Encouraging a Culture of Innovation to Beat Competition

Fostering
a culture of innovation and creativity in business can help one stay a
step ahead of competitors, by ensuring that products and services remain
up to date and in line with what customers need. Innovative businesses
often have strong, inspirational leaders and management and well-trained
and motivated employees. These businesses maintain a culture of
innovation, constantly looking at every aspect of the organization and
not just its products and services.

In
today’s business environment, it is difficult for businesses to
outgrow, out market, or out price the competition but driving innovation
while implementing continuous improvement will help businesses stand
out from the competition. Every business wants to innovate, even if it
is not on the same level as Apple or Google. Innovation has to have a
purpose. That’s exactly what Apple has been doing, and its devotion to
designing new customer experiences centered on technology has
contributed to a 1,300 percent rise in its stock price in the past 10
years and a market capitalization that exceeds that of Microsoft. Apple
keeps innovating because it has deliberately fashioned a culture of
innovation. The company’s steadfastness to design and innovate is built
into its DNA and that enables it to promote, conceive and implement
revolutionary ideas and remain in a continuous state of reinvention.

Business
innovation now a day’s does not only mean making the product
development better but it also means that companies should keep
reinventing themselves in ways, that the internal and external customers
goodwill towards the company increases. Research has found that
companies that do the best in a tough economy are those that innovate
and are open to outside ideas. The power of the crowd innovation is
being utilized by many businesses and many companies are doing
efficiently by outsourcing their first line support and service function
to the crowd. Air New Zealand’s Aviation Design Academy for example,
set out to design the best long-haul flying experience. Passengers were
asked to design parts of the flying experience on their new 777-300
aircraft – the cocktail, in-flight food, eye mask and one “freeform”
idea.

The
winners had the opportunity to take a flight from Auckland to London to
sample the implementation of their ideas. The competition attracted
huge number of entries and generated more interest in Air New Zealand’s
marketing initiative.

In many cases, CEOs see collaboration as
key to their success with innovation. They know they cannot do it all
using internal resources. So they look outside for other organizations
to partner with. True innovation requires someone who can visualize the
possibilities of an idea generation and who has the ability and tenacity
to successfully implement it. With successful idea management services,
organizations can blend the strengths with various feedbacks as a means
to encourage a culture of innovation. This way the best idea is most
likely to successfully beat completion in the market.

Furniture Rental London Eases Your Relocation Needs

Life becomes hectic for people who have high flying jobs. They come across a number of problems. One of the major problems that they face quite often is their need to relocate within a short notice period. This means packing up your belongings and moving from there to the other place where the company asks for. Now, if you think packing and relocating to be an easy affair you are completely wrong. Apart from being hectic, relocation is also expensive and time consuming. Has your company asked you to relocate to or within London? If yes, you don’t need to worry about packing and moving your furniture. Furniture rental London can be of great help to you in this case.

Furniture rental London offers a lot of advantages for your relocation needs. The first and foremost advantage is that you don’t have to sit the whole day and pack all your furniture all by yourself for your relocation needs. Even though if you plan to hire the services of a relocation company for your moving needs, it is true that you don’t have to pack all by yourself; the company will do all these things but in lieu of that they will charge you hefty amounts. However, with hiring furniture in London you don’t have to pay such heft amounts. Then again, with hiring furniture in London you don’t have to worry much about your furniture reaching the destination safely, securely and on time. Relocating is undoubtedly a hassle but you can definitely make it hassle free by using your intelligence.

There are also many people who think of buying yet another set of furniture for their homes when they relocate from one place to the other. To be very true, this is also not a wise idea. Purchasing furniture in London would cost you much. The option of furniture rental London is best in such cases. This option makes life more comfortable, easy and smooth.

Furniture rental London has become increasingly popular among social high-flyers of the world. You can find a number of companies in London that offer furniture on rent to their potential customers. These companies really makes life easier and smooth. They in fact offer furniture packages for hire purposes. What does this mean? This means you simply do not need to worry about co-ordinating your lounge, bedroom, dining room or any other room because everything will be done for you by them. There are different styles of furniture available for hire purposes. They range from traditional to modern designs.

Now the question you may ask is how to get in touch with such furniture rental companies in London. Internet is the best place for you. You just need to browse furniture hire London to get several reputed and reliable companies providing high quality furniture for your home, office and garden at an affordable pricing.

