online Section 1 covers 7 online collaboration platforms like Miro and Mural Section 2 presents 6 video conferencing tools Of course we included Zoom but we advise you to have a look at runner up Butter too Section 3 describes 4 tools for preparation and instruction among which SessionLab to get your agenda straight and Loom to make great instruction videos Section 4 introduces 5 tools for prototyping and testing including Marvel and Toonly In section 5 you find 3 tools to make your online workshops more interactive like Mentimeter and Tscheck in We assessed all tools Their overall rating you find in the title of each tool We rated our most favourite ones with five stars 1 ONLINE COLLABORATION PLATFORMS EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS TOOL 1 MIRO REVIEWED BY MARIA VITTORIA COLUCCI www miro com 3 out of 5 stars 3 is an average value as people love it for the infinite possibilities it gives them while others are frustrated not being able to write post its or to use it smoothly If your participants have never used it you will need some time to teach them the basic features and let them get used to it For this reason I suggest you send the link to the board with some explanations a few days in advance and set aside some time at the beginning of the workshop to give some tips on how to use it and let people try it out WHAT EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS Miro is a cloud based collaboration tool It features a digital whiteboard on which you can go from ideation to execution on an infinite canvas It s scalable includes 100 pre built templates and works cross device Together with Mural it s one of today s most popular and trusted tools to co create online There is a free version available with a limited set of boards 4 out of 5 stars If you ve never used it you ll need some time to learn OVERALL RATING 5 out of 5 stars Miro is a powerful and flexible tool that facilitates me to apply all the innovation techniques for all my innovation workshops WEBSITE WHY 224 mode and design tools to make the participant experience immersive and engaging FIT TO METHOD I find Miro super flexible you can use it with all the methods mentioned in this book All the FORTH templates are made in Miro and in Miroverse the community templates gallery You can also find here templates that fit some other innovation methods like problem framing or design sprint I love Miro because I can design my workshops flow and interactions with participants functionally and engagingly I can create spaces for individual workshop sections or subgroups to work together on different innovation method tasks It has mindmaps Kanban tables and hundreds of ready to use posts its that you prepare for your participants to use I can also upload slides images formats and use it as the only board to share I can create my template to improve and reuse and to share with other co facilitators I also enjoy the timer which everyone can see and hear so I don t need to inform people about time left for the exercises Participants don t need to have a Miro account and can access the board through a link Miro has many useful features for online facilitation such as anonymous voting writing post its in bulk FIT TO TECHNIQUES ONLINE INNOVATION 225 In Miro I apply 7 of the techniques for online innovation mentioned in the book Asynchronous work if the team has to work between the workshops I leave frames and templates they need to use with clear instructions then I can see if and when someone is working on it so I can monitor the progress Working together alone I prepare settings and post its to let people brainwriting in silence I always suggest using the Bulk mode to write ideas on post its for two reasons people won t struggle with post its they just have to write and are not influenced by others Voting anonymous I use this a lot and when possible I prepare the voting session in advance Chat function I use it mainly during the asynchronous work to give feedback and answer questions Lightning Demo I prepare the frame and spaces in advance KILLER FEATURE With no doubt the killer feature is the bulk mode It allows participants to concentrate only on their ideas without worrying about selecting the arrow moving the post its and change style and colour TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS Miro is browser based It works best with Google Chrome It doesn t work well on Internet Explorer in my experience There is also an app version of Miro for desktop and you can use it on your mobile DEVICE TYPE Mobile Tablet Desktop AVOID IF I avoid using Miro for short workshops when participants have never used it and I m not going to use it again with them In that case other tools are easier to use TOOL 2 MURAL REVIEWED BY FLORIAN HAMEISTER OVERALL RATING 5 out of 5 stars Mural is for me the best and most intuitive tool for remote facilitation at the moment I love to work with it WEBSITE www mural com WHAT Mural is a cloud based collaboration tool It features a digital whiteboard on which you can go from ideation to execution on an almost infinite canvas It s scalable includes 100 pre built templates and works cross device Together with Miro it s one of today s most popular and trusted tools to create together online 25 ONLINE TOOLS FOR INNOVATION

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WHY TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS WEBSITE I love Mural because it is so intuitive for me as a facilitator and also for my participants The tool is designed for workshops and I love the possibilities you have with designing your boards I can really create an experience for my participants With that it is the perfect place for innovation processes with all their different stages that need space for insights creativity and focus You can design your process here The participants can work all together at the same time or when it suits you as on Miro Mural is browser based and works best with Google Chrome It also has an application for Mac and mobile 4 out of 5 stars www padlet com EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS WHAT DEVICE TYPE 4 out of 5 stars Mobile scan post it limited functions Tablet scan post it limited functions Desktop full function FIT TO METHOD Padlet is a website that provides users with a digital canvas Users can post text videos and images from a mobile device or a desktop Multiple users can post at the same time It is a great visual tool that could be used as an inspiration board for a brainstorm session or as a board for sharing pdf files videos and other stuff you want to share You can also adjust the look and feel if you want to change the design according to your branding or personal taste For each board you can create a unique URL and a password You can also easily generate a QR code with the URL to share with your team EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS AVOID IF As it is cloud based you might experience internet security arguments with Mural I avoid Mural if the internet speed of my participants is slow then it gets hard to use Mural 5 out of 5 stars It is very intuitive for first time users EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS Although Trello is not a whiteboard like Miro or Mural and is less flexible I still use Trello for all the online innovation methods mentioned FIT TO TECHNIQUES In Trello I apply the following 3 techniques for online innovation working synchronous asynchronous Working togetheralone Visualisation KILLER FEATURE 5 out of 5 stars It gets a 5 star rating for facilitators because it has everything relevant for workshops It s easy to use and gives me as a facilitator all the possibilities I need to make and facilitate an awesome workshop TOOL 3 TRELLO REVIEWED BY ANDREW CONSTABLE FIT TO METHOD 4 out of 5 stars A very versatile platform and easy to use As Mural is a whiteboard you can use it for all the methods mentioned as it is super flexible I am in favour of designing structured processes and that works perfectly here WEBSITE On the desktop Trello supports Chrome Safari Firefox and Edge browsers The Trello app is available for IOS and Android The Trello Desktop App is available for macOS and Windows www trello com DEVICE TYPE WHAT Trello is a highly visual work management app It draws on the principles of Kanban a method of visualising workflows to provide an overview of a project from start to finish This is done using Trello s boards lists and cards A board focuses on a specific project like an innovation challenge Each board contains lists that may for example indicate the steps of the method used The cards within the lists hold information on a specific task Mobile Tablet Desktop EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS FIT TO TECHNIQUES AVOID IF 4 out of 5 stars It s very simple and intuitive but also limited to innovation workshops With Mural I apply the following 6 techniques for online innovation Working synchronous asynchronous with sharing the board link with exercises before and after the workshop Working together alone during the workshop and also using the voting anonymous for getting unbiased feedback For preparation of ideation workshops I use Lightning Demo Mural boards I like to design so it fits the company and the innovation phase virtual room design I guess that the killer feature of Trello is that people can use it in so many different ways even to plan your marriage TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS OVERALL RATING I tend to avoid Trello when you have a lot of convergence processes moments of choice in your online innovation project Other tools like Miro offer you a better anonymous voting tool WHY WHY I use Padlet for example to collect inspiration for an ideation session like pictures video s favourite innovations links to websites et cetera I also use it as a source for energisers and warm ups And it is also useful to share documents like pdfs and other files in an organised way when you want your team to have easy access 5 out of 5 stars It s very simple and intuitive EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS FIT TO METHOD Padlet fits any method where you need an inspiration board or where you need an organised easy overview of relevant content like for example in a Design sprint or in the FORTH innovation method It is less applicable for short sessions like the Lightning Decision Jam Its facilitation superpower is the feature that makes the difference You can get all participants together and hold them together These are features that help you run a productive workshop I like Trello as it s a visual way for teams to collaborate Without a lot of effort I can bring other people together to digitally work on various types of projects among which innovation In one glance Trello tells me what s being worked on who s working on what and where something is in a process TOOL 4 PADLET REVIEWED BY FLORIAN HAMEISTER 4 out of 5 stars You could do synchronous and a synchronous work with Padlet and also put Lightning Demo on it I just use it for sharing and not as a tool to use in workshops themselves 226 ONLINE INNOVATION 227 25 ONLINE TOOLS FOR INNOVATION KILLER FEATURE OVERALL RATING FIT TO TECHNIQUES

