Future Innovation Developments

Earth and Human-Centric Innovation

• Starts from the health of the planet and its ecosystems

• Treats humans as part of nature, not the center of it

• Starts from human needs, users and markets

• Treats nature as a resource and a constraint

Sustainable innovation

4 Sustainability pillars

1. Environmental protection, resource management

2. Social equity and community resilience

3. Economic viability and long-term stability

4. Institutional governance and policy support

Environmental and Social Sustainability

• Emphasizes the protection and management of natural resources to prevent degradation

• Involves reducing pollution, conserving biodiversity, and mitigating climate change through sustainable practices

• Organizations adopt strategies such as life cycle analysis, renewable energy integration, and waste reduction

• Focuses on equity, inclusiveness, and well-being of individuals and communities

• Organizations implement programs that enhance working conditions, engage with communities, and promote ethical practices

Economic Sustainability

• Emphasizes the need for long-term financial viability without depleting resources

• Aims for economic growth, employment opportunities, and fair distribution of wealth

• Integrating sustainability intro economic planning is necessary for stability and resilience

Institutional Sustainability

• Focuses on governance, policies, and mechanisms that support sustainable development

• Institutions set regulations and ensure compliance with sustainability initiatives

balanced score card

Sustainability balanced score card

Incremental Sustainable Innovations

Small, gradual changes to existing products or processes, such as improving energy efficiency or using recycled materials. Easier to implement but may not fully address larger sustainability challenges

Radical Sustainable Innovations

Transformative changes, such as creating entirely new technologies or business models. Examples include wind turbines or electric vehicles. While they tackle systemic change, they require significant investment and face more resistance

• Eco-innovation

Almost synonym of sustainable/environmental innovation.

• The environmental benefit is the necessary, defining feature, and economic and social goals come along with it.

Green innovation

Sub-set of eco-innovation, focuses on specific environmental improvements in products, processes, or services. Often driven by regulatory and market demands

Regenerative innovation

Innovation that goes beyond reducing harm, aiming to actively restore and replenish natural and social systems, creating net positive impact

Sustainable Business Innovation Models

• Align organizational strategies with environmental, social, and economic goals, aiming to create value for businesses, society, and the environment

• Embed sustainability goals into value creation, delivery, and capture

• Value proposition → Delivering value beyond economic gains. E.g., circular economy promotes resource efficiency and waste reduction

• Stakeholder collaboration → Multi-stakeholder engagement is central. Fosters shared responsibility among suppliers, customers and communities

• Resource optimization → Prioritizing efficient resource use and waste minimization. E.g., renewable energy adoption and recycling

• Innovative practices → Emphasizing innovation strategies, such as adopting product-service systems, which reduce environmental impact, while maintaining profitability

Circular Economy

• Closed loops → Materials remain within the production cycle through reuse, remanufacturing, or recycling

• Open loops → Materials or by-products are transferred between industries to reduce overall resource use

• Reuse → Extending product life via refillable packaging and repair systems

• Remanufacture → Restoring products to near-new conditions, vital in electronics and automative sectors

• Recycle → Transforming waste into raw materials to reduce dependence on virgin resources

Link with Best- HR Practices?

• Recruitment and Selection ⇒ Hire for environmental values and systems thinking, employer brand attracts candidates who care, screen for willingness to work across boundaries

• Training and Development ⇒ Environmental awareness and circular design skills, cross-functional training so engineers understand supply chain and end of life

• Performance Management ⇒ Add environmental and social targets to appraisal, measure team and long-term outcomes, not only individual short-term output

• Compensation and Rewards ⇒ Link bonuses to sustainability KPIs, recognize green ideas and green citizenship behavior, not only revenue

(Green) Branding

• Has a company ever released something that killed its own best product?

• Cannibalization →When a new product takes sales from its own existing products, instead of from competitors

• What about sustainability?

Green washing

a deceptive marketing or public relations practice where an organization makes false, exaggerated, or unsupported claims about the environmental benefits of its products, services, or goals

Social Innovation

• Creating and implementing novel ideas, products, services, or practices aimed at addressing unmet social needs - innovation for the greater good

• Prioritizes social well-being over economic gain

• Involves business, public and third sector organizations

• Examples of applications include poverty relief, health and welfare, arts, education

Inclusive Innovation

• Innovation processes that actively involve marginalized or underserved populations

• Addresses the needs of those often excluded from traditional innovation systems

• Is a €1,200 iPhone with excellent accessibility features inclusive innovation?