If you are looking out for furniture rental London, Emblem Furniture must be your choice. Furniture packages at http://emblemfurniture.co.uk suits a range of tastes and budgets. This company is considered as one of the leading furniture rental companies in UK.

Creative Innovation

How creative is your innovation “process”?

Think about it? Is your innovation process highly prescriptive or very organic?

Is your innovation pipeline delivering a balanced portfolio of projects
and products or is it skewed to being incremental or hedging on high
risk disruptive innovation?

With all of the capability to
connect and communicate with other people and data, creating a balanced
and fruitful innovation ecosystem in today’s world has been made easier,
wouldn’t you agree? Or maybe not!

There are several issues that
we need to acknowledge, which are spoken privately but not always
openly discussed as you will see why. There are also two strategies that
we need to embrace, understand and implement.

Innovation Issues

Innovation is about being creative, creating that new “thing” that nobody else has thought of and adds value.

Below are some of the common innovation issues in the form of barriers
and constraints that I have come across whilst working in various
sectors such as the construction, pharmaceutical and biotech industry,
albeit with varying degrees. Think about how many of these you have
experienced within your organisation.

Standardisation – you are
working in a business and a world where you have to conform to
procedures, policies, legal requirements, so much so that creativity is
virtually non existent

Linearity – from standardisation you have
business processes, work flows, whereby you believe if you follow the
process you will get the right results. I believe it was Einstein who
said Insanity: “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting
different results.” There is a time when you need to go off-piste.

Diversity – within your business and organisation you will have a set
number of people with certain skill sets, training and knowledge based
on what you believe to be correct. There are over 7 Billion people in
the world and I would bet that there is someone, somewhere who is not in
your organisationthat has the block-buster idea or know how to develop a
transformation and disruptive innovative solution.

Passion –
how passionate are you and the people within your organisation about
your work, how it contributes to creating and developing new products
and services. Are you high performing organisation?

Creativity -
do you promote continual learning and development through dynamic
collaboration across your business and with outside organisations that
can help you to think creatively?

Visualisation – having
visibility of your innovation pipeline, that can be shared with anyone
and supports divergent thinking is part of creativity.

Poor
decision making – you are constantly being bombarded with data,
requests, distractions that it is becoming more difficult for your to
make informed decisions and is taking longer to make.

Fear
culture – fear of being wrong, getting a negative result and sharing it
because of what people might think of you or how it will affect your
career to get to the “top”.

You will notice in most of the items
above there are only one or two points that are system and technology
related while the others relate to people – you and me. And yet what I
have discovered is that businesses will typically focus on the
“tangible” assets such as the business processes, systems, equipment and
not on the “intangible” assets, which include people, the organisation
and knowledge (including data and information) that contains the highest
part of an organisations value and innovation capability.

Why is that?

Probably because processes and systems are easier to understand and
therefore easier to optimise. But are you optimising the right part of
your organisation?

People working collaboratively

I
recently attended a presentation to listen to the person who led the
engineering and construction delivery of the London 2012 Olympic Park.
It was truly amazing how leadership where able to pull so many people
together, deliver innovative designs and construction solutions and
still meet and sometimes exceed the key milestones and metrics that were
set, by working together as a team – a very big and diversified team.

The other key attribute that the presenter identified was clarity.
There was clear visibility of what the objectives where, how they were
going to do it, roles and responsibilities.

There were several
main points to the successful delivery of the London 2012 Olympic Park
but two in particualr resonated with me.

Collaboration – people working together to deliver an agreed outcome

Visualisation – the use of integrated visualisation tools such as BIM so everyone understood. Total clarity.

Helping people to collaborate with clear visibility can support and enhance your innovation capability.

Creative Innovation

Regarding the issues listed above I have considered their effect on
creative innovation and how collaboration and visualisation could
faciliate change and improvement.

Standardisation

If you
work in a highly regulated industry you will veer to the safe, low risk
position and more often or not you are driven there out of fear. Fear
of getting it wrong can lead to very serious consequences such as a
safety issue. This standardisation is further endorsed by people in your
organisation who make sure you follow the linear process so that you do
not step off the “proven path”.

