We all know that innovation is key to long-term business survival and success, and yet most companies don't proactively manage it. You can quickly assess your own level of "innovation management maturity" by answering the following questions:
Have you clearly and precisely articulated the type of innovation that you seek and shared that information with your partners and employees?
Have you defined the exact criteria you would use to evaluate competing proposals for innovation?
Do you have a clearly defined process for harvesting, evaluating, developing, and implementing innovative ideas?
Are employee roles and responsibilities for innovation defined?
Do you have a budget for innovation, or at least a general sense of what you could/would spend if the right idea came along?
If your answer to most of these questions is, "Not really," then you probably experience some of the following symptoms:
Your team has lots of ideas, but they never seem to go anywhere; OR, you don't have any ideas.
You have a very specific vision for your next product line / revenue stream, but you can't get your partners to commit.
When one of your employee's approaches you with a "great idea," you don't really know how to respond and feel a vague anxiety that you haven't created an organization that inspires and rewards creativity and initiative.
It feels like all the productive thinking about the company's strategy and growth is done by you or a handful of senior leaders.
Revenue growth is tapering, flat, or declining.
Your very best employees are disengaging or moving on to other other jobs.
Your future feels limited.
If you suffer from these symptoms, the good news is that that LaunchPath offers a simple, practical, affordable solution that will allow you to quickly and effectively manage innovation in a manner that will unlock your firm's full potential. Here's how.
The Solution
There are four basic ways that we help our clients manage innovation more successfully.
Define the Plan - The quickest, cheapest, and highest impact thing that we can do for you is simply help you define your firm's innovation program. Depending on your situation, this can be done for as little as $2,500 and will immediately provide an answer to all the uncomfortable questions asked above.
Train Employees - We provide day-long employee training sessions for as little as $250 per employee that will dramatically improve your team's understanding of your business and how to productively generate and evaluate ideas for improving and/or expanding your business.
Program Manage Your Innovation Program - Once you have an innovation program, you need someone to manage it. If you don't have those resources internally, we provide a great service at an attractive price point.
Provide "Outsourced VP of Business Development" - If you are interested in developing brand new products/services and don't have the executive bandwidth to support the project, I am available as an Outsourced VP of Business Development to provide executive guidance and support to the project. There have been breakthrough insights over the past 10 years on how to innovate new product lines with much lower cost and risk. I am an expert in this "Lean Startup" process and can train, guide, and support your team to make sure your projects get their best chance at success.
Why LaunchPath Is the Right Partner
First, let me just say that I make you a personal guarantee that I will never waste your time.
I have already experienced significant business success through my first company, a multi-million dollar technology firm named Telogical Systems, and have Co-Founded LaunchPath because business innovation is a personal point of passion. I may not be able to help you, but I can absolutely promise you will enjoy the conversation.
In terms of my specific credentials, here's what I have to offer:
I have developed my first company, Telogical Systems, from a boot-strapped startup to an 85+ employee, highly profitable technology company.
I have trained over 50 aspiring, high-impact entrepreneurs in the Charleston region via my Entrepreneur Boot Camp program.
I created LaunchPath out of the process that I will share with you and went from a literal blank sheet of paper to our first client in 84 days.
Having launched on July 16th of this year, we currently only have two clients. One is a ~ $2M/Yr provider of various information and consulting services; the other is a ~$150M/Yr government contractor. The feedback has been very positive from both of those engagements and I would be happy to put you in touch with them as references.
Thank you again for your interest. I hope you find the information I shared above helpful and interesting, and that you will be reaching back soon to schedule that meeting. I really look forward to getting to know you better.
Sincerely,
Gray