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KILLER FEATURE EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS WHAT TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS You are able to adjust the look and feel if you want to change the design according to your branding or personal taste 3 out of 5 stars Howspace is browser based TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS 3 out of 5 stars Howspace is an AI powered digital collaboration tool that has quite a lot of awesome features that help you to engage your participants before during and after the online workshops Padlet is available for IOS Android Mac and Windows FIT TO METHOD WHY DEVICE TYPE As Slack is a communication tool I use Slack for all the innovation methods mentioned when keeping my project team updated I love the killer feature which combines instant messaging and email but all in one channel to promote a more effective communication medium in the project I am managing The social aspect of online innovation journeys is an Achilles heel Using this tool can help to get people connected and engaged on a social level as well as on a professional level I tested Howspace and I believe in the power of the tool Especially because it is so flexible and is the one spot where all participants can share their thoughts with the group in a very simple way The AI helps you to get insights into chats word clouds or polls I personally do not use it at the moment because it is quite expensive and I also have the feeling that people are overwhelmed with so many tools Mobile Tablet Desktop AVOID IF There is no specific reason to avoid Padlet EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS FIT TO TECHNIQUES I use this communication medium to share files keep my team updated and provide asynchronous work opportunities KILLER FEATURE TOOL 5 SLACK REVIEWED BY ANDREW CONSTABLE DEVICE TYPE Mobile Tablet Desktop AVOID IF Avoid Howspace when you want to use it for small groups and for one time usage from the facilitator side It is quite costly too TOOL 7 KLAXOON REVIEWED BY FLORIAN HAMEISTER TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS OVERALL RATING OVERALL RATING Slack is available for IOS Android Mac and Windows 3 out of 5 stars A good alternative to email and instant message although it can be overkill for small projects DEVICE TYPE 5 out of 5 stars It is very intuitive as it works as a platform 3 out of 5 stars It s a cool idea to have an all in one tool but for me personally not very user friendly EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS WEBSITE 4 out of 5 stars As a facilitator you need to dig into the tool a little bit to understand how it all works The AI support is something that really helps us as facilitators www klaxoon com www slack com Mobile Tablet Desktop WHAT AVOID IF Slack is a communication medium that is billed as an alternative to email I use Slack across various options of communication such as channels private groups and direct messaging As this is similar to email I share documents files across teams and in a one to one format I add apps for example from Miro Pushing activity from my Miro boards to Slack keeps everyone on my team aware of new comments mentions projects or team activities I tend to avoid Slack when the project environment is very small and there are limited messages being sent between individuals in my project team WEBSITE WHAT It is not for a specific method it is more for social connection and learning That takes part in all methods Klaxoon claims to be the full suite of collaborative tools for efficient teamwork Besides a whiteboard it has a video conference tool and engagement tools like surveys questions quizzes adventures and mission features FIT TO TECHNIQUES WHY TOOL 6 HOWSPACE REVIEWED BY FLORIAN HAMEISTER Working a synchronous and synchronous Working together alone and voting anonymous Use break out rooms Lightning demos Using questionnaires and polls Use the chat function Design a virtual room WHY OVERALL RATING KILLER FEATURE Innovation projects can become disjointed unless you ensure that you have a clear and concise communication channel As an Innovation facilitator I set up specific channels per project to keep everyone informed of the project updates 4 out of 5 stars Howspace is an impressive tool with a lot of potential for remote workshops www howspace com For me the killer feature is AI that helps to analyse and summarise the answers and comments in no time It s great that Howspace operates like a website Everybody knows how to use it It combines video conferencing documentation surveys as well as a whiteboard in one platform I like the concept behind it But for me as an innovation facilitator it is too complicated It is the opposite of Mural It wants to cover everything and that makes the user experience not really intuitive 228 ONLINE INNOVATION 229 WEBSITE FIT TO METHOD EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS 3 out of 5 stars I think the whiteboard is not as simple and easy as Mural or Miro 25 ONLINE TOOLS FOR INNOVATION

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EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS 3 out of 5 stars I tried to understand it but I lost interest very quickly because the user experience was not good FIT TO METHOD As Klaxoon has also a good whiteboard you can use it for all the methods mentioned as it is super flexible 2 VIDEOCONFERENCING TOOLS I love the killer feature of break out rooms which are great for collaboration in smaller teams cloud based or open source video conferencing tools In my experience big companies often ask to use it There is a free version in which video calls last up to 60 minutes The gallery view is limited to 9 people The others being in small circles at the bottom of the screen This means that you and the rest of the people don t see each other There s also an extended gallery mode but in my experience there is significantly more delay in videos when using this model TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS WHY www zoom us Zoom works on Windows Mac iOS and Android You can use the app or use it via a web browser WHAT DEVICE TYPE It is the most popular platform in companies and participants probably already use it in their day by day work You can use channels and calendar to share with the team Zoom is a cloud based videoconferencing tool that allows you to set up virtual video and audio conferencing I tend to use the chat option as well as screen sharing breakout rooms and other collaborative capabilities For more interaction there is the option to do an online poll which I find very good to use Zoom has the gallery view mode that allows you to see every person on the call at once which as a facilitator allows me to manage the session better Mobile Tablet Desktop EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS AVOID IF EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS I tend to avoid only when the security restrictions of your organisation don t allow using Zoom Otherwise it s my go to video conferencing tool 3 out of 5 stars I assessed it with 3 because when you re using Teams with a team working in a company either you ask for an internal account or you have some limitations for example accessing the channels or getting notifications TOOL 8 ZOOM REVIEWED BY ANDREW CONSTABLE OVERALL RATING Working a synchronous and synchronous Working together alone and voting anonymous Lightning demos Using questionnaires and polls Design a virtual room 5 out of 5 stars One of the best great for facilitators due to breakout rooms KILLER FEATURE What is really great is that you can change your whiteboard into columns or lists and back via a button With a lot of filter options you can export very easy all needed information in the wanted format It is browser based DEVICE TYPE Mobile Tablet Desktop AVOID IF Avoid it as a facilitator for one time use only because it is quite complex I use it across these techniques working synchronous asynchronous and working together alone during the videoconference by muting yourself and using the chat function Working in break out rooms KILLER FEATURE FIT TO TECHNIQUES TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS FIT TO TECHNIQUES WEBSITE WHY FIT TO METHOD A big part of Zoom s appeal to me is its simplicity It s easy to get started the app is lightweight and the interface is relatively intuitive to use TOOL 9 MICROSOFT TEAMS REVIEWED BY MARIA VITTORIA COLUCCI EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS OVERALL RATING 5 out of 5 stars 3 out of 5 stars The user experience of Microsoft Teams is limited as you can only see 9 participants 50 with the extended view which is not stable EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS 5 out of 5 stars FIT TO METHOD www microsoft com en ww microsoft teams As Zoom is a video conferencing tool I use it with all the innovation methods mentioned for communication and collaboration WHAT ONLINE INNOVATION Teams is a video conferencing tool so you can use it with all the innovation methods mentioned FIT TO TECHNIQUES WEBSITE 230 4 out of 5 stars Usually you use Microsoft Teams as the company already uses it so project teams know how to use it Microsoft Teams is a unified communication and collaboration platform combining videoconferencing chat and content sharing The service integrates with the Microsoft 365 suite and has end to end security standards This made Teams very popular in companies and preferred over other 231 On Teams I ve applied the following four techniques for online innovation a synchronous work using the channel feature Working together alone asking participants to mute themselves The chat function and the reactions to communicate Break out rooms You can title each room and send people randomly or not broadcast messages while you cannot switch participants among rooms once you ve set And this limits you a bit as a facilitator The Teams chat remains available also after the meeting is finished So if you need to pick information or feedback you will find it easily KILLER FEATURE The availability of channels to communicate with the team on 25 ONLINE TOOLS FOR INNOVATION

