Sumários

Innovation Strategy pt.1

17 Novembro 2025, 09:30 • Gonçalo Nuno Alfredo Cardeal

S5 – Innovation Strategy

Framed innovation strategy as setting direction—where to play/how to win—and aligning choices with core competencies and market structure.  


Covered Assessing the Firm’s Current Position:

  • External analysis (Five Forces): rivalry, entry barriers, supplier/buyer power, substitutes; applied with a shared e-scooters (Lisbon) flash case and discussed complements/externalities.  

  • Stakeholders & Internal analysis: stakeholder map and Porter’s value chain (primary/support activities) with a software-company adaptation.  


Defined and tested Core Competencies:

  • What they are, how to test them (differentiation, customer value, breadth, inimitability), and how competencies → core products → end products.  


Introduced Strategic Intent:

  • Ambitious long-term aim that stretches capabilities; gap view from current to desired position and link to Balanced Scorecard measures.  


Choosing Innovation Projects:

  • Quantitative: Development budget logic, NPV, IRR, and Real Options thinking.  

  • Qualitative: Screening questions across market/use/compatibility/distribution & pricing/capabilities/timing & cost; Pugh matrix & Q-sort; R&D portfolio mix and DEA.  


Group exercise:

  • Review interviews and assess the need for more information,

    Combine interviews with other forms of desktop research.

Adoption of Innovations

14 Novembro 2025, 09:30 • Gonçalo Nuno Alfredo Cardeal

S4 – Adoption of Innovations

Explained why adoption matters: value appears with use; invention ≠ impact; impact ≈ Invention × Adoption × Retention.

Introduced the diffusion of innovations curve and adopter categories (innovators, early adopters, early/late majority, laggards).

Discussed “crossing the chasm”: the gap between early adopters and the pragmatic majority; need to ship the whole product (core + complements, support, references).

Explored network externalities and complements: how installed base, standards, and partner ecosystems amplify value.

Reviewed S-curves & inflection points and learning/experience effects—when to be first vs. fast follower, and how timing links to complements and readiness.

Connected adoption concepts to project work: segment targeting, whole-product design, and launch timing.

Group exercise:

  • Continued the research phase.

Fuzzy Front End: Idea Management

10 Novembro 2025, 09:30 • Gonçalo Nuno Alfredo Cardeal

Reconnected Design Thinking with a quick recap of the Double Diamond and the HMW formula, reinforcing that well-framed problems drive better ideas (see slides on DT and HMW).  

Opened the second diamond (Ideate)—why it matters and how to do it well:

  • Mindsets for creativity: Challenge assumptions, connect, disrupt, flip; dream, experiment, spot patterns, stay curious.

  • Ground rules (IDEO): defer judgment, encourage wild ideas, build on others, stay on topic, be visual.

Practiced ideation techniques:

  • Brainstorming (fast, judgment-free), Silent Brainstorming, Brainwriting, Worst Possible Idea, and SCAMPERto systematically stretch the idea space.

Covered managing/selecting ideas:

  • Criteria-based scoring, dot voting, impact–effort matrix, and simple concept scorecards to move from many options to few testable candidates.

Covered prototyping & testing as learning (low-fidelity first; test assumptions, not polish).

Group exercise

  • Began the research phase for projects: drew stakeholder maps, chose a research methodology (interviews, desk research, netnography, etc.), and started defining who to interview with draft scripts.  

The Fuzzy Front End: Creativity

7 Novembro 2025, 09:30 • Gonçalo Nuno Alfredo Cardeal

S2 – How to Structure Creativity in Innovation: Design Thinking Process

  • Defined why creativity matters in innovation and framed it as a repeatable, structured process, not random inspiration.

  • Introduced the Design Thinking process, focusing on the first stages:

    • Empathize – understanding users, contexts, pains.

    • Define – synthesizing observations into clear problem areas.

    • Ending at drafting initial “How Might We…?” statements (HMW); 

  • Clarified expectations for the Group Project and connected it to Design Thinking.

  • Group exercise:

    • Formed final teams (4–5 students).

    • Selected a project theme and sector/field.

    • Conducted an initial sector scan to identify existing innovations, key players, and early opportunity areas that will feed into deeper research.

Introduction - Types and Drivers of Innovation

3 Novembro 2025, 09:30 • Gonçalo Nuno Alfredo Cardeal

S1 – Introduction & Types/Drivers of Innovation 

  • Present course goals, assessment, and group project.

  • Clarify what innovation is, and key dimensions: incremental vs. radical, competence-enhancing vs. destroying, modular vs. architectural, product/process/service/business model.

  • Map sources of innovation: individuals, users, firms, startups, universities, suppliers, open-source, government.

  • Group exercise: pick a sector, list innovations, classify them, and identify main sources & megatrends.

  • Takeaway: innovation follows patterns. Knowing them is the foundation for managing it strategically.