fREEZONE INNOVATION

Creativity is the generation of ideas and innovation is the practical application of those ideas for business profits. From “idea-to-cash.”

What is INNOVATION?
It is not Brainstorming! It is not creativity! It is not right brain thinking! It is not R&D… It is an engineered and logical process! It uses the contributions of ordinary people. It needs a thinking structure and it needs to be facilitated!

What is FREEZONE INNOVATION™ ?

• It is an outcomes based and results driven process applied to innovation.
• It is a focused and logical 5 step approach that will take you from creativity (idea generation) to innovation (applied business solution.)
• It was designed by Dr Charles Kepner in collaboration with Dr. Matthys Fourie and is grounded in their extensive experience in critical thinking skills.
• It has been successfully applied to areas such as new product development, brand extensions, cost reduction, suggestion schemes, marketing strategies and process improvements.
• It is a process that empowers your organization with the strategic skill of innovative thinking.

The key lies in the ability to create an exciting and challenging task that will ignite the imagination and resourcefulness of the people involved. Setting the task can make the difference between a normal creative solution or a “breakthrough”, drastic new way of doing something.
The aim is to de-contaminate and de-emotionalise the problem situation through thorough analyses, creating the basis for new information to enter the situation and to spark new ideas in the process. This will serve as the springboard for innovative ideas. This is also the process to jump-start innovation by creating the ability to find “new associations, insights and conclusions” from known elements and facts.

Free Zone Thinking is the rational analytical skill of evaluating information in such a way that it will produce new ideas, insights, techniques and relationships to produce an innovative way of doing something.

Imagine having the following…

We know that Innovation is going to be the next “Business Wave” and that the difference between survival and demise is going to be whether an organization would be able to innovate and adapt to market forces. Imagine having the following in place throughout your organization:

• A process for Innovation that is known to everyone and that would harness ideas from everyone in the organization.
• A team of well trained in-house innovation facilitators and coaches that would ensure the proper analysis and investigation of every idea so not to lose any market opportunities.
• Well-trained individuals that would be able to facilitate regular company challenges.
• A company suggestion scheme that delivers 5-10% to your company’s bottom line.
• A Culture of “correcting or repairing” company problems to that of solving every company problem creatively thus delivering improved results every time.

The following are some success stories:

• A FMCG company used FreeZone to improve their market intelligence tool, which was an input for their product development system. The initial application was so successful it is being implemented into their process worldwide.
• A refining company, one of the largest oil from coal refineries in the world, is using FreeZone to continuously generate breakthrough methods for extracting oil from coal.
• A large Manufacturing Company used the process to find a way to extend the life of their fabric from the traditional 450 hours to over 800 hours. This breakthrough application is now being implemented across Europe.
• SME a company in the energy sector, is using FreeZone to find ways to get better buy-in from their project engineers for greater accountability. It was so successful that they went from major slippages in all 85 projects to meeting deadlines in at least 75% of their projects within 3 months.
• A chemical plant was on the verge of closing down. After one workshop they developed 5 new viable programs that ensured the plant not only did not close down but actually expanded. They changed from normal chemical processes to aerosol "filling spaces".
• A beverage/bottling company had never given much attention to their suggestion scheme. They used the FreeZone approach to harvest suggestions and empowered their employees to take a suggestion from the idea phase to that of a practical and profitable product(s). They had more cost savings success with this application than they had with the LEAN process.

“A seeming paradox of innovation is that most useful ideas originate from a structured process rather than random occurrences of creativity."

Gartner Group 2002, Focusing the Innovation Process

Empower your team today with the essential innovation skills that will make you a leader in today and tomorrow’s challenging business environment.