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different topics to share documents and to have continuous conversations during the asynchronous work are the killer features As it s integrated with the company email people get notifications you can call them during instant meetings as they re always on TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS Microsoft Teams is browser based and works on desktop and mobile devices DEVICE TYPE Mobile Tablet Desktop AVOID IF I usually use it when the company asks for it I prefer not to use it if I need more flexibility to change settings easily during the workshop or to have engaging interaction between participants TOOL 10 BUTTER BY FLORIAN HAMEISTER EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS break out rooms and the layout is not very engaging 5 out of 5 stars Butter creates an awesome user experience WEBSITE some versions of Windows I recommend using Mozilla Firefox www jitsi org jitsi meet DEVICE TYPE EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS WHAT 5 out of 5 stars It focuses on facilitators With all the features it helps me to make awesome workshops and helps me to focus on facilitation Jitsi Meet is a free open source time free system for making video calls It does not require registration or the installation of any software You can use it from your browser giving it the necessary permissions to manage your computer s microphone and webcam Mobile Tablet Desktop FIT TO METHOD Butter is a video conferencing tool so you can use it with all the innovation methods mentioned FIT TO TECHNIQUES You can apply the following techniques for online innovation working together alone during the videoconference by muting yourself Using the chat function and doing polls Butter also provides break out rooms KILLER FEATURE My killer feature is that I can design workshops up front with agendas polls breakout sessions timer et cetera in one tool Templates I can use over and over again TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS It is browser based and we recommend using Chrome DEVICE TYPE 5 out of 5 stars Butter focuses on remote workshops and really understands what is needed I love it Mobile Tablet Desktop WEBSITE AVOID IF www butter io There are some incompatibilities of Butter with browsers like Explorer or Edge In some cases participants are not able to connect their video and audio OVERALL RATING WHAT Butter is an all in one platform with all the tools you need to host interactive workshops and training sessions Butter is my new favourite video conferencing tool for workshops It is easy to use It combines a videoconference tool with an agenda planner polls questions Miro integration and good interaction tools cool music and a fun design that makes videoconferencing an experience TOOL 11 JITSI MEET REVIEWED BY MARIA VITTORIA COLUCCI 232 I avoid Jitsi Meet when I work with companies and with large groups as break out rooms is not provided WHY It s super easy it allows you to make video calls at the touch of a button literally TOOL 12 WONDER ME REVIEWED BY FLORIAN HAMEISTER EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS 5 out of 5 stars Jitsi is easy to use for participants OVERALL RATING EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS 5 out of 5 stars Jitsi scores a 5 as it is extremely easy With 2 clicks without a download you can start a meeting as a facilitator 4 out of 5 stars Wonder me is simple to use and the background can be personalised That helps to create an atmosphere on the workshop topic For personal interaction Wonder me is nice FIT TO METHOD WEBSITE Jitsi Meet is a video conferencing tool so you can use it with many methods I don t use it working with companies as it s not known by them and there can be security restrictions Jitsi doesn t provide break out rooms so I won t suggest it for large groups www wonder me FIT TO TECHNIQUES On Jitsi Meet I ve applied two techniques for online innovation work together alone during the videoconference by muting the group Using the chat function reactions are unfortunately limited to raising your hand KILLER FEATURE WHY AVOID IF You can directly embed a YouTube video in Jitsi Meet and show it to all participants If you connect it with your YouTube account you can do live streaming WHAT Wonder me is a virtual space where people can meet and talk Participants can see who is speaking to whom They can move their avatars around with their mouse To join a conversation they move closer to leave it they move away WHY It is not only a videoconferencing tool Wonder me enhances the social interaction because simple one one and small group talks are possible I like to use it for workshops where you do a lot of work in smaller groups I also use it in longer projects to host informal meetings EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS 5 out of 5 stars It is very easy to use TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS 3 out of 5 stars My overall rating is only 3 as Jitsi has no You need a browser or the Jitsi legacy desktop app There are some incompatibilities with Google Chrome on 4 out of 5 stars It is simple to set up but as a facilitator it can be challenging to get all people 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FIT TO METHOD tions which I have experienced myself It is a video conferencing tool so you can use it with almost all the innovation methods WHY FIT TO TECHNIQUES You can apply the following techniques for online innovation working together alone during the videoconference by muting yourself Using the chat function Break out rooms KILLER FEATURE Google Meet allows me to connect with innovation project team members and customers so I can chat over video and text As it s integrated into the Google platform this is a seamless task and can be used across different platforms which makes it much easier for me when running a workshop or meeting 3 TOOLS FOR PREPARATION INSTRUCTION EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS 5 out of 5 stars FIT TO METHOD TOOL 14 SESSIONLAB REVIEWED BY MARIA VITTORIA COLUCCI I use it for every method for which you need to make a detailed session plan and planning like the FORTH innovation method a Design Sprint and a Lean Sprint You can decide which level of detail to share with participants OVERALL RATING FIT TO TECHNIQUES It is for session preparation so it doesn t relate to a specific facilitation technique I like to drag around modules and exercises while the timing always stays correct Co create workshops with my colleagues It s also of great value for me I love that participants can form easy intuitive groups on their own EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS 5 out of 5 stars With SessionLab I create my session templates simulate different time boxes share with co facilitators and review and change after the session It is browser based 4 out of 5 stars WEBSITE DEVICE TYPE FIT TO METHOD www sessionlab com Mobile only audio Tablet only audio Desktop As Google Meet is a communications platform I use it for all the methods mentioned as it allows for screen share and the chat function is useful during sessions with my teams WHAT AVOID IF FIT TO TECHNIQUES I avoid Wonder me when I have workshops with very structured processes and when people need to be focus on adding content in another digital tool because in Wonder me it is easy to start moving around and get distracted I use Google Meet across the following techniques The chat function to prevent interruptions in the session Make videos to show results Working together alone as you can mute yourself and the rest of the meeting when using this platform which is great to stop interference SessionLab is an online workshop planning platform that allows me to set my agenda break my content into chunks and outline a session and organising it into various time blocks You have different colours for activity types like ice breakers activities debriefings and you can add your own categories and colours It has an inspiring library of activities to integrate into your session and allows you to collaborate with co facilitators KILLER FEATURE WHY The integrations with the Google platform and 3rd party apps via the app store are great for me and my team s needs Mobile Tablet Desktop SessionLab is easy to use It helps me to plan my workshops with more time awareness and especially online where timeboxes are very short it s incredibly valuable When I co design with colleagues we share the first draft agenda and ask each other to contribute by changing parts timebox or adding notes I have my own templates customised with my logo and I reuse them adapt and update I also look for other facilitators templates to get inspiration Simply drag and drop exercises and modules in a session plan Google Meet is primarily designed as a way to host video meetings However I like the ability to enable the camera and microphone independently so you can just use it for audio calls if you wish which is great for low bandwidth connec AVOID IF EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS WEBSITE I tend to avoid Google Meet when you want to use breakout rooms during your session as currently as of 2021 there is no function for this Participants don t use it they receive the easy to read agendas The different parts are outlined with different colours so they have a broad vision at a glance www boardle io 234 ONLINE INNOVATION 235 25 ONLINE TOOLS FOR INNOVATION TOOL 13 GOOGLE MEET REVIEWED BY ANDREW CONSTABLE 5 out of 5 stars TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS OVERALL RATING 4 out of 5 stars Simple to use part of the google suite of apps The only drawback is the lack of breakout rooms WEBSITE www meet google com WHAT Google Meet is available on the web and on phones and tablets for Android and iOS DEVICE TYPE KILLER FEATURE TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS It is browser based DEVICE TYPE Tablet Desktop AVOID IF I m using it almost always However when I have to run a short workshop where the structure is very simple and straightforward I skip it TOOL 15 BOARDLE REVIEWED BY MARIA VITTORIA COLUCCI OVERALL RATING 5 out of 5 stars I get lots of inspiration as Boardle puts together all in one the best of Miro Mural Klaxoon templates for the main innovation methods WHAT Boardle is a tool offering more than 200 templates for remote

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workshops a list of worldwide remote facilitators and a community to exchange ideas and practices with worldwide facilitators TOOL 16 LOOM REVIEWED BY FLORIAN HAMEISTER WHY OVERALL RATING I enjoy Boardle as a fantastic source of inspiration for my boards I can find templates already made by other facilitators and save time In addition I have access to an international community of facilitators to share ideas experiences and thoughts 5 out of 5 stars With just one click I can record my screen and make instructions On click more and I can share the link with my participants That saves me so much time I love Loom WEBSITE DEVICE TYPE Not relevant EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS www loom com KILLER FEATURE 5 out of 5 stars WHAT EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS Loom is a video messaging tool that helps you get your message across through instantly shareable videos With Loom you can record your camera microphone and desktop simultaneously Mobile Tablet Desktop 5 out of 5 stars FIT TO METHOD Boardle offers ready made templates for Problem Framing Prototyping and Pretotyping Lighting Decision Jam Design Sprints as well as templates for brainstorming and creative Icebreakers that you can use in all online innovation methods FIT TO TECHNIQUES Boardle collects templates from boards such as Miro Mural Klaxoon so I ve applied all the techniques from those tools like working asynchronous and synchronous Working together alone and voting anonymous Lightning demos Using questionnaires and polls Design a virtual room KILLER FEATURE EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS What I love about Loom most is that it s just one click away from being able to record your screen and your face at the same time Sending the link for the video directly afterwards to the participants is fast and helpful 5 out of 5 stars TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS I use Calendly for all methods where you are working with teams and have to schedule workshops Mac Windows iOS and most web browsers not on Internet Explorer AVOID IF You may avoid Loom when you prefer to explain things in writing WHY I use Loom extensively for quick explanatory videos for example when you want to explain a feature of an online tool while showing how it works on screen I use Loom too for instructions on exercise participants have to do at home as preparation for a session For me it is easier to make a short video showing them the needed context instead of writing it EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS TOOL 17 CALENDLY REVIEWED BY ANDREW CONSTABLE FIT TO METHOD FIT TO TECHNIQUES Calendly has calendar integrations with Google Calendar Office 365 Outlook and iCloud Calendar So I am never double booked It s one of the best apps I use TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS No specific requirements Mobile Tablet Desktop AVOID IF OVERALL RATING 5 out of 5 stars So much easier than going back and forth to arrange the timings of a meeting WEBSITE EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS WHAT TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS 4 out of 5 stars Once installed it is pretty easy to start a recording It is browser based FIT TO METHOD DEVICE TYPE Desktop Loom can be used for any method where you want to clarify or explain things with a video rather than in text Calendly is an app that offers me a versatile set of features that allow me to schedule one on one appointments group events and team meetings There is a free version available which I use AVOID IF FIT TO TECHNIQUES There s no reason to avoid it unless you think you don t need or want to inspire others Record videos to explain tasks or to instruct participants Working synchronous and a synchronous Set up templates to be filled by participants My goal is to eliminate the problematic back and forth when trying to nail downtimes for a workshop Rather than email chains and phone tag I can send my availability with a link even if the people booking time with you don t use Calendly It s really a time saver for me 236 ONLINE INNOVATION 237 Boards are organised by methodology technique and tools I love to search and get inspired 5 out of 5 stars DEVICE TYPE 5 out of 5 stars Participants just need to watch the video KILLER FEATURE EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS Avoid it when you re still a fan of paper planners and calendars which I am not I would recommend you move your manual process to this great app www calendly com WHY 25 ONLINE TOOLS FOR INNOVATION

