The Dream Cafe: Lessons in the Art of Radical Innovation

EEXPERIMENTATION

Experimentation is at the heart of every great disruptive brand strategy. Insight can only ever tell you where an opportunity for innovation might exist; experiments are where you create opportunities and the site where the space for serendipity resides.

The classic approach to setting up an experiment – known as scientific method – involves the utilization of a strict protocol of testing and retesting a hypothesis. In this way, experiments become a means of proving a conclusion that has already been reached. The focus on achieving a self-fulfilling prophecy will sound familiar to anyone who has operated in the brand business. Perhaps it's got something to do with the fact that marketing tends to be taught like it's a science – but there is a clear tendency to reiterate the known in almost every industry. Holding onto the comfort blanket of old formulas can only ever provide temporary relief from the need to acknowledge the truth – that it's time to let go and begin to innovate.

Innovation can and does come from the application of scientific method. However, in A world where taste, need, values and definitions of function are constantly shifting, we need a more open approach – one that offers opportunity to not only discover but actually create the future of need.

Don't Wait for the Future, Because it Won't Wait for You

The radical and disruptive impact of the ...