Research in the International Journal of Industrial and Systems Engineering, offers a new approach to evaluating and classifying innovative ideas within a company. The work introduces an ontology, a conceptual framework, for defining and measuring how radical a new idea is so that decision-makers within the company can assess its potential impact and push the company down a particular road rather than an alternative.
Earlier researchers have grappled with how to identify and evaluate radically new ideas with an innovating company. Obviously, it is impossible to test all possible ideas. Previous discussions often revolved around assessing the level of risk or waiting until the effects of an innovation could be quantified. However, these approaches have proven to be limited in their effectiveness. Objective probabilities are frequently unavailable for radical ideas, rendering risk assessment inadequate. Additionally, relying on retrospective assessment of outcomes does not aid decision-making in the early stages of idea selection.
Andrew N. Forde and Mark S. Fox of the Department of Industrial and Information Engineering at the University of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, have found a way to address the shortcomings of earlier approaches. They have a fresh perspective that treats radical ideas as uncertainties and then employs subjective probabilities in the process of making a decision about whether a given idea should be taken further. This approach acknowledges that different decision-makers may hold varying beliefs about the potential outcomes of an idea, making probabilistic assessments subjective.
“Idea evaluation and selection is a problem that takes place in the present. Implementing all ideas to determine the best one is impractical and it remains impossible to select ideas from the future; thus hindsight is not a viable decision-making tool,” the team writes.
The study aims to define what elements are essential to predict the future and evaluate an idea’s performance within it. Their ontology tackles the inherent complexity by encompassing fifteen distinct categories of innovation. It then formulates properties based on competency questions around the idea.
The research could have far-reaching implications for various industries. By establishing a common framework for evaluating and classifying innovative ideas, the team offers a solid approach to handling subjectivity among decision-makers. As organizations hope to extract the best value from their innovators to get them ahead in a wide rang of rapidly evolving markets, such research if applied appropriately could give them the tools they need.
Forde, A.N. and Fox, M.S. (2023) ‘An innovation ontology for idea forecasting and measurement’, Int. J. Industrial and Systems Engineering, Vol. 44, No. 2, pp.141–185.