🟨 The story behind a little piece of paper: Post-its
Today we’re going to tell you the story behind this little piece of paper.
Arthur was working at 3M developing a strong adhesive for the aerospace industry.
In the process, he accidentally created a weak adhesive.
This new material had two interesting characteristics:
When stuck to a surface, it could be removed without leaving any residue
And it could be reused several times
While not helpful for his aerospace project, Arthur got support from management to use his creation. He did some prototypes and went on to present his idea to all the departments inside the company. After some time, another 3M employee was frustrated that the bookmarks would fall from inside his books and realized he needed a bookmark that would stick and could be removed without damaging the pages. He teamed up with Arthur, and this is how Post-it notes were born.
The story behind this little piece of paper
What was an initial failure was transformed into a profitable business opportunity. Post-its now generate over $1 billion annually and can be found anywhere in the world.
This story is a great example that shows innovation can come from the inside.
But what do we need for innovation to happen? We need technology, people, and culture. Just as we saw in the 3M story:
They had the time and the resources to create this product
They worked in multidisciplinary teams
Had the encouragement from management to find a use for this creation
Companies can innovate internally by developing new ideas through R&D Centers. Still, they can also open up their doors to external collaborators using open innovation models, meaning getting ideas from the outside.
And while this has proven to be successful, it's essential to realize that companies and the startup ecosystem have different cultures, and they need to learn how to work together.
A good example would be how NASA, a few years ago, tried getting external ideas from non-scientific people through an open innovation platform. This was incredibly appealing to outside collaborators, but scientists working at NASA resisted the idea because it meant that external people were solving the problems they were discovering. This is what is known as the “not invented here” syndrome, and it’s the rejection of new ideas that come from external sources.
According to our research, to avoid this from happening inside NASA or any other company, there are vital factors that help build innovation from inside:
Having a defined process or structure means clear steps to bring new ideas to reality.
A combination of different disciplines, meaning teams composed of members of diverse skills and experience.
Welcoming ideas coming from all levels and not only from upper management
Building effective communication channels
“If culture is the key to innovation, people are the key to create that culture”
Written by Laura Santana, Eduardo Lima, and Sebastián Sierra