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4 TOOLS FOR PROTOTYPING TESTING TOOL 18 MARVEL REVIEWED BY RODY VONK OVERALL RATING 5 out of 5 stars Your first prototype doesn t have to be perfect at all Create the first draft quickly so you can learn from user feedback as soon as possible I definitely re commend Marvel for this purpose when you prototype apps FORTH innovation method Design Sprint Lean Sprint Lean Startup Pretotyping WEBSITE FIT TO TECHNIQUES WHAT Creating a prototype with this tool can be helpful when you want to use questionnaires surveys to gain insights about a digital solution like an app I would combine the two Create a questionnaire with what you want to learn from testers with a tool like Google Forms while your target audience is using your prototype created in Marvel Toonly is an animated explainer video creator that you can use to create simple videos to provide instruction on how to do something marketing for a product or service and more KILLER FEATURE www toonly com backgrounds and characters but everything has its price and Toonly doesn t cost you a fortune If you need specific scenes backgrounds or objects you can import them but you may need to hire an expert to create the illustrations for you or find suitable ones in stock libraries WHY Animated videos are more engaging and are perceived as being more valuable than text I recommend using Toonly since it so is easy to use It offers a library of scenes backgrounds and figures Literally with one click you select the movement you want for a specific character TOOL 20 SPEECHELO REVIEWED BY RODY VONK www marvelapp com I think it is so smart that within Marvel you can create hyperlinks over sketches It really gives you the experience as if you were using a real app WHAT TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS Marvel helps you transform your pen and paper ideas into an interactive iPhone or Android prototype Quickly snap your sketches to simulate your app idea I really like it since you don t need to build a full technical backbone for an app in order to test your very first draft of your idea while giving testers an interactive experience iPhone iPad Apple Watch Apple TV and Android As Toonly is not a tool for participants in an online workshop the star rating doesn t apply 4 out of 5 stars Speechelo is a very user friendly tool I think some of the available voices sound a bit robotic and the range of available voices in the standard version isn t large enough Despite this it works great DEVICE TYPE EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS WEBSITE Mobile Tablet Toonly is not a facilitator s tool so the star rating doesn t apply www speechelo com AVOID IF FIT TO METHOD I would not use Marvel when you are in a further stage of the innovation process where you need prototypes that should almost look like the end solution There are other tools out there that will serve you better at that point This app is great for making a video presentation of a solution to get feedback This is done in for example the FORTH innovation method Design Sprint Lean Sprint and Lean Startup It is also a helpful tool for pretotyping Speechelo instantly transforms text into a video voiceover using AI technology By simply typing or copying and pasting written text the tool creates a realistic sounding voiceover in seconds What I like is that you can choose from different languages so even if you are not a native speaker you can create great voiceovers in the languages offered in Speechelo WEBSITE WHY It is very easy to use and makes it simple to get your ideas out of your head and into a format that you can easily share with people Marvel saves time and helps you refine and iterate your ideas quickly I find this tool a great example of how easy you can combine good old sketches with smart technology FIT TO TECHNIQUES EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS TOOL 19 TOONLY REVIEWED BY RODY VONK As Marvel is a prototyping tool not a tool for participants in an online workshop the star rating doesn t apply OVERALL RATING EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS As Marvel is a prototyping tool not a facilitator s tool the star rating doesn t apply FIT TO METHOD I find Marvel very useful in any method that aims for building pretotypes and testing simple first drafts quickly like the 238 EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS From a facilitator s point of view I like to use Toonly recording videos to explain tasks or to instruct participants to gain understanding in an engaging way ONLINE INNOVATION WHAT WHY TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS Speechelo provides a voiceover service for individuals that do not feel comfortable recording their own voice have maybe a poor microphone or when English is not your first language For me using a tool like this saves a lot of time since I don t have to record voiceovers myself for explanatory videos for example Desktop Windows or Mac EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS DEVICE TYPE Desktop As Speechelo is not a tool for facilitation the rating does not apply AVOID IF EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS In all its simpleness Toonly has a limited selection of scenes 4 out of 5 stars Although Speechelo isn t a tool to use 239 25 ONLINE TOOLS FOR INNOVATION KILLER FEATURE 4 out of 5 stars The drag and drop functionality combined with the library of backgrounds and characters to easily create animated video s is what I love about Toonly I would have given it 5 stars if there was a free trial version available OVERALL RATING There are tons of images and audio to choose from so nothing feels canned or regurgitated

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while facilitating I find it very handy creating videos to explain certain process steps or templates you want participants to execute or use TOOL 21 CANVA REVIEWED BY ANDREW CONSTABLE TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS FIT TO METHOD Canva is a browser based platform that can be used across Mac Windows IOS and Android You can use it in all innovation methods that require gaining insights from customers FIT TO METHOD OVERALL RATING DEVICE TYPE FIT TO TECHNIQUES Speechelo can be used to communicate a message to stakeholders and customers It is particularly well suited when using methods such as Design Sprints FORTH Pretotyping and Lean Startup methods to outline a concept for example when prototyping a solution 5 out of 5 stars Easy to use my go to design platform www canva com Mobile Tablet Desktop WHAT AVOID IF I use Canva as a design platform to create graphics presentations posters and other visual content in an easy to use format I tend to avoid Canva when I am in a low bandwidth area or country due to the high performance requirements I ve used it in 2 techniques for online innovation use a questionnaire survey to gain insight in a quantitative form and feedback online from customers Working synchronousasynchronous where participants can fill the forms asynchronous and then discuss the results synchronously FIT TO TECHNIQUES I apply a tool like Speechelo for the following techniques for online record videos to explain tasks or to instruct participants to aid understanding Make videos to show results so people can see this asynchronous Visualisation to provide structure to get a common understanding Lightning Demos to aid the creative process WEBSITE WHY I love Canva as it allows me to create graphical presentations and other formats that can be used by innovation teams to communicate the message to customers or stakeholders Due to its online nature I have used this in a simultaneous manner with participants to allow greater visibility when creating graphical artefacts TOOL 22 GOOGLE FORMS REVIEWED BY MARIA VITTORIA COLUCCI OVERALL RATING KILLER FEATURE Google Forms can also handle photos videos and files which you can include in your form and it lets respondents upload files in their responses too TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS You need to have a Google account to set up the questionnaire in some cases respondents must have a Google account too EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS 4 out of 5 stars I use Google Forms to make personalised surveys in an easy and flexible way even if some features are limited for non Google users 5 out of 5 stars WEBSITE Tablet Desktop TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS www docs google com forms AVOID IF As Speechelo is web based it can be used with all browsers 4 out of 5 stars WHAT DEVICE TYPE FIT TO METHOD Mobile Tablet Desktop As Canva is a graphical tool I use it to create designs that can be used in customer experience decks Design Sprints FORTH and Pretotying plus many more I use Google Forms for conducting online surveys getting feedback from testing and pretotyping All the information gathered with the survey is automatically recorded in an Excel spreadsheet in real time I avoid it when the security restriction of the organisations does not allow employees to connect to a Gmail account For quick answers and polls you also have easier tools AVOID IF FIT TO TECHNIQUES WHY I would not use Speechelo when you wish to record more authentic videos Your own voice does still sound more human than an AI voice but that is probably just a matter of time In Canva I use it to apply the following 6 techniques for online innovation working synchronous asynchronous Working together alone Lightning Demo Visualisation Set up templates to be filled by participants I like it as It s very easy to use You can insert different types of questions open multiple answer fields numerical fields et cetera and design an attractive graphic template Then I have all the answers in a spreadsheet to elaborate and analyse them KILLER FEATURE It only takes 3 clicks to complete a voiceover of your video To me a tool like this should be as simple as possible and this tool is KILLER FEATURE Canva has designs for every situation ease of use and photo editing it s one of my favourite go to apps DEVICE TYPE EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS 5 out of 5 stars EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS 4 out of 5 stars 240 ONLINE INNOVATION 241 25 ONLINE TOOLS FOR INNOVATION