This is further complicated
when you have other people trying to create something new and are
continually trying to step off the proven path. Both are working
separately and to a degree, in opposite directions. But isn’t amazing.
When a mistake is made or something does go wrong there is great
learning. When these groups gather to analyse and work out
collaboratively what went wrong, innovative solutions are created.

It takes an issue, for people to react and come together. What if you
were to “fail” in a controlled way – fail quickly, continously, learn
quickly and do it cheaply.

Celebrate that failure as a new
learning and do it as a group rather than specific departments or
individuals. What would that do to help increase your innovation
capability?

Measuring people

People work differently;
they have different skills and capabilities for learning and being
creative. When in a group do you consider their performance from that
perspective or do you revert to the dreaded Personal Development Plan
and measure them individually. You can have fantastic individuals but
unless they are team players, team collaboration will be low and will
stunt your innovation and growth. Look at any team sport and who are the
winners.

Aesthetic collaboration

Is your organisation
and people being bombarded with data, information, emails – demands for
immediate answers and responses? You probably have emails for example
that you do not even bother to look at – you have become anesthetised to
this communication. Similarly, if your innovation follows a linear,
prescriptive process and is a continuum of targets and milestones,
following procedures religiously, completing work that you know to be of
no innovative value, but carry on for fear of non-compliance, you have
an anesthetised process.

You need to create a culture and
environment for aesthetic collaboration by developing a visual and
social process that captures ideas through social critiquing,
communication – collaboration acts as a catalyst for transformational
innovation. This creates a “lens” for you to focus on. This is when your
senses are at their peak and will help you and your colleagues become
more creative such that you gain insights and ideas that create new
value for your organisation and supports improved and quick decision
making.

Key to aesthetic collaboration is to be more visual and
have the ability to visually collaborate (socialise) with a diversity of
people both internally and externally. Having this unfamiliarity of
people and uncertainty of not knowing what will be said, what divergent
questioning, thinking and answering will occur creates a high degree of
excitement, alertness and focus. It is genetically built into us. I am
sure you have experienced this haven’t you?

Visualisation

To support aesthetic collaborations the ideasneed to be dynamic and
interactive. Typically you will capture these onto spreadsheets for
analysis, develop a presentation to visualise and email it to
communicate to other people. Sounds familiar?

You only have to
look at the use of BIM (Building Information Management) within the
engineering industry and the positive effect it has including an
increase in innovation. Being able to visualise a complicated “boring”
drawing into a 3D, fully rendered visualisation of what a building will
look like allows a diversity of people to interact, create ideas and
solutions that the engineer would never think of.

This I
remember vividly when reviewing hospital bedrooms with nurses during
their coffee break using visualisation to walk “virtually” through and
see the wards that they would be working in. There was a long list of
design points that us engineers just did not even think about. This
co-creation was a new experience and developed a passion within the team
to succeed.

Creative Innovation

I hope this has helped
you to think how you can develop a creative innovation culture within
your organisation using collaboration and visualisation as potential
catalysts for change and creative innovation.

Is Automated Trading Realistic for the Individual Trader

As an individual professional trader you have some fantastic advantages in the markets over institutional traders and long term investors; however you also have a number of areas where the odds are stacked against you. Two of the major stumbling blocks have been budget restrictions and limited resources.

The large institutional traders have huge budgets for research and development as well as programming and technology. Retail traders are subject to the limitations of their own time and ability. As a retail trader you rely on your own ability to trade error free and are hindered by your time restraints. You don’t have the luxury of handing over your positions to your Hong Kong or London trading desks when you head off to bed. In order to succeed at trading you need to focus on your advantages and minimise the weak areas. One of the best ways of minimising the weaknesses faced by an individual trader is to incorporate automated trading into your strategy to eliminate most of the problem areas faced by independent traders.

Automated trading systems were first developed and used by large institutional market participants but with the development of advanced trading platforms available to individual traders, the world of automated trading strategies is now open to the retail trader allowing him or her to compete on an equal footing with the large banks and institutions.

Electronic trading platforms such as Ninjatrader and Metatrader, available to the retail trader to trade foreign exchange via their broker of choice, has revolutionised trading for individuals. These programs allow end users to write their own automated trading plans and Forex trading systems. You can automate trading in very much the same way as the institutional traders have been doing for some time to gain an edge over the market.

