Real-World Tactics for Leaders Looking to Turn Breakthrough Ideas into Scalable Impact

Disclaimer: The opinions represented here are those of the individual and do not necessarily represent those of their current or former employer.

Innovating in a complex business environment is no easy feat. It requires strategy, execution, and a focus on real-world impact to bring ideas to life. We spoke with Russell Hanson, Chief Innovation Officer of Sama Therapeutics, an AI-driven healthcare company, about what separates successful innovation initiatives from those that fizzle out. He shared how a practical mindset can help businesses succeed in a shifting landscape, and the ways leveraging AI is making it easier than ever for innovators to speed up their workflows.

Watch the full interview below, or read on for a selection of key takeaways.

Key takeaways:

• Prioritize solving real customer needs to ensure innovation efforts pay off. Innovations rooted in customer value are far more likely to succeed in the market
• Embrace emerging technologies to boost innovation speed and efficiency significantly. New tools (like AI assistants) can dramatically reduce the time and effort required from your team
• Integrate business strategy with technical innovation to bridge the lab-to-market gap successfully. Cross-functional planning and business acumen ensure great ideas can become profitable products, instead of gathering dust in the lab
• Foster a vibrant, collaborative innovation culture through hackathons and cross-functional teamwork. Engaging employees in creative sprints can spark breakthrough solutions and energize teams across your organization
• Invest in building internal talent and expertise instead of over-relying on outsourcing. Developing in-house capabilities retains critical knowledge and accelerates long-term innovation, whereas excessive outsourcing can drain expertise.

Focus Innovation on Customer Needs

Innovation efforts should start and end with the customer. No matter how cutting-edge a technology or idea is, it will stall if it doesn’t solve a real problem for customers or if there’s no market demand. Business history is littered with technically impressive projects that failed commercially because they didn’t address what the end-user truly cared about. As a leader, you should ensure your innovation teams are continually validating their ideas against customer needs and feedback. This might involve early user testing, market research, or even co-creating solutions with customers.

“Any company, any business, any organization is sort of beholden to their customers. If nobody’s using it, nobody cares. If nobody’s paying for it, it gets shelved… Whatever’s making money gets the attention. The customer is always right and we build stuff that our customers want. That’s just really important.”

Focusing on customer needs may seem like simple advice, but it’s a shockingly common area where businesses stumble. A CB Insights analysis of startup failures found that 42% failed because they were building something with no market need — by far the most common reason on the list. When kicking off a new project, start by writing a mock press release that emphasizes the benefits for the consumer. Framing the project that way helps you develop a clear vision for what you’re trying to accomplish in a practical, marketable way.

Embrace New Tech Tools to Amplify Productivity

Hanson points out that generative AI and coding assistants have matured to the point where they can dramatically speed up development cycles or data analysis, and as a leader, it’s important to keep an eye on these advancements and thoughtfully integrate them into your workflows. Studies have shown that adopting such tools can yield remarkable efficiency gains – for instance, AI coding assistants have been found to cut programming time by as much as 56% in some cases. In practice, this could translate to getting a prototype ready in days instead of weeks, or analyzing customer data in hours instead of days.

“It saves me a ton of time… to the point where I would have a PhD scientist from Yale doing the same thing as I have Claude (an AI) doing on a day-to-day basis. I’m able to transform a data file for my professor colleague at the University of Pennsylvania in 20 seconds, where it would have taken me half a day to do it. I just think it saves folks a lot of time. People who aren’t skilled in the art of vibe coding will probably have to learn how to program, but for those who do, it’s just a tool that’s safe.”

Shopify’s developers began using an AI coding assistant and saw their development cycles shorten and code reviews speed up; in one case, commit times dropped by about 15%, allowing features to roll out faster. These tools freed employees from repetitive tasks and enabled them to focus on creative, high-value projects. Don’t shy away from new technologies that can act as force multipliers. Pilot them on a small scale, gather results, and if they prove their worth (as many do), scale them up. By embedding the right tools, you empower your team to innovate faster and more efficiently than the competition.

Looking to put these principles into practice? Explore how Brightidea’s innovation management platform can help drive these changes in your organization.

Bridge the Gap Between Innovation and Business

Hanson is a firm believer that innovation executives should ensure that their teams aren’t innovating in a vacuum – technical teams need to collaborate with business strategists, finance, legal, and other functions early in the process. Bridging this gap might mean educating technical talent on business fundamentals, or pairing scientists and engineers with mentors in marketing and operations. Without this balance, even brilliant projects can stumble.