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5 TOOLS TO MAKE WORKSHOPS INTERACTIVE use it during the workshop or send the link or QR code and ask to answer using polls and questionnaires KILLER FEATURE TOOL 23 MENTIMETER REVIEWED BY MARIA VITTORIA COLUCCI OVERALL RATING 5 out of 5 stars Mentimeter is great for my audience engagement both synchronous as it is super easy and smart and asynchronous I display the results in many appealing ways It has a smooth mobile integration through the use of QR codes and it gives a surprise effect to your audience TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS Mentimeter recommends using a desktop computer for the presenter and handheld devices for the voters For the presenter most web browsers will work The audience might use Android Windows Phone iOS or Chromebook DEVICE TYPE www mentimeter com Mobile Tablet Desktop WHAT AVOID IF I use Mentimeter to create live polls quizzes word clouds Q As to get real time input and to engage my team I create my poll then share a QR code or a link with the team and as they answer I can visualise and share the results with them in different formats as tag clouds charts matrixes Be careful when you want to integrate it with PowerPoint as it doesn t work properly WEBSITE WHY I use it to add interactivity and keep the audience engaged since online feeling more distant than being in the same physical room It s extremely easy to use During a meeting I share the QR code and participants can answer in a few seconds with their phones I share the screen to show the results in real time WHY Use tscheck in starting or ending a workshop By asking questions unrelated to the topic you are working on you improve the connection between participants which makes your online workshop more personal Having these questions at hand in an online tool is what makes it so helpful for me as a facilitator EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS 5 out of 5 stars Participants have to do nothing on their computer They only have to answer the question on the screen which can sometimes be a bit hard to be honest FIT TO METHOD You can use it for any session for every method It s for synchronous work not related to a specific technique KILLER FEATURE The killer feature is the tool itself since it is as simple as showing a question on the screen nothing more You can use it on any platform EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS 5 out of 5 stars WEBSITE AVOID IF EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS www tscheck in 5 out of 5 stars WHAT FIT TO METHOD Tscheck in is a website with a database of checking in and checking out questions that appear on your screen randomly I like this tool because of its simplicity It is no more than a question on your screen When you are running a short session about 60 to 90 minutes where you need to get to specific objectives you may run out of time if you are asking participants to answer questions that are not related to the topic of your session 242 ONLINE INNOVATION www kahoot com If you want just like me to make your online workshops more interactive use Kahoot It is an online game based system to help educate participants using quiz based learning It allows me to create a fun and social learning experience for participants At the time of writing Kahoot was announcing the option to create full presentations with slides or even import your slides from other software to build interactive presentations on one platform 4 out of 5 stars What I like about Tscheck in is that its functionality is limited to what it was meant to do provide you with check in and check out questions for your sessions It would have been nice if the tool contained more questions or if you could add your own I use Mentimeter to apply the following techniques for online innovation Working synchronous asynchronous as you can WEBSITE WHAT TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS FIT TO TECHNIQUES 5 out of 5 stars I like the combination of game based learning and the new feature to import your slides which makes Kahoot a powerful tool for creating engagement with your audience while presenting your content all with one tool 5 out of 5 stars Also here a 5 star rating since as a facilitator you only have to go to the website and click on a button to go to the next question It is as simple as that OVERALL RATING I use it with any method to make my sessions more engaging OVERALL RATING EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS FIT TO TECHNIQUES TOOL 24 TSCHECK IN REVIEWED BY RODY VONK TOOL 25 KAHOOT REVIEWED BY RODY VONK DEVICE TYPE Mobile Tablet Desktop 243 WHY I like to use it for fun and to create interactivity and engagement but a Kahoot quiz can also be a great way to check the knowledge of participants before you start your workshop to help you to avoid making it too simplistic or too complicated for your audience EASE OF USE FOR NEW PARTICIPANTS 5 out of 5 stars Kahoot gets 5 stars since it is very easy to join by just entering a code In a quiz participants just have to click on the colour coded answer on their mobile device EASE OF USE FOR FACILITATORS 4 out of 5 stars For facilitators it requires some effort to prepare polls and quizzes It is quite simple to do but you will need some preparation time 25 ONLINE TOOLS FOR INNOVATION

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You find an overview of 10 innovation methods you can use for your online innovation workshops sprints or projects Each method was explained in depth in chapters 7 10 Section 1 covers 3 innovation methods for short online workshops like Problem Framing the Customer Experience Deck and the Lightning Decision Jam Section 2 presents 2 methods for online innovation sprints of a week or less like Pretotyping and the Design Sprint Section 3 describes 5 methods for online innovation projects in which we feature the FORTH innovation method Lean Startup the Business Model Canvas methodology the Purpose Launchpad the Circular Design Process relevant user will be defined And finally the problem statement will be drafted WHICH TECHNIQUES In a Problem Framing process all of the online innovation techniques besides the lightning demos can be applied WHICH TOOLS You can use whiteboards like Miro Mural or Klaxoon and videoconference tools like Zoom MS Teams or Butter to stay visually connected For check in and check out in the sessions Tscheck in works fine METHOD 1 PROBLEM FRAMING WEBSITE 1 www designsprint academy about problem framing WHAT TIP The techniques you can apply for a CXD workshop are working together alone choosing the feelings Voting anonymous for the top 5 Use Bulk mode to write ideas on post its in the action phase Using the chat function Working in Break Out Rooms to discuss the outputs Most of the time the real problem hides behind the stated problem so take your time to find the real problem METHOD 2 THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE DECK WHAT 248 2 WHICH TECHNIQUES The outcome is a clearly defined problem statement at the end of the problem space which is the ideal start for the HMW how might we question and the ideation phase WHY You start with the problem discovery to find out what problems there are and categorise them Afterwards you focus on understanding the context of the relevant problem and the relevant user Then the experience of the most CXD is a method of gaining insights into your customers but on its own it is unlikely to trigger a process of innovation The pitfall is that everyone is thinking already in solutions 90 minutes 6 hours WEBSITE HOW HOW PITFALL DURATION Problem Framing is a design thinking method to define the actual and most relevant problem More on Problem Framing you find in chapter 7 You use it because most of the time the so called problem is not the actual problem or it is not well precise enough described RESULTS It is a process of 9 micro steps that lead a group after identifying a customer segment they want to work with to understand the customers desired and undesired feelings In the first seven steps participants individually address how we want our customers to feel and not feel Then they share the results with the group and vote for the top 5 In the last two steps they start working together identifying ways to detect the feelings understand the causes and take actions RESULTS 1 3 INNOVATION METHODS FOR SHORT ONLINE WORKSHOPS needs and get insights on the critical elements of the desired customer experience and how you can work together to shape it You can integrate it in other more structured methodologies as the FORTH innovation method in the Observe Learn phase before the Customer Friction interview Or in the Business Model Canvas in the customer relationship section www ridersandelephants com thecustomerexperiencedeck The Customer Experience Deck CXD was created in 2019 by Jeremy Dean to help teams build a shared understanding about their customers It s a simple nine step process to build a shared vision of who your customers are and to start innovating their customer experience More on CXD you find in chapter 7 WHY WHICH TOOLS For a CXD workshop you can use any online collaboration platform although we would prefer Miro or Mural to structure the online process It will help if you use a video conferencing tool with break out rooms We ve used Zoom but also Microsoft Teams or Butter to get a good experience For example all the other tools for preparation instruction SessionLab to create and share the program and the tools to make sessions interactive are of great value for a CXD session PITFALL TIP Collect customer experiences directly using CXD to conduct interviews or focus groups with potential clients so that the output will be much more meaningful METHOD 3 THE LIGHTNING DECISION JAM WEBSITE www ajsmart com ldj WHAT The Lightning Decision Jam LDJ is an exercise to generate solutions for a problem with a product or service try to come up with new product features or solve a problem within a team or process any problem you can imagine It helps to identify problems and to decide on the first steps to take to solve them Whether you work in a 5 person company or a multinational this exercise is useful in any workshop where you want to put an end to useless unstructured discussions More on LDJ you find in chapter 8 WHY 3 A CXD workshop can take from 2 to 3 hours depending on the size of the group Use the Lightning Decision Jam to quickly identify problems the participants have on their minds and define the most important problem to solve quickly The highly structured process is aimed at coming up with a 249 OVERVIEW 10 ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS DURATION You apply it to create a shared understanding of the client s ONLINE INNOVATION The outputs are the top five desired and not desired customer feelings shared by the group Plus a canvas is drafted with actions to create this experience It can be a great starting point for developing innovation based on the client s needs