These platforms have proprietary scripting languages, which enable individual traders to develop their own scripts, indicators, money management systems and ultimately automated trading systems. Due to the fact that these languages are open source there is a large community of developers sharing systems, ideas and expert advisors with other individual traders. This sharing of ideas, research, knowledge and coding allows traders to learn and improve their trading results.

However, this still left the retail trader with the need to learn a programming language and development skills which takes many hours of learning as well as a process of trial and error. Costly errors could be made in the process especially if you are not an experienced programmer to start with. With the advances in trading software the process of developing an automated trading plan for those not experienced in programming has become significantly more user friendly. The building of your own system is also well support through modern software trading programs by allowing us to fully adjust and backtest our system before running it in a live account.

Automated trading on the Futures or Forex market is the process of running a computer derived program through your preferred trading software platform. You as the individual trader use the in-built wizards to set your trading system rules and the software will automatically execute your plan day and night as if you were sitting in front of your screens constantly. The key advantages of this are numerous.

Your trading plan running automatically through your trading software does not need to sleep and does not make mistakes. So you have 24 hours of error free, stress free trading. Its a dream come true for retail traders who can now compete on a level playing field.

Car Park Investment Or Car Parking Investment-a Beneficial Investment

Car Park Investment or Car Parking Investment is now considered a lucrative and profit-earning investment. With the ever-growing increase in the number of roads that are plying on the road there has been an increasing demand in the amount of parking space for cars. The need for such space is growing every single day with the number of car owners increasing each day. Parking these cars has become a real headache and of utmost importance. Car Park Investment or Car Parking Investment has been the ideal solution to such problems.

Nowadays we can find a lot of people interested in investing in buying property for lending out space for Car Park Investment or Car Parking Investment. Such Car Park Investment or Car Parking Investment is made where there is a lot of population residing and in congested and commercial areas mostly around the centre of the city or hub. Investing in car parking lots around shopping malls are a great idea if you want to make the best profit out of leasing out such parking space. With the rise in the number of cars everyday the price of such parking space is getting costlier and selling like hot cakes.

Such Car Park Investment or Car Parking Investment is gaining tremendous popularity and response in countries like U.K, Dubai and U.S.A. Most of these car parking spaces are leased out on a long term basis within a commercial building or complex. Car Park Investment or Car Parking Investment is a good way of getting a consistent and monthly flow of income rate. According to a recent survey and poll, it has been found that the drivers in London followed by the drivers in Birmingham, Glasgow and New Castle spending the maximum amount of time looking and hunting for car parking space.

Car Park Investment or Car Parking Investment has been a boon in disguise for those owning cars because parking car is really a struggle and troubles-some job in crowded places. Again if the Car Park Investment or Car Parking Investment is made in a location which is easy to access and commute and it can reap great benefits for the same reason. So while investing in space to be rented out for car parking make sure that is located as such that car owners can drive in easily without the distance and space being a hindrance.

Car Park Investment or Car Parking Investment is diversified property investment as we can find more and more people taking the risk of Car Park Investment or Car Parking Investment. Countries like New Zealand and Australia are also showing great interest in making such investments. This goes to prove that it is a really booming business venture which can actually help you in earning the maximum profit and gain. There is no doubt in the fact that it will entail you to reach newer heights in your business making goals.

How Undeveloped Land Is A Better Investment Diversification Strategy

Any investment diversification strategy should involve undeveloped land.

Dont trust the national numbers on housing values as the final word on all real estate investment. Regional differences are significant and opportunities abound.

The conundrum for investors who are intrigued with UK land and real estate is, with a growing population and so little building in the past decade, why arent more houses being built?

After all, Census 2011 showed a growth rate of about 7 per cent since 2001, a much healthier addition of population than most countries found in the Eurozone. England and Wales in particular are a strong draw for immigration, and the birth rate has remained relatively strong even through the financial recession of the past six years. Exacerbating this further, pensioners are living longer and in greater health, keeping granny from moving out of her granny flat.

Savills research offers some data and analysis that suggests some fundamental ways in which housing will be built in the years to come. It offers a different perspective to anyone involved in land development, as investment on UK strategic land and raw acreage is most adaptable to market needs before buildings are constructed.

