Listen to your technology users – they have led the most transformative innovations in history

In 1971, the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET), which served as a precursor to the modern Internet, had about 1,000 users. the @banner It was a mysterious symbol. Then, engineer Ray Tomlinson He changed everything by creating a system for sending messages to other computers on the ARPANET, using the @ sign to indicate who to send each message to. Email was born.

One of the biggest inventions of the digital age wasn’t created by a company looking for a product to sell. Cooked by a user who has a problem to solve. Tomlinson He said It was not until nearly 25 years later, in 1993, that he fully realized the significance of his invention.

Users were also behind the invention dishwasher (A socialite looking to make dinner party clean-up easier), L phone (An engineer wanted to talk to his wife upstairs from his laboratory downstairs), L Plastic contact lenses (the eye doctor who is tired of wearing heavy, thick glasses) and even new technology companies like them Airbnb (The founders rented an air mattress in their living room to help with the rent on their San Francisco apartment.)

Users are a major source of disruptive innovation, yet they are often overlooked. We recently published an analysis of 60 cases of disruptive innovations in the world Journal of Product Innovation ManagementFrom LASIK surgery to electric power tools. Our goal was to understand where disruptive innovation originates. We were surprised to find that nearly half of the innovations we identified came from users, not producers.

Combining “knowing the need” and “knowing the solution”

Users have a unique, up-close view of the problem – and know where current solutions fall short. Existing technical experts and producers have a clearer sense of what potential solutions could look like, but they are nowhere near as needed. By combining “user knowledge” with their “solution knowledge,” companies can unleash a wealth of opportunities for growth and competitive advantage.

Disturbing thoughts B2C products and services often originate from individual consumers looking to meet their own needs. Disruptive innovation in B2B can come from professionals looking for new tools or systems to do their work more effectively. For example, physician John Gibbon and his wife Mary developed a heart-lung machine and used it to perform one of the first successful open-heart surgeries.

Our study It has been found that products that offer significantly new functionality are more likely to be developed by users and are often created at times when customer needs are changing rapidly. On the other hand, innovations with high technological novelty are more likely to be generated by producers who have the necessary technical expertise. These tend to emerge in moments of rapid technological change.

Our research calls into question current thinking about… Disruptive innovation. The narrative going back to entrepreneur Clayton Christensen has been that disruption comes from startups and other new market players, while larger companies generally lag behind. Users are seen as part of the problem. When your customers keep asking for the same thing over and over again, there’s not much room for innovation.

But our research shows that there is not just one model for innovative innovation, and users can be a source of ingenious ideas rather than a barrier. While companies often look to users for input on how to modify existing projects and innovate around the margins, we’ve found that they can also generate disruptive, game-changing innovations.

Tips for supporting disruptive innovation

So, how can your company highlight revolutionary innovations from users? First, create a culture of open innovation that values ​​insights from outside the organization. Although the technical geniuses in your R&D department are experts on how to build something new, they are not the sole authorities on what you should build. Our research suggests that it is especially important to look for user-generated disruptions in times when customer needs are changing rapidly.

Talk to your customers and create channels for dialogue and engagement. Most companies regularly survey users and conduct focus groups. But to identify truly revolutionary ideas, you have to go beyond reactions to existing products and dig deeper into unmet needs and pain points. Customer complaints also provide insight into how current solutions are failing. Artificial intelligence tools Facilitate monitoring online user communities and analyze customer comments, reviews and complaints.

Keep your pulse on social media and online user communities where people share innovative ways to adapt existing products and wish lists for new functionality. Users also congregate offline. At sporting events, you may find athletes creating custom solutions to meet unmet needs. Mountain bikes were invented in the 1970s by riders who assembled custom bikes, called clunkers, to explore the beautiful off-road landscape of California.

Focus on key users who are ahead of the trends. Lead users are often the first to see the growing consumer needs that will be prevalent in the future, and will benefit from new solutions. Research shows Lead user ideas are more commercially valuable than the average customer’s ideas. However, take their input with a grain of salt, as mainstream users sometimes appreciate specialized functionality that mainstream customers won’t care about. You can also look for key users embedded within your organization – for example, employees who work at a car company because they are car enthusiasts.

Finally, explore co-creation initiatives that foster direct collaboration with innovative users. For example, run a contest where customers submit ideas for new products or features, some of which may turn out to be really annoying. Or sponsor hackathons that bring together users with needs and technical experts to design solutions.

Companies are always looking for an innovation edge, but they often miss out on one of the most powerful sources of groundbreaking ideas – their users. By tapping into your broad range of existing users and customers, you can harness their creativity and expertise to drive truly disruptive innovation.

Christina Rasch is Professor of Digital Economics at Cohen toLogistics University In Germany. Tim Schweisforth is Professor of Organizational Design and Collaborative Engineering at Hamburg University of Technology In Germany.