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lot of solutions fast very creative ones or those that may have been overlooked The process also helps find the best solution based on how much impact the participants think a solution will have and the effort they expect it to take to implement it After identifying the best solution the workshop ends with a shortlist of clear actions to test the solution with names of those responsible for taking those steps and a timeline for executing them RESULTS HOW The effectiveness of the LDJ is based on no discussion As a facilitator it can be challenging to keep the team from preventing to discuss Without discussion all participants take a couple of minutes in silence to write down the problems and challenges they can think of After that everyone votes individually for the most important challenges they think should be solved The problem with the most votes will be used to generate solutions in silent brainstorm By doing this in silence discussions are avoided and everyone can contribute Go for quantity over quality Solutions can be judged and refined later Again by voting the solutions are prioritised Based on how much impact a solution is expected to have and the effort it would take to realise it the solutions are compared This determines which solutions should be tried out first Then a list of actions is made with a timeline to start testing the solutions chosen There are 4 outputs 1 An overview of prioritised problems and actionable solutions from a team colleagues in a short period of time 2 Decisions made on which solution s to test first 3 Actionable steps to start testing the chosen solutions 4 A list of next best solutions to try if the top prioritised solution doesn t work in the test phase PITFALL TIP Manage expectations beforehand and explain why there is no room for discussion Be strict on the timings per step in the LDJ to keep the speed up and prevent discussions WEBSITE www pretotyping org WHAT Pretotype is a neologism created by Alberto Savoia to indicate in the process of innovation the realisation of a fake product service we want to realise that simulates pretend and precedes the real one The aim is to validate quickly and economically whether the idea we have had is worth pursuing There are different types of pretotyping techniques depending on the product service or target audience More on Pretotyping you find in chapter 7 4 To quote the inventor of Pretotyping to make sure you are building the right it before you build it right It aims to see if the market is interested in a product or service before investing too much time and resources in developing an innovative idea HOW The technique working together alone is key in this process just like voting anonymous This is key to prevent discussions from happening The bulk mode in the tool Miro helps participants write ideas quickly without being distracted by what other participants are writing WHICH TOOLS Microsoft Teams Zoom or Butter for videoconferencing no breakout rooms needed can be used Use Miro or Mural for writing post its Slack is helpful for follow up with the team involved in the execution phase of solutions DURATION 60 to 90 minutes ONLINE INNOVATION techniques are more critical than others to figure out how the product service will appear WHICH TOOLS METHOD 4 PRETOTYPING WHY WHICH TECHNIQUES 250 2 2 METHODS FOR ONLINE INNOVATION SPRINTS In online prototyping you can use all the prototyping and testing tools mentioned above plus Invision Proto io YouTube Besides you can use online collaboration boards such as Miro Mural for their flexibility DURATION Pretotyping is used to obtain the rapid validation of one s hypotheses The benchmark for pretotyping and getting high quality data is the Hour To Data which gives a good idea of the time frame RESULTS The pretotyping outputs are significant YODA Your Own Data that validate or not the market engagement hypothesis You can interpret this data based on a meter divided into five success categories from very unlikely 10 to very likely 90 success PITFALL It is a quick and easy method and the risk is to trivialise it Be careful in choosing the right market on which to test the pretotype and in analysing the data There are five steps in Pretotyping 1 Isolate the key assumption and define what the premises of the new idea are 2 Draft a concrete verifiable market engagement hypothesis by clear and quantifiable assumptions 3 HypoZoom think about how you might test locally quickly and inexpensively while staying true 4 Choose a type of pretotype plan it test it In this phase we choose the best technique to validate the data and build the pretotype costs and time 5 Analyse the data make tweaks repeat the process TIP WHICH TECHNIQUES www gv com sprint In the pretotype method you can use all the techniques suited to work and co create together Visualisation WHAT 251 OVERVIEW 10 ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS Start testing immediately do not make the phase of choosing and implementing the pretotype last too long Share the data analysis and interpretation with two people you trust who are not yet as in love with the innovative idea as you are It will help you to be less biased METHOD 5 THE DESIGN SPRINT WEBSITE The sprint is a five day process for answering critical business

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questions through design prototyping and customers testing ideas More on the Design Sprint you find in chapter 9 3 5 METHODS FOR ONLINE INNOVATION PROJECTS WHY Working together in a sprint you can shortcut the endless debate cycle and compress months into a single week METHOD 6 THE FORTH INNOVATION METHOD HOW new concepts On Test Ideas you get feedback on all concepts from customers improve them online and select the top 5 improved concepts They will be worked out online as mini new business cases for decision making by your top management WHICH TECHNIQUES In an online FORTH innovation project all 10 of the online innovation techniques are applied which is one reason why the methodology gets great results digitally METHOD 7 LEAN STARTUP WEBSITE WHICH TECHNIQUES The FORTH innovation methodology was introduced in 2005 by its founder and author of this book Gijs van Wulfen It is a structured methodology to start innovation from challenge to new business cases with a diverse internal group of participants It s applied worldwide in every sector you can imagine with great success It was brought online in 2020 very successfully The online FORTH process consists of a series of 23 short workshops in 12 weeks With FORTH you can generate 100 online new evolutionary and or revolutionary products services business models experiences and processes More on the FORTH innovation method you find in chapter 10 WHICH TOOLS WHY RESULTS 5 In a Design Sprint we combine design thinking and rapid prototyping We use most of the ten online innovation techniques throughout the 5 day process WHICH TOOLS In the design sprint we use Miro or Mural as our digital whiteboard We use Zoom or Google Meet for video conferencing and integrate other tools for booking the sessions and recording notes DURATION The Design Sprint can be run between 3 to 5 days depending on the variation used In this book we explain the 5 day process RESULTS The outputs of a Design Sprint are a validated prototype following customer useability tests PITFALL The pitfall is cutting out the steps in the recipe Only experienced sprinters should change this otherwise there is a risk of losing the process s effectiveness TIP Look to have a second facilitator in the sessions who understands the process They can help with running the sessions and running the technical elements 252 WHAT 6 FORTH has been scientifically proven to more than double the output of your innovation stage gate process The internal support for the new business cases generated is huge as both the innovation team as the senior managers are taking part in the online expedition HOW FORTH is an acronym and stands for Full steam ahead Observe and Learn Raise ideas Test ideas and Homecoming In Full Steam Ahead you draft together with your management the innovation assignment select the team and kick off the project In Observe Learn you discover innovation opportunities and identify customer insights online On the island of Raise Ideas you create more than 1000 ideas on a collaboration platform like Miro and work out the best 15 into ONLINE INNOVATION TIP FORTH is the royal way to start innovation online Apply it when innovation is relevant and a big jump has to be made by your organisation A Design Sprint is a time constrained five phase process that uses design thinking with the aim of reducing the risk when bringing a new product service or feature to the market www forth innovation com the participants are completely booked with back to back meetings that there hardly is any time left except at night We like to work with Miro as our preferred online collaboration platform in FORTH although some FORTH facilitators also get great results with Trello We use as a video conferencing tool Zoom of course but also Microsoft Teams or Webex And we are fans of Butter All the other tools for preparation instruction prototyping testing and the tools to make sessions interactive are of great value to the FORTH innovation process DURATION A full FORTH innovation project of 23 shorter workshops would take you around 12 weeks The outputs of the FORTH innovation process are 3 5 mini new business cases for your innovation challenge which will have great support among both the participants of the expedition as the top managers Next to that a very positive side effect of a FORTH expedition is that the journey is so immersive that it will change their mindset into an innovative one FORTH is known for its ability to kick start a culture for innovation in organisations applying the method PITFALL With 23 short workshops in 12 weeks the FORTH methodology is an intensive process that requires dedication and time Although all the workshops are planned there is also some asynchronous work to be done And the main pitfall is that 253 WEBSITE www theleanstartup com WHAT Lean Startup is a methodology for developing businesses and products The Lean Startup method was first proposed in 2008 by Eric Ries using his personal experiences adapting lean management and customer development principles to high tech startups The method combines experimentation iterative product releases and validated learning The Lean Startup method seeks to increase value producing practices during the earliest phases of a company to have a better chance of success It emphasises customer feedback over intuition and flexibility over planning More on Lean Startup you find in chapter 7 WHY 7 The Lean Startup methodology aims to shorten product development cycles and rapidly discover if a proposed business model is viable HOW Unlike typical yearlong product development cycles Lean Startup eliminates wasted time and resources by developing the product iteratively and incrementally Developing a minimum viable product MVP the version of a new product which allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort plays a crucial role in Lean Startup OVERVIEW 10 ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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WHICH TECHNIQUES WHAT In an online Lean Startup project all 10 of the online innovation techniques could be applied depending on your preferred tools Alexander Osterwalder developed the Business Model Canvas in the 2000s It is a methodology to innovate the business model of a product service or organisation More on the Business Model Canvas you find in chapter 7 WHICH TOOLS For a Lean Startup innovation project you can use any online collaboration platform although we would prefer Miro or Mural We use the videoconferencing tool Zoom but also Microsoft Teams or Webex And we are fans of Butter All the other tools for preparation instruction prototyping testing and the tools to make sessions interactive are of great value to a Lean Startup process DURATION The Lean Startup method is not about cost it s about speed Eric Ries But how long it takes from idea to successful business will vary greatly among sectors RESULTS A tested and validated MVP minimum viable product and business model would be the methodology s first deliverable PITFALL In Lean Startup you test hypotheses and then pivot your idea accordingly But when you try as many directions as possible and see what holds it might create chaos that is very hard to deal with for you for the development team for management and eventually for even for your customers TIP At the core of Lean Startup is making your assumptions explicit and adding a second tip is to talk to your potential users as soon as possible to get real customer insights of real users tion in a canvas of the nine essential elements of the new business model plus pretotypes or prototypes to be tested and clear and defined actions on how to proceed PITFALL The Business model Canvas helps you create innovative business models to develop new ideas or new markets It is a very well known and articulated method The main pitfalls could be limiting yourself to a Business Model Canvas that remains unrealised or making the structured analysis phase last too long HOW TIP WHY 8 There are five steps to define a new business model 1 Mobilise where you prepare create awareness and the momentum Define the team 2 Understand where you research and analyse elements needed for the business model design 3 Design where you transform the ideas into a prototype or better a pretotype to validate your ideas 4 Implement where you put into practice what you ve designed 5 Manage where you adapt and modify the business model in response to market reaction WHICH TECHNIQUES In an online Business Model Canvas you can apply all 10 of the online innovation techniques WHICH TOOLS You can use any online collaboration platform Besides on Boardle you can find a Mural template of the canvas ready to use It will help if you have a video conferencing tool with break out rooms like Zoom Microsoft Teams or Butter to get a fresh experience All the other tools for preparation instruction SessionLab to share the program and the tools to make sessions interactive are of great value Draft the canvas with a reasonably well diversified team Use an iterative process realise it completely and then repeat the process specific order Purpose People Customer Abundance Sustainability Processes Product and Metrics since the eight areas are connected in a way that a certain area always needs some previous evolution of the other ones Purpose Launchpad is a meta methodology using other methodologies like Design Thinking Business Model Canvas and Lean Startup WHICH TECHNIQUES In an online Purpose Launchpad all 10 of the online innovation techniques could be applied WHICH TOOLS Purpose Launchpad is a meta methodology many of the online tools presented in this book could be applied DURATION METHOD 9 THE PURPOSE LAUNCHPAD WEBSITE www purposelaunchpad com WHAT Purpose launchpad is an ongoing process The heart of Purpose Launchpad is a sprint a time box of one two or more weeks depending on the level of evolution of the initiative during which the team makes real progress evolving along the Purpose Launchpad Axes Purpose Launchpad is an open methodology and a mindset to generate and evolve early stage initiatives into purposedriven organisations to make a massive impact It was developed by Francisco Palao with the input of 150 contributors around the world More on Purpose Launchpad you find in chapter 7 RESULTS WHY The pitfall might be that it s an iterative ongoing process which of course might stop at some point in time without urgency or priority 9 Purpose Launchpad was designed to help you build purposedriven organisations and evolve your mindset to become explorers who will discover the right path to create a new organisation business product or service that will positively impact the world DURATION HOW METHOD 8 THE BUSINESS MODEL CANVAS There s no fixed duration It may take you a few hours to a few days to a few weeks when you iterate the process WEBSITE RESULTS www strategyzer com Canvas business model Canvas The business model outputs are the clear and shared defini The Purpose Launchpad has eight key areas The way you develop these key areas is by making some progress in the first area Purpose and then making some more progress in the following area Customer The iterative process has a 254 ONLINE INNOVATION 255 The iterative process on each of the eight key areas has three evolution levels Exploration Evaluation and Impact On a polar graph you can spot the evolution status of all the Purpose Launchpad Axes PITFALL TIP While implementing the Purpose Launchpad you not only evolve your initiative alone but also your team s people And that s the most powerful evolution OVERVIEW 10 ONLINE INNOVATION METHODS