Frugal Innovation

• Reducing the complexity and cost of a good and its production

• Often associated with sustainability because it minimizes the use of resources (raw material, energy, fuel, water, waste, financial resources), it is more affordable, and accessible

• Enables enterprises to access low-income markets in developing countries

• Simplicity, creativity and agility - “Doing more with less”

• Ratan Tata wanted to create a market for lower-class families who could afford two-wheelers but not a car

• No radio, air conditioning, anti-lock brakes, airbags, power windows, airbags, remote locks, etc. were installed in a car

• The cheapest car in the world! ($2000)

Success Competencies of Frugal Innovation

• Affordability:

• Simplicity

• Resource of efficiency

• Scalability

• Durability

• Accessibility

• Sustainability

• Cultural fit

• Collaborative innovation

• Adaptability

Designing a Frugal Strategy: €10 table

Responsible Innovation

• Prioritizes the social, ethical, environmental and cultural impacts, along with financial ones

• Anticipate, reflect, include, respond

• Examples of “responsible/irresponsible” industries/products?

• The general view is that organizations, governments and the public must strive to follow a process that seeks to promote opportunities for science and innovation that are socially and
  environmentally desirable and undertaken in the public interest

Public and Non-profit Sector Innovation

• Innovations that create public value and address societal challenges

• Improving the efficiency, equity and effectiveness of public and non-profit organizations

• Service-dominant innovation focusing on societal value

• Complex stakeholder ecosystems and regulatory constraints

• Regulatory compliance

• Access to public funds, grants, and open data

• Community co-creation enhances stakeholder engagement

• Bureaucratic processes slow implementation speed

• Resource constraints limit innovation capacity

Types of PSI

Examples of PSI

Drivers of PSI

1. Societal, Economic & Political Pressures

   • Demands for transparency and fairness

   • Calls for equitable services

   • Budget pressure drives efficiency

   • Regulation shapes innovation priorities

2. Technology & Adoption

   • AI platforms boost service efficiency

   • Perceived usefulness drives acceptance

   • Readiness shapes technology adoption

3. Globalization & Diffusion

   • Cross-border networks share practices

   • Benchmarking drives policy learning

   • Transnational initiatives speed uptake

   • Collaboration spreads best practices

Sustainable innovation

each type serves at least one pillar, not necessarily all four

The Role of Uncertainty in Innovation

• Pressure compresses innovation cycle timelines

• Limited data fosters creative solutions

• Uncertainty increases organizational risk tolerance

• Flexibility improves resource allocation efficiency

• Chaos and Crisis AI-driven forecasting

• Automation and robotics

• Biotech and healthcare

• E-commerce, digital platforms

• Financial sector

Chaos in Innovation Management

• A state of unpredictability where small variations in initial conditions can lead to significant and often unforeseen outcomes

• Introduces long-term uncertainty, relevant to technological disruptions, economic shifts, and environmental challenges that create instability

• Small changes trigger big outcomes

• Systems show nonlinear complex behavior

• Bifurcation points cause system shifts

• Self-organization emerges amid unpredictability

Chaos in Organizational Settings

Real-world markets often exhibit volatile, nonlinear behavior, where minor disruptions can lead to significant and unexpected consequences

First actions for companies in chaos

• Return to cash-generating products: Prioritizing offerings that provide reliable income

• Short-term cost management: Cutting unnecessary costs and focusing on operational efficiency

• Measure and adjust: Companies track financial and market conditions for further investments

Strategies for directing chaos

• Balancing exploration and exploitation

• Adaptive planning and scenario analysis

• Simple rules for decision-making

• Leveraging feedback loops for innovation

• Self-organization and dynamic capability development

• Investing in strategic alliances and joint ventures

Crisis in Innovation Management

Sudden disruptions that demand immediate, high-stakes action, often reshaping industries and accelerating crisis-driven innovation by compressing timelines and forcing rapid adaptation and experimentation

Features of crisis-driven innovation

• Acting under extreme uncertainty and pressure

• Highly improvisational

• Unconventional collaborations

• Fast decision-making

Strategies for managing crises

• Rapid pivoting and crisis innovation

• Emergency response and resilience building

• Public-private collaboration

Common Barriers to Innovation

• Resource constraints

• Institutional rigidity

• Lack of coordination and collaboration

• Focus only on short-term survival

• Chaos and crises as sources of innovation

• Crises create urgency that bypasses traditional barriers

• Chaos adopts disruptive innovation breaking down existing systems

• Critical for both: the ability to reallocate resources dynamically

Chaos and crises as sources of innovation

Crises creates urgency that bypasses traditional barriers

Chaos adopts disruptive innovation breaking down existing systems

Critical for both: the ability to reallocate resources dynamically

• Organizations must embed adaptive capabilities into their long-term strategies

• Post crisis evaluations, knowledge-sharing platforms, and flexible governance structures

Innovation is expanding beyond profit

earth-centric approaches put planetary health at the core of strategy, not as an afterthought

Public and non-profit sector innovation creates societal value under unique constraints

regulation, bureaucracy, and complex stakeholder ecosystems

Social, inclusive, and frugal innovation each address different gaps

unmet social needs, excluded populations, and affordability (“doing more with less”)

Chaos and crisis are not only threats

they compress timelines, bypass barriers, and can trigger breakthrough innovation

Organizations should build adaptive capability before disruption hits