Specifically, the firm offers the following data points:

Regional differences mask home prices Overall, homes in Britain have seen an average value increase of 6.4 per cent since 2007. Which is all well and good, except it masks the differences between North and South: in the South East and London, increases in home values are in the ballpark of 10 to 20 per cent. In the North of the country, values have fallen. This is not to say a land investment in those areas will not make sense, as real estate is sometimes tied to hyper-local factors. But the larger point is that in London and the South East, better opportunities are likely to be found.

Generation rental Of greater significance is the shifting of ownership to rental for many middle class families. Savills reports the value of Britains private rented stock has risen by 42 per cent over the past five years and an extraordinary 250 per cent in the past ten years. The 4.8 million private homes that are rented today represent 17 per cent of all dwellings, when just ten years ago to-let housing was a mere 10 percent of the national inventory. What has caused this? Increasingly, working families are unable to afford the necessary deposits required for purchase, and tighter lending standards by banks also make it more difficult to get mortgages.

Best opportunities for those with cash to invest All those rental homes still need to be built, begging the question: Who will finance them? According to the director of Savills research, There is now a real opportunity for investors with cash, particularly those ready to invest for income, because capital value growth will be muted over the mid term.

Real estate developers are on the front lines, constructing the right buildings for the market. But before they can do that, land investment companies identify parcels nearest to where building of one type or another should take place. This often is where employment is growing, or for any other reason the population is sufficient to fill new housing. Strategic land development will usually involve property zoned for agriculture or commercial or industrial purposes which local planning commissions will identify as more appropriate for residences, factoring for local economic conditions and growth opportunities.

Individuals who want to participate in land development and investing in real asset classes should first work with a qualified, independent financial advisor to be certain they are working with legitimate players and that the investment fits their overall financial goals.

Do I Need An Abpi Qualification Necessary For A Veterinary Sales Job

The ABPI (Association of British Pharmaceutical Industry) was founded in London, England in 1891 and was traditionally known as “The Drug Club”. The headquarters for this company is located in London, England, where the organization’s primary function is to act as an association for the pharmaceutical trade for companies in the United Kingdom producing medicines for humans. Its secondary task is to provide complimentary resources, such as pamphlets, to schools in the United Kingdom in order to facilitate and promote science and its applications in the industry. These pamphlets are aimed at providing information to patients and healthcare professionals, in addition to providing information about associated careers.

In the first three to six months in the United Kingdom, the new sales person will typically spend time learning their territory, the customer, and the product. Medical Sales Representatives are also required to pass the ABPI within two years of accepting a job as a Medical Sales Representative. After two yearsare over, the representative will be unable to work in their profession without this qualification. Traditionally, the hiring company will cover the expenses associated with qualifying for the examination and will offer an option for eLearning or distance learning at home.

Veterinary Sales positions are highly competitive due to the specialized nature of customers that are served by the Veterinary Sales Representative. While existing Medical Sales Representatives and Pharmaceutical Sales Representatives are often considered for these positions, because of their ability to cope with complex terminology and concepts within the medical field, veterinary nurses and/or other animal-based educated individuals are preferred. Candidates with the latter qualifications should typically possess a 2.2 grade point average or above in their course of study.

As with any other Medical Sales position, Veterinary Sales Representatives will be required to visit customers every day; set goals and then meet or exceed those goals; be persuasive and encourage interaction with the customer; be knowledgeable, organized, plan ahead, and obtain a high degree of autonomy. Veterinary Sales Representatives should possess a certain level of proficiency to quickly identify the needs or key services of the veterinarian’s practice, so the representative can therefore select the products most beneficial for the client. One of the benefits to Veterinary Sales over Medical Sales is that it’s typically easier to obtain an appointment with a veterinarian, than it is with a physician due to sheer volume of human patients seen over animals.

Since ABPI, by definition, is associated with medication for humans, Veterinary Sales Representatives are expected to have a high degree of competence and expertise in their industry, but there are no ABPI code requirements or constraints. The ABPI qualification would be deemed informative and useful for background as some of the information would be transferable. However, the qualification would not be aimed toward veterinarian medicines. Many Veterinary Sales Representatives may already possess the qualification from a previous Medical Sales Position or a Pharmaceutical Sales Position. However, new Veterinary Sales Representatives may secure the qualification and membership in the association; however, for networking, edification, and other reasons, such as their peers have the qualification.