New Perspectives in Science Education

In this Paper, I will demonstrate a perfect one day innovation business game for pupils or young students. The goals of the game are:

To learn how a systematic innovation process work

1.     To become aware of what it means to innovate

2.     Finally – to understand that innovation can be easy and funny

Based on a simple innovation process you will go to several steps. At the beginning of the process you will start from scatch (no ideas at all) and you will end with a business model.

The business game is useful for public ideas-awards and even for teaching innovation management.

A lot of junior business companies have grown out of this game.

Keywords: innovation process, Trendmapping, morphological matrix, 6-view screen, business-model

Step 0: Show, how does a simple innovation process work

Innovation management has strictly nothing to do with chaotic or unstructured work. On the contrary, innovation management always follows very specific procedures – also known as the so-called innovation process. This is presented in literature in a variety of different ways, but the principle is always very similar: The (very simplified) outline below aims to give you a rough overview of the steps taken during the innovation process.

Step 1: Beginning the Game: How to obtain search field(s)

In the innovation business game we prefer Trendmapping, based on the trenDNA from Darrell Mann. It is very funny to discuss, the most relevant trends for the business we want to innovate.

In a systematic way the participants reduce more than 160 customer trends to the most 15 relevant. Finally we will establish a trendmap and find loops and collectors, which are very important for our business. These trends are the searching field for generating ideas. Time needed: about 60 minutes

Step 2: A simple tool to generate ideas

In the 2^nd step I will show you a very efficient method to find new products or services with regard to the defined trends. Depending on the number of participants, you will get over 100 ideas in less than one hour.Time needed: about 60 minutes

Step 3: Tools for the concepts and deciding

The next tool depends on a generated product or service. In the case of a product the most useful toll would be a morphological matrix to get a few concepts how the product could be in a more detail. In case of a service, you will use the 6-view-screen, to analyse all customer’s needs. The tool is also suitable for product. However, it works perfectly for services…

Step 4: Tools for developing and realisation

The last step in the business game is, to transform the concept into a business-model using a checklist.

Steps: You have to define how to earn money, specify your customer, point out how to realise your performance, say which network and resources you need.

Step 5: End of the day

Finally, each group has to present the business-model. A jury should choose the best idea…