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METHOD 10 THE CIRCULAR DESIGN PROCESS PITFALL WEBSITE The Circular Design Process helps you get in the right circular direction but the mindset and the focus of the participants have to be already on sustainability www circulardesignguide com WHAT The Circular Design Process is a design thinking process specialising in creating circular designed products services and business models originated by IDEO and the Ellen Macarthur Foundation More on the Circular Design Process you find in chapter 7 WHY 10 TIP There are a lot of great methods in the guide Take your time and pick the ones that suit your process best Make sure you as a facilitator understand the why And for what of each method The economy has reached a point where we have to think differently The circular design process gives you all tools on hand that help you innovate new products and services that are more sustainable and lead us in the direction of a circular economy HOW The process provides well known methods modified for a circular design for all four stages Understand Define Make and Release and are ready for use WHICH TECHNIQUES In an online Circular Design Process all 10 of the online innovation techniques could be applied WHICH TOOLS Digital whiteboards Miro Mural Klaxoon work fine And to get connected Zoom Microsoft Teams or Butter make sense Loom and SessionLab help you prepare the sessions and with Canva and Google Forms you can prepare prototypes for simple tests DURATION It may last from a couple of days to a month RESULTS The output is circular products services and business models 256 ONLINE INNOVATION

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ABOUT THE AUTHORS Gijs van Wulfen Gijs Dutch 1960 is a worldwide authority in innovation and design thinking He worked as a marketer in the fast moving consumer goods industry and as a strategy consultant before founding the FORTH innovation method in 2005 FORTH is a scientifically proven methodology for the start of innovation which is implemented on six continents In 2020 the methodology was taken 100 online with great success His third book on innovation The Innovation Maze was crowned as Management Book of the Year As a LinkedIn Influencer he has 330 000 followers From Crete the island where he lives he inspires people all over the world to be amazing innovators in a practical way with his keynotes books webinars Clubhouse audio events and YouTube videos Recently Gijs is one of the authors of the Future Fit Manifesto the successor of the Agile Manifesto of 20 years ago www gijsvanwulfen com gijs gijsvanwulfen com 258 Maria Vittoria Colucci Maria Vittoria is Italian living in Milan In her job she supports leaders and organisations to innovate and to build a culture for innovation Her expertise is in innovation methods and remote facilitation as well as in cultural and leadership innovation She is a business economist who started her career as a marketing consultant then became fascinated by design thinking and human experience HX Having graduated in Economics earning an MBA becoming a FORTH Innovation Master facilitator Executive Counsellor and Coach she likes to combine and merge knowledge and practices to promote innovation change and well being She s been working for more than 25 years in management consulting companies with major clients across different industries In 2015 she co founded Evidentia B Corp a consulting agency based in Milan www evidentia it She co edited the Italian version of the book The Innovation Expedition of Gijs van Wulfen In the 100 online switch she is working to give a human touch to the online experience https www linkedin com in mariavittoriacolucci mariavittoria colucci evidentia it Andrew Constable Andrew is an MBA qualified Forbes magazine contributor innovation and growth marketing specialist and Lean startup coach working with startups and organisations to gain traction with their product or digital solution Andrew helps teams generate ideas develop products and get noticed in the market Andrew builds entrepreneurial mindsets to create and improve products via a metric driven method Andrew runs a Lean startup Innovation Growth marketing agency focusing on creating more successful startups and growth focused organisations via Innovation methods Andrew is a certified Leanstack Lean startup coach a FORTH innovation method facilitator and a Growth marketing specialist Andrew is a member of the Association of Business Mentors a fellow of the Institute of Innovation and Knowledge Exchange and a member of the association of MBAs Andrew has over 20 years of experience in product management in global organisations managing complex relationships at a strategic level and driving business change Having spent his career working across organisations of various sizes he has a good grasp of the needs of organisations whether it is a startup or a more established organisation Florian Hameister Florian as a Remote Innovation facilitator helps companies to fill their development pipeline with attractive products services and business models With over 10 years of experience in the producing industry as an industrial engineer and project manager he made probably all the mistakes in the product development you can It is this experience he uses to help his clients become unstuck and innovate again Through his passion for remote facilitation he is able to enjoy his family life to the fullest and is taking up gardening He is a big fan of the circular economy and tried to start worm composting about six years ago After having over a thousand fruit flies on the walls he figured composting in an apartment has its limits Since moving to the countryside he is giving it a second try Rody Vonk Rody based in The Netherlands has been working as an entrepreneur for almost 20 years He started his career as a creative concept developer in advertising agencies Now Rody uses his creative background to develop disruptive ideas and strategies for organisations that become stuck in their daily routine or projects What he has learned from these assignments are welcome examples and sources of inspiration in his training workshops and presentations on Design Thinking Serious Creativity and Innovation The training Rody facilitates is characterized by the combination of theory and practical group work Hands on activities and group discussion as well as interactive exercises and the application of different tools and techniques blend throughout his sessions Over the years he has facilitated face to face and online sessions around the globe in countries in Europe Africa and the Middle East for hundreds of people with a great variety of job titles innovation managers product owners board room members R D experts etc for a wide range of international operating organisations and multinationals www visualisesolutions co uk andrew constable visualisesolutions co uk www florian hameister de florian florian hameister de www rody vonk com info rodyvonk nl 259