“They come from an engineering or science background and they don’t have a business background. Unfortunately, there are a lot of hurdles on the legal side, the business side, the tax side, the company formation side, and the capital raising side that are entire jobs. Coming straight out of school with a PhD and trying to learn business is a tough road. I think people learn that eventually. You kind of need an MBA to talk to the other MBAs, as we sometimes say… that’s what I’ve seen.”

To ensure innovations cross that proverbial chasm from prototype to product, leading companies build cross-functional teams and processes. A great example is Apple’s development of the first iPhone. Rather than handing off a concept from one silo to another, Apple formed a cross-disciplinary skunkworks team – hardware engineers, software developers, designers, and operations folks – all working closely together on “Project Purple.” In an interesting twist, one of the iPhone’s software engineers took on the role of spearheading its marketing strategy, even appearing in the first product demos. This blend of technical and business roles paid off enormously: despite some internal challenges, the iPhone’s launch was a massive success and the product became the cornerstone of Apple’s business.

Cultivate an Innovation Culture with Hackathons and Sprints

For innovation leaders, running hackathons or similar events can serve multiple purposes: they break down silos by bringing people from different departments together, energizing employees with a fun challenge. However, Hanson says it’s important to structure these events thoughtfully to get the most out of them. Hanson noted that simply declaring a hackathon in the office from 9-to-5 might not inspire the best results, but variety and a bit of spectacle will help. You might host it off-site, over a full day or two, or even virtually with participants from multiple locations. Providing some incentives (prizes, recognition) and executive support for follow-up can also ensure ideas don’t die on the vine once the event is over. When done right, hackathons can inject excitement into your innovation program and surface solutions that management didn’t even know employees were capable of.

“I almost wish we had more hackathons within our company. Getting people together – buying some pizzas or beers – and somehow accommodating folks with kids and families, since staying late at work isn’t appealing, is key. You could have a daytime or offsite hackathon, something more interesting than just going to your office and saying, ‘Today we’re going to have a hackathon.’ A little diversity, or just doing something different, would make the hackathon more fun and interesting.”

The value of hackathons and a collaborative innovation culture is evident in many organizations. Facebook is a prime example of harnessing hackathons for innovation. Facebook’s video uploading and sharing capability originated from a hackathon project when a pair of engineers pursued a passion to integrate video into the platform. Even Facebook’s Timeline profile design was born as a hackathon demo called “Memories,” which a small cross-functional team developed and presented; within a year, that concept evolved into the Timeline feature rolled out to all users. When employees see their hackathon ideas get real investment and turn into projects, it reinforces the message that innovation is everyone’s job. Over time, this kind of culture can be a true engine of growth and continuous improvement for your business.

Build Internal Capabilities and Limit Over-Outsourcing

While outsourcing certain tasks or projects can be useful, especially for speed or cost efficiency in the short term, outsourcing core innovation work can backfire badly. Hanson reflected on this from personal experience: relying too heavily on external vendors or contractors to build your product can lead to a loss of critical knowledge and skills within your organization. If an outside group develops the secret sauce of your business, you risk ending up empty-handed once their contract is over – you’ve essentially paid them to learn how to solve your problem, and you haven’t cultivated that expertise on your own team.

“I think one issue we had is we outsourced too much stuff. If I’d done less outsourcing and brought more people in – or better people in – instead of relying on outsourced work, that would have been better. If you pay an outside group to build your product, on one side, if they could build the product, they already would have, and you’re basically paying to train them to solve your problem. And then you lose the expertise of having your own person trained to solve your problem. Those are big problems with doing too much outsourcing.”

Plenty of companies have learned the value of developing internally versus excessive outsourcing. Tesla de-emphasized outsourced labor and vertically integrated its supply chain, which decreased its production costs by roughly 15% over a two-year span. Conversely, Boeing outsourced an unprecedented portion of design and manufacturing to external partners around the world, resulting in major delays and quality issues that have permanently sullied the brand’s reputation.

Innovate with Intention

Innovation doesn’t succeed in isolation. As Russell Hanson makes clear, moving from vision to real-world value requires strategic alignment, cultural momentum, smart technology adoption, and thoughtful execution. Whether you’re a C-level executive, innovation officer, or a VP leading change, embedding these principles into your workflow can make the difference between stalled efforts and sustainable breakthroughs.

To continue learning from top minds in innovation, connect with Russell Hanson on LinkedIn. His thought leadership in healthcare AI and digital transformation offers ongoing inspiration for innovation professionals across industries.

