Melatonin is the world’s largest producer of medical devices, thus it needs a steady inflow of ideas for innovation. The company has been doing this successfully using modern social networking tools, which help it receive ideas from across the globe. It has developed community pages dedicated to specific topics where global workforce can learn and share knowledge. This allows knowledge to flow smoothly across all levels and empowers everyone working in the company to come out with new ideas.

Intuition is not a reliable guide when it comes to evaluating the potential of ideas. According to Ronny Kohavi who is an architect at Microsoft’s Online Services division studies in the software industry have shown that when evaluated through controlled experiments less than 50% of such good-to-great ideas work. Therefore relying on intuition to judge the potential of any idea is a not advisable.

Source: Technology Review

Vijay Govindarajan, an author and professor of international business at the Tuck School of Business shares insightful, thought provoking and inspiring opinions on the need to dream big (it fosters innovation); the importance of failure (he calls them knowledge building exercises); the need to develop employees as entrepreneurs (to attract and keep the smartest people); and to push the boundaries of innovation by going beyond your traditional costumer base.

Source: Inc

Tyson Toussant and Tim Coombs spent six years developing, a more durable substitute for canvas made from recycled plastic, they called it Bionic Yarn. Here they narrate how they went about turning into a brand.

Source: Forbes

All of us operate from our personal perspectives, which include prejudices and other self-limiting beliefs, even people who are very successful. But how are some people consistently able to stay on the cutting edge, people like Steve Jobs, Warren Buffett and Oprah Winfrey. The answer may lie in that their unique perspectives are fueled by many things, including an open-minded outlook towards life, the world and work; curiosity, and a high level of confidence, and determination. They may be risk-takers, but what’s more important to ascertain is how they view risks.

Innovation is the magic word, if are not innovating your rivals will, and get an edge over
you. This article looks at some ideas like contestification, the influence of touch screen on content,
WWWabs, digital coupons and social media based gaming all of which are poised to make remarkable changes in how businesses are commonly conducted in 2011 and beyond.

Source: HBR

Where most mariners see danger Ron Stamp sees opportunity. Icebergs have fascinated this native Newfoundlander since childhood. As a young man he started seeing them as a source of profit and has spent most of the last 2 decades trying to transform his vision into reality. He has tried iceberg vodka and iceberg beer with limited success and his latest foray is gourmet water.
Source: LA Times

Innovation is the current corporate mantra, and there’s no doubt that when done right it can create wonders. But innovation is not required in every business especially when things are as good as they should be. This article describes three businesses whose owners have always tried to keep things as they have always been, and continue to reap profits from this strategy.

Source: Forbes

Dairy farming is growing by leaps and bounds in China, which also means that this industry has also become one of the major sources of greenhouse gas emissions. However Huishan Dairy, one of the biggest of its kind in China, has put together a win-win solution to this problem. It will be installing a system that would generate electricity from methane gas collected from fermenting cow manure. Apart from generating electricity, this strategy will prevent methane from reaching the atmosphere, produce organic fertilizer which is safer than raw manure and also reduce waste and odor.