What it Takes to Sustain an Innovative Culture

The Importance of Innovation for Business Success

 Some feel that an innovative culture's sustainability is more about how the people at the lower level of the food chain. They say this because these are the ones that are initializing creativity. They come up with new ideas and ways of doing things. At this level is the foundation of innovation. Imagine if the video game companies' management team tried to create, design, produce, and promote all of the games themselves. Some think they would fail. Trip Hawkins, the founder of EA Sports, has more than six thousand developers spread out over twenty studios. These workers are the ones that are the real creators behind the scenes. Mr. Hawkins is the face of the company. If EA Sport, or any other leading companies in the industry, slowed or stopped being innovative, they do not believe they would be in business long. When complacency creeps in, high performance becomes mediocre. Quality and productive declines, and in some cases, companies become irrelevant. For them to avoid this, they must never stop being innovative. It is the leading edge of development that provides companies with staying power and longevity.

EA Sport has been around for thirty-eight years. It is an excellent example of a company that has consistently performed, maintained a high level of performance, and continually increased its product quality (A Northern Enterprise, n.d). Austin, Boston and Silicon Valley are innovative ecosystems because they have embraced the ideology of change. In their rights, these cities have come to grips with what it takes to make and keep them relevant in the tech world and are now considered tech giants. These cities have become hot spots for innovation, entrepreneurship, and economic growth. A partnership is another critical element in the development and stability of an innovative ecosystem. The idea of economic unity is causing cities such as Greenville, South Carolina, to grow exponentially.

The city has clinched the thought of maintaining significant and positive relationships with public and private agencies and organizations that will impact the city's interest positively. The process led to the revitalization of downtown Greenville and the commitment to growth and change has created a domino effect for the city and the surrounding counties. Companies like BMW have built a manufacturing company there. Michelin Tire has a facility located there also. They would be remiss if they did not mention the GSA Technology Council, who has held a steady footprint since 2002 (Sounds From The Past, n.d). Because of the commitment from this city's leadership, and the surrounding counties the following suit, South Carolina has become one of the more sought out areas for companies and organizations to claim stake. Companies have selected this location because they have the ingredients to become an innovative ecosystem if they are not already. The industry balance for economic development in varying business creates the influx and diversity of people to meet the different businesses' growing demand. The skill sets and education levels drive companies to penetrate those areas for emerging businesses. Many other cities follow this model and are making changes to become competitive enough to draw industry leaders to their cities.

Successful Examples of Innovative Ecosystems

Many proven factors qualify and have qualified cities as innovative ecosystems. Not all of them have kept up with the requirements to remain relevant. However, cities like Austin, Boston, Greenville, and Silicon Valley have shown that they are committed to the journey of continually innovating and not becoming irrelevant( Hotels en Riviera Maya, 2020). They have shown that change is inevitable, and that change is good when it is needed. Today it is needed. We have seen examples of what it takes to become and stay relevant. Those that are willing to stay are willing to change.

We know that data has become the new gold of the 21st century. Tech firm such as Apple, Google, Square, Pinterest hold so much data that on the United States population that tech firms are beginning to get backlash from the US government. The latest hot topic around tech has been about a Chinese company called tick-tock "The Trump administration alleges that Tok-Tok poses a national security concern because it gathers vast swaths of data from American users, which could be accessed by the Chinese Communist Party. Tok-Tok has denied those allegations. The company has said its data centers are located outside of China and that none of that data is subject to Chinese law." (Pham,2020). The Tech world is booming due to the influx of consumers and their strong balance sheets making investors confident in their abilities to outperform. These tech companies are changing the game and the culture of the workplace. While each company is desperately fighting to gain our attention so are the employers. "Much social and civic innovation is possible if the GAAF platform monopolies (Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook) are broken up or regulated appropriately".(Warren,2020) Therefore, brainstorming on innovative ways in the workplace has become more critical now than ever before. "Experts who were canvassed about the relationship between people’s technology use and democracy also expressed serious concerns about how things will unfold in the next decade." (Jackson,2020) I can't say I disagree with the experts in this case. Artificial intelligence is becoming more integrated into our daily lives whether we see it or not. "

The growing consensus that AI should benefit society at-large leads to calls to facilitate the adoption of AI systems to promote innovation and growth, help address global challenges, and boost jobs and skills development, while at the same time establishing appropriate safeguards to ensure these systems are transparent and explainable and respect human rights, democracy, culture, nondiscrimination, privacy and control, safety, and security".( Perset,2020) Employees and employers are starting to compete with great technology the innovative challenge is how will humans adjust or adapt to new AI technology. I am not sure of the answer to this question just like many experts trying to figure out that answer but “I do expect new social platforms to emerge that focus on privacy and ‘fake-free’ information, or at least they will claim to be so. Proving that to a jaded public will be a challenge."(Adams,2020) Small and large businesses will need to go back to basics such as showing humanistic characteristics, creating a family work culture, and forming those relationships with each other that will have an advantage on technology every time.

What Makes Austin, Boston, and Silicon Valley Stand Out?

What does it take to sustain an innovative culture?

Is there an appropriate time for an organization not to be innovative?

What makes Austin, Boston, and Silicon Valley innovative ecosystems?

What other geographic areas throughout the world do you consider to be innovative? Why

 So how can a regular business sustain innovation in its work culture amongst huge tech giants?

What is an innovation ecosystem.?

As I mentioned our world is changing and its changing fast. just like the industrial boom we are on the horizon of integrating our culture with technology. I do not believe that there is an appropriate time for a company to look into innovation I believe that the owners or the board members of a company should always look into innovative strategies to make their company better or give their company a better competitive edge. The saying keeping up with the Jones is a thing of the past with technology playing a major role in our lives we must surpass the Jones and be one step further than our competition. “Our technology continues to evolve at a growing rate, but our society, culture, and economy are not as quick to adapt. We’ll have to be careful that the benefits of AI for some do not further divide those who might not be able to afford the technology."(Sweeney.2020)

The two ways to increase economic output within an economy is to increase the number of inputs in the production process or think of new ways to get more output from the same number of inputs." (Schumpeter) This is exactly what the tech industry is doing and is continuing to do especially in areas like Silicon Valley and other areas like Boston and Austin. Innovative ecosystems can be found in every industry not only in the tech world, look at what the automotive industry is doing with Tesla and General Motors now looking into flying cars. We see innovation happening right now as COVID has forced many companies to start their small innovative ecosystem by creating solutions to challenges caused by the "The best innovations are created in response to specific, urgent, and sizeable problems. In some ways, the Covid-19 crisis has made our most urgent problems and their potential solutions more obvious. pandemic."(Schroeder,2020) Yes, there is innovation happening in London, Africa, and other parts of the world because of technology but if we considered the marco economy, we are approaching innovation in different industries besides tech.

References

Jackson, D. J. (2011).  National Science Foundation, 1(2). Schroeder,Dirk.July02,2020 “Turn Your Covid-19 Solution into a Viable Business” retrieved from https://hbr.org/2020/07/turn-your-covid-19-solution-into-a-viable-business Anderson, Janna and Rainie, Lee. June 15,2020” The INNOVATIONS THESE EXPERTS PREDICT BY 2030”.RETRIEVED FROM https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/14/tech/oracle-tiktok-us-china-intl-hnk/index.html Please write replies those students post each 375 words. Please provide accessible links for references.