And if you’re ready to turn these ideas into action, explore how Brightidea can helpyour organization scale innovation with purpose. From hackathons to ideation pipelines to AI-enhanced decision-making, Brightidea empowers you to harness the full creative potential of your workforce and deliver measurable business results.

You don’t need another hype cycle—you need results. This release isn’t for spectators, it is built for teams that are actually doing the work: solving problems, launching ideas, and scaling innovation without the drama.

This fall, we’re giving you what others can’t (or won’t): serious tools, real automation, and performance that doesn’t get in your way.

Complete backlog management for teams.

Your team has more work on their to-do lists than capacity. Without clear multi-dimensional prioritization, the wrong things will get worked on. Departmental Idea Box, changes that. As the world’s first multi-pipeline process. The tool helps you manage all ideas captured from big to small, routing them to the right pipeline and the right owner.

Department Idea Box updates include:

• Cross-Pipeline Visibility: See everything in one place—no weird workarounds.
• Automated Routing: Shift ideas between pipelines seamlessly within the UI and with automated routing rules and logic.
• Sub-Pipeline Design: Each process gets its own space with out of the box workflow and an intuitive left rail for quick navigation.
• Access for Entire Team: Easy group creation and instant one-click sharing to invite team members to engage.

A dashboard that keeps you focused on business value.

You shouldn’t need a data science degree to prove ROI. Our updated event dashboard shows what matters—engagement, goals, and outcomes—all in one place.

Dashboard now includes:

• Streamlined UI: Cleaner layout, easier reads. 
• Set Event Goals: Align events, goals, and reporting timelines to your scheduler to track value per participant.
• Demographic Insights: Drill into department and location information, discerning where the hubs of innovation are growing.
• AI Recommendations: Let the system tell you how to improve to drive better outcomes based on data trends.

A refreshed mobile app operating 10x faster.

We threw out the old mobile app and started from scratch, using AI to accelerate our work. Why? Because innovation happens in real life—not behind a desk.

Mobile now delivers:

• Native Speed: Built on modern architecture for lightning-fast performance.
• Seamless Sync: Start an idea on your phone, finish it on desktop.
• Clean UX: Better filters, sorting, dark mode.
• AI Summaries: Scan ideas quickly, without reading walls of text.
• Smart Notifications: Stay in the loop—minus the noise.

AI at every step of the process.

The AI race is on everyone’s mind. Like the other tech paradigms that came before it. And in a world where IP is becoming more cherished as execution becomes expedited, we want to ensure you have the foundation for successful experimentation within your business.

Here’s how AI shows up in this release:

• Rapid Brainstorm: Humans and AI work side-by-side in a shared collaborative space. Work in tandem to build compelling ideas and perspectives instantly.
• Organize with One-Click: Automatically cluster and organize ideas through grouping to categorize work and uncover patterns and insights—fast.
• No Hesitation Prioritization: Work within purpose built evaluation tools to surface what’s worth acting on now.
• Develop and Define: Enrich fragile ideas converting them into clear PRDs and strategic memos, ready for buy-in and execution.
• Build Mode, Activated: Instantly launch your PRD in an app builder to prototype with no engineering bottlenecks or setup overhead.

Key platform updates where you need them most.

These updates remove friction and give your users more power while minimizing the learning curve.

Some highlights from across the platform:

• Browse Screen Refresh: From grid to gallery—make discovery more intuitive.
• Email Template Design: Custom pipeline templates to bring people back into the platform.
• Monthly Impact Tracking: Now measure business value by month, creating more granular measurements.
• Security Upgraded: MFA available to meet stricter enterprise and IT requirements.
• Straight Out of Beta: Rich Text Editor 3.0, View Idea 3.0, Rules Engine—now generally available.

Stay above it all with BIC5.

The best innovation software gets out of the way. This release proves it.

What Facebook, Intuit, and SNHU got right about demand-side innovation

Disclaimer: The opinions represented here are those of the individual and do not necessarily represent those of their current or former employer.

Innovation is often framed as a visionary’s art. A spark of genius that drives revolutionary products. But Bob Moesta, President & CEO of the Re-Wired Group, author of four books, and proponent of the Jobs to Be Done theory, sees it differently. We interviewed Bob to get his practical insights from decades of helping teams build better products and gain insights rooted in understanding the real reasons customers choose to buy, switch, or abandon.

From mentoring under Clayton Christensen, working with companies like Facebook, Intuit, and Southern New Hampshire University to helping launch over 3,500 products, Bob has seen firsthand how customer motivations shape successful innovation. His advice? Stop guessing what customers might want in the future. Instead, study what caused them to act in the past.