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INDEX 4 part sketch 182 5 senses toolbox 98 Active innovators 17 18 Affinity mapping 122 AJ Smart 171 AltSpace 215 Amazon Build It 136 Amazon gift cards 137 Anonymous voting 71 108 109 122 125 133 196 205 AR VR technology 214 215 Augmented reality 214 Bad internet 24 BigScreen VR 215 Bloom Nicholas 12 Boardle 39 108 131 138 235 Braindump 203 Brainstorm process 202 Break out rooms 72 100 108 122 125 132 133 139 154 156 164 Bulk mode 43 72 108 109 122 158 159 161 172 196 Business Model Canvas 119 122 123 127 130 131 132 133 254 Butter 39 50 108 109 118 128 131 148 154 164 232 Butterfield Stewart 46 Callaghan Chris 141 Calendly 39 108 119 131 174 237 Canva 39 132 148 240 Carroll Lewis 32 Chat function 74 108 122 125 Circular Design Process 147 256 Claxoon 108 260 Co facilitation 99 108 Colucci Maria Vittoria 7 258 Comic Book Hero 203 Concept assessment 206 Concept improvement 206 Concept improvement workshop 205 206 218 Concept making workshop 4 Concept presentation 205 Concept testing 218 Concept transfer workshop 219 Constable Andrew 7 259 Crazy 8s 183 Ctrip 12 Cultural differences 31 Customer Experience Deck CXD 123 124 248 Customer feedback 206 Customer frictions 200 201 Customer frictions workshop 201 218 Customer interviews 205 Customer journey 120 Customer journey mapping 121 122 124 125 Emrich von Kajdacsy Jens 89 End presentation workshop 208 219 ESKA 195 Exploration preparation workshop 218 Exploring trends 218 Dias Bionda 7 Discovery preparation workshop 201 De Wal Frederik 7 Design Sprint 170 251 Design Sprint Process 172 Design thinking 122 142 170 Digital whiteboards 25 28 95 175 216 Distractions 80 Donut 107 Dropbox 109 128 131 Hameister Florian 7 193 194 259 Hoffman Reid 137 Hololens 214 Homecoming 207 217 Howspace 39 109 228 Hybrid FORTH innovation process 219 220 Hybrid innovation 211 215 217 Hypozoom 135 139 Facebook 10 Figma 184 Fondazione Cariplo 148 FORTH ideation space 67 FORTH innovation journey 192 209 FORTH innovation method 19 123 190 217 252 FrameVR 215 Franklin Benjamin 26 Full Steam Ahead 197 217 Glue 215 Google Drive 118 128 131 Google Forms 39 109 148 175 197 214 241 Google Meet 39 185 234 Google Slides 156 Innovation 16 Innovation assignment 198 205 Innovation focus workshop 198 217 Innovation opportunities 199 Innovation opportunities workshop 199 Innovation sweet spots 18 Innovation team 198 Jitsi Meet 39 232 Jobs to be done 129 Kahoot 243 Keely Larry 17 Kickoff workshop 199 217 Klaxoon 39 148 229 Knapp Jake 170 171 180 183 Lean canvas 127 128 129 Lean Sprint 128 Lean Startup 126 142 253 Lightning Decision Jam 152 157 249 Lightning demo 74 122 132 139 181 182 LinkedIn 128 Loom 39 54 109 119 131 148 174 185 236 Loughlin John 7 Einstein Albert 155 Ellen Macarthur Foundation 147 Empathy map 120 122 Idea directions 204 Idea directions workshop 204 Ideation workshop 203 216 IDEO 147 170 Impact Effort matrix 162 163 Magic Leap 214 Making workshops interactive 39 61 242 Marvel 39 57 128 132 238 Mayura Ash 127 McKinsey and Company 147 MeetinVR 214 Mentimeter 39 61 109 242 Meyer Erin 31 Microsoft teams 39 107 108 156 231 Middel Coenie 196 ONLINE INNOVATION 261 INDEX

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Minimum Viable Product MVP 126 Mini new business case 207 208 Mini new business case workshops 218 Miro 39 42 108 109 118 124 128 131 148 156 158 159 160 172 174 175 176 196 197 203 205 216 224 Mozilla Hubs 215 Municipality of Milan 148 Mural 39 44 108 109 118 128 131 138 148 156 160 216 225 Netiquette checklist 106 New product brainstorm 218 Nreal 214 Observe Learn 123 199 217 Observe Learn workshops 201 218 Online collaboration 39 41 224 Online Design Sprint 172 Online innovation 20 Online innovation methods 114 115 247 Online innovation pitfalls 22 Online innovation rules 93 Online innovation techniques 65 Online innovation tools 14 25 37 39 40 224 Online lean sprint 128 Online magical moments 86 Online onboarding 86 Online pretotyping 137 Online problem framing 118 Online time 104 109 Online voting 105 Osterwalder Alexander 130 192 Phillip Morris International 197 Poll 75 76 Preparation and instruction 39 52 235 Pretotype 135 Pretotype canvas 138 139 140 Pretotyping 129 134 251 Pretotyping process 138 Problem framing 116 119 124 129 132 248 Problem market fit 127 129 Problem solution fit 127 129 Problem statement 122 Proto persona 120 122 123 Prototype 184 185 Prototyping and testing 39 56 132 238 Purpose Launchpad 141 255 Purpose Launchpad scorecard 143 PWC 12 13 Quest 214 Raise Ideas 202 217 Reactive innovators 18 19 Rec Room Immersed 215 Remote collaboration 13 Resilience 16 Ries Eric 126 Rules of engagement 29 Rumii 215 Padlet 39 107 109 119 120 227 Palao Francisco 141 Pandemic 15 Petriglieri Gianpiero 83 Savoia Alberto 134 SCAMPER 203 SessionLab 39 52 108 109 119 124 131 148 197 235 Shuffler Marissa 83 Silly things 203 Slack 39 46 109 118 128 131 144 156 165 228 Slow elevator problem 117 262 ONLINE INNOVATION Smits Michael 144 Spatialchat 108 109 214 Speechelo 39 109 239 Spotify 109 Spradlin D 116 Star model facilitation 101 108 Storyboard 184 Storytelling 132 133 Survey 75 76 108 109 205 SWOT analysis 119 122 Synchronous and a synchronous work 69 109 132 133 139 196 Team introduction workshop 199 217 Tech onboarding 94 108 175 Tech facilitator 99 Test Ideas 205 217 The Innovation Expedition 190 Toonly 39 58 109 132 238 Trello 39 107 108 109 118 226 TRI meter 136 138 139 Tscheck in 39 64 108 119 131 242 Typeform 197 Watercooler 107 WhatsApp 144 What would Apple do 203 Wonder me 39 108 109 233 Working together alone 70 122 125 133 156 203 World Time Buddy 173 Yukita Daisuke 104 YouTube 128 148 Zoom 14 19 39 48 83 108 118 124 128 131 148 154 164 174 175 176 185 197 230 Zoom fatigue 84 Zuckerberg Mark 10 User Journey Map 180 UserTesting com 172 185 Value proposition 130 Van Wulfen Gijs 7 34 114 153 190 193 258 Van Zijderveld Kees 195 Video conferencing 25 28 39 48 83 175 230 Virtual room design 66 Virtualist 215 VISPA 215 Visualisation 133 Vonk Rody 7 259 263 INDEX

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ONLINE INNOVATION If you would have asked us at the beginning of 2020 After describing ten common pitfalls we share whether you could effectively innovate 100 online some great tools and techniques that work in prac we would have said NO WAY And now we know tice We discuss the Achilles heel of innovating we were so wrong Yes you can innovate your online and present ten methodologies you can use organisation entirely online You can devise new for online innovation hands on The Lightning products services experiences processes and Decision Jam the Design Sprint and the FORTH business models without any doubt Since 2020 innovation method will be highlighted and we we and many others with us have proven this in work out a hybrid version of this methodology practice Innovating online is here to stay At the end of the book you will find a systematic description of twenty five tools and ten methods This book inspires you with effective online collabo clearly and simply to help you pick the right ones ration tools techniques methods and rules to kick for your online innovation journey start yourself to innovate your work and your organisation completely online That s why this is This book is written for you as a consultant coach a practical HOW INNOVATE ONLINE book facilitator manager or student in the field of design thinking and innovation www bispublishers com ISBN 978 90 636 9621 4 9 789063 696214 PRACTICAL METHODS TECHNIQUES AND TOOLS TO KICK START YOU 100 ONLINE