Research Paper on:
Business and Innovations

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
employees. 3. Environmental protection (Zahra, 1999, p. 36). The only way to remain competitive is to foster innovations within the company. This requires the continuing development of employees and  it requires risk-taking. Innovation cannot be simply left to chance; companies must set the stage and foster entrepreneurial thinking, creativity and initiative among employees. In other words, innovations must be  managed. There are four phases in the innovation process: 1. Strategy development: Success requires a written plan with goals and identification of the companys capabilities. Cross-functional teams need to be  established. They work to identify the essential characteristics of the ideal new product line. The team also delineates the parameters and goals that will define success. 2. Ideation: The  question to answer is: How can the company come up with ideal new product development opportunities--perfect new product concepts to drive the future growth of your business? Another question to  answer is what is the company really good at? What is the market? Based on these answers, the group brainstorms new product ideas. 3. Evaluation: The group must then  evaluate the list of ideas that have been generated. There needs to be a list of criteria any new product must meet. Each idea is measured against the list of  criteria. A variety of strategies can then be used to narrow the list down to the items that will be selected for product development. 4. Implementation: The market is  then explored to determine which of the selected products would have a large enough market to pursue the manufacture of the product. The ones that have the market are the  new products that will be designed and manufactured (Buggie, 2001, p. 36). The foregoing is a very brief outline of how to foster and manage innovation within a company. It