Watch the full video below, or read on for a selection of key takeaways.

Key takeaways:

• Start every innovation effort with a real customer story. Understand what causes a person to say, “today’s the day,” and build backward from there.
• Avoid “job washing.” Base your product decisions on observed behavior, not rationalized assumptions.
• Interrogate the past, don’t speculate about the future. Uncover causal mechanisms through careful interview techniques rooted in behavioral inquiry.
• Structure hackathons around problems, not ideas. Anchor team creativity in real customer struggling moments to generate more meaningful solutions.
• Differentiate why customers hire your product from why they stay. Growth depends just as much on reducing churn as increasing acquisition.

Begin With the Moment of Truth

Many teams start with broad market research or trend analysis, but Bob insists that meaningful innovation begins with a single moment: when a customer decides to act. That inflection point holds the key to real demand. By unpacking the emotional, functional, and situational triggers behind it, teams can uncover patterns that no survey or dashboard could reveal.

“I’m a firm believer of what I call the N of one… I want to understand what causes one customer to say today’s the day they need to buy your product… We studied what causes people to say, today’s the day I need to set up an Etsy account… Out of all of that, we were able to learn basically all the dynamics around the industry and set up Facebook Marketplace… Within almost six months, it was almost $4 billion.”

Airbnb followed a similar path. Early research revealed their users weren’t just looking for affordable lodging, they were craving connection, authenticity, and a sense of belonging. This insight reframed Airbnb’s value proposition and shaped everything from branding to UX. By anchoring product and messaging in these deeper emotional drivers, Airbnb redefined customer experience and unlocked massive growth.

Don’t Confuse Rationalization With Reality

It’s easy for teams to sit in a room, build user personas, and hypothesize reasons why customers might want their product. But Bob warns this leads to what he calls “job washing”. Assuming rational behavior where none exists. Real progress starts by understanding the actual causes behind a customer’s decision, not the ones we wish were true.

“People sit in a room and hypothesize all the things a customer can do… But nobody randomly switches to your product. There is actually a causal mechanism behind it… Most small businesses hate QuickBooks. They don’t hate QuickBooks, they hate accounting… We made QuickBooks very simple and very easy. The result is that it helps people make progress.”

Slack uncovered similar truths in its early days. Rather than pitch itself as a messaging tool, the team observed how disjointed email threads and file sharing slowed team momentum. By focusing on progress and making collaboration feel seamless, they positioned Slack as a workstream enabler rather than just another software in a busy tech stack. That framing helped it become one of the fastest-growing B2B products of the decade.

Want to run high-impact innovation hackathons in your organization? Hackathon 5 can help you coordinate stakeholders, manage the event, and ensure those post-event action items are tracked to completion. Book a demo.

Ask Like an Investigator, Not a Marketer

Customer interviews aren’t about asking what people want, they’re about uncovering what caused their behavior. Bob’s approach borrows more from intelligence gathering than traditional UX research. The goal can’t be about validating assumptions, but identifying the hidden forces behind decision-making. That means asking detailed, situational questions that reveal motivations people often don’t even realize themselves.

“We never talk to people about the future… Most of the methods that I use are based on criminal and intelligence interrogation… You said this, but did you mean that? These two things don’t connect. What happened?… One example is Southern New Hampshire University… Out of those interviews, we just said: what caused you to say today’s the day to enroll?… We focussed on that, and they’re now the largest university in the world.”

This principle helped Duolingo unlock explosive growth. By running behavior-first user studies, they discovered that emotional triggers, like the fear of losing a streak, kept users engaged far more than typical gamification. They leaned into these insights, designing features like the “daily goal” and “streak freeze,” which now power their retention engine.

Redefine Hackathons Around Real Jobs

Many hackathons start with a vague prompt or open-ended challenge. Bob argues that’s a missed opportunity. Instead, anchor the event around a specific struggling moment and let teams build solutions that help people make real progress. By focusing on tangible user problems, teams can channel their creativity into solutions that address actual needs, leading to more meaningful and impactful outcomes.

“The job should be the foundation of the hackathon… It’s the fundamental difference between how I think about innovation and most people… Instead of ‘build it and they will come,’ I study where people struggle and build something to fit their lives.”

Starting with a problem and building a solution that directly addresses it was no better exemplified than the “Make the Breast Pump Not Suck” hackathon held at MIT. Recognizing the widespread dissatisfaction with traditional breast pumps, the event brought together engineers, designers, healthcare professionals, and parents to reimagine the device. One standout innovation was the “Mighty Mom Utility Belt,” a hands-free, wearable pump designed to offer mobility and discretion for mothers. This user-centered approach led to prototypes that directly addressed the real challenges faced by breastfeeding mothers, showcasing how focusing on specific user struggles can drive meaningful innovation.

