Ideation Practice

The above figure is from Christensen's Seeing What's Next. I've annotated the underlying figure to show the role of ontology on the various markets, and the value of language differentiation for continuous innovation in the same market, discontinuous innovation in the same market, and discountinuous innovation in different markets. Conceptualization and differentiation are a matter of words. These words create markets and profits.

The meaning of words amounts to more than their definitions. The meaning is tied to an ontology, which philosophers define as sortables. Taxonomies are more familiar. Taxonomies are about classes of things and the relations between those things. Ontologies are about measures and metrics. The word goverment has two connotations: goverment is good, and goverment is evil. The difference between these connotations is one of what is being perceived, sensed, or mesured--the sortables. Different philosphical frames or cultures have at their origin ontological differences. Cultures in particular exhibit ontological barriers that make them a force for exclusion.

Radical innovations both succeed or fail from the force of these ontological barriers. Getting across the geography of ontological barriers is difficult and involves what Geoffrey Moore characterized as markets that are serial and at the same time mutually exclusive. Conquering the terrain is left to the making and delivery of words. Ultimately, the ontological distance and mutual exclusion of the markets nested in the ontological geography protect the vendor, while they tune up their words and explore the conceptual and semantic space. That exploration, that failure, that learning opportunity makes the vendors strong. That geography keeps the vendor under the radar.

Continuous innovation is more straightforward. Listen to the customer. Do what they say. Depreciate features as needed. Replace them with the new features that your lead customer wants. Be fast. Be ahead. Have the steeper S-curve. Explain your differentiation. But, consider yourself lucky, because you don't need to deal with ontological differences. You should be one with your customers. You should be speaking the same language. Still, the value of your product will depend on being able to explain its differences in a way that doesn't give rise to risk, or makes you just like the other guy.

Creating a market for a radical innovation forces us to be language planners, to put words to conceptualizations, to use old words in new ways, to create new connotations that connect different ontologies to familiar words, and to fight a lexical war over the meaning of those words through our press releases and press mentions. The meaning of a buzz word is usually all over the map, but when that word was birthed, it meant one very clear thing. It was one vendor's verbalization of their differentiation, of their conceptualization. Competitors redefined the soon to be buzz word, over time, until it came to lose all of its value in the marketplace, and in the competing vendor's marking collateral. Buzz words appreciate and later depreciate.

Find the right words and you will exceed your dreams. Find the wrong words and you will struggle in the tarpits. The markets wait impatiently for the right words.