Know Why They Stay, Not Just Why They Come

Understanding why customers buy is half the battle. To drive sustainable growth, Bob says, teams must also learn why people leave and recognize that the reasons for staying often evolve over time. It’s not enough to optimize the onboarding experience. Companies need to continuously investigate what features, outcomes, or frustrations shape long-term loyalty or attrition.

“Churn interviews are really important… They didn’t randomly leave you. If you can understand the situations that cause them to leave, you can add features that will keep people… The reason why they bought you is not necessarily the reason why they stay.”

Zoom’s early growth was fueled by ease of use, but user feedback later revealed that reliability and security became critical to retention, especially for enterprise clients. That shift in focus led Zoom to double down on backend performance and security protocols, ensuring that the platform scaled with users’ needs and avoided churn as competitors caught up.

Build With Cause, Not Just Creativity

Innovation isn’t about guessing what might work, it’s about discovering what already does. Bob Moesta’s approach reminds us that true progress begins by understanding the real-life moments that trigger action. Whether you’re designing a product, structuring a hackathon, or reducing churn, the key is to ground every decision in the customer’s context. Look for the causal forces behind choices, not just the features you want to ship.

To explore more of Bob Moesta’s thinking, follow him on LinkedIn where he regularly shares insights on innovation, product strategy, and entrepreneurial problem-solving. He’s also the author of several influential books including Demand-Side Sales, Learning to Build, and Choosing College, all of which dive deeper into the frameworks and stories behind helping people make progress. Check out all of Bob’s books here.

Want to turn customer insight into innovation outcomes? Brightidea’s Hackathon 5 makes it easy to frame challenges around real problems and empower teams to build solutions that truly matter. Get in touch today.

Summer is here. As schools let out, vacation plans are finalized, and long days at the beach become the priorities of the day, we wanted to share our latest software release, designed to support you and your innovation goals.

Like a super-sized, complex sand castle, complete with battlements, turrets, and a gatehouse, we see you building-out your Brightidea platforms engaging an ever-broadening set of stakeholders, supporting more varied processes and engaging larger and larger swaths of employees.

To that end we’ve sprinkled some ‘everyday magic’ throughout our platform to help you KEEP BUILDING what your organization needs to survive and thrive in this age of constant disruption.

Building upon our existing foundation, we’ve worked hard to refine the innovation tools you rely on daily. We are constantly enhancing and developing based on your feedback, so you can expand your innovation programs and ensure the best ideas win.

Scaling Innovation Throughout Your Organization

As you build upon your foundation and your innovation program scales, we wanted to take a beat to ensure the right features were in place to support your journey. You might be expanding your programs globally, or have pressure to better track business impact; these features are for you:

• Expanded Translation Capabilities: Whether you’re rolling out a challenge across global offices or engaging multilingual teams, Brightidea now offers a seamless in-browser translation service. No heavy integrations, no development delays—just fast, flexible translation support. Contact your Customer Success Manager to request a customized quote or activate a trial.
• Business Impact Overhaul: We’ve completely revamped the business impact UI and added features making it much more intuitive to use. There’s now a new modern accordion layout making it clear what can be expanded or contracted, with changing input field colors for easy editing. We’ve also updated the “Costs” section to allow switching from free‑text to drop‑down cost categories enabling cleaner, more consistent data and finance‑friendly reports.
• Updated Google Analytics Integration: Admins can now set Google Analytics 4 (GA4) codes for advanced analytics tracking. GA4 offers enhanced measurement capabilities and utilizes machine learning to fill in data gaps.

The Details That Matter…

Just like a sand castle, starting with a foundation before adding the details of brick shapes and spires, we are adding a little bit of everyday magic to refine the foundation of our core platform. Polish makes perfect, which is why we continue to refine the features that our customers interact with daily:

• Reorder Answers on Scorecards: As an admin building a scorecard, you now have the ability to reorder the answers to questions the same way users can on submission forms.
• Idea Codes in Action Items Progress: We now display idea codes in the table for tracking ideas in Development steps, making it easier to find and manage ideas as they progress. ​​Including idea codes helps streamline the process of tracking and managing action items.
• RTE for Action Item Emails: We’ve enabled Rich Text Editing 3.0 (RTE) for Action Item emails. Rich text editor capabilities now include bolding, bulleting, hyperlinks, and other rich elements.
• Editable Email Templates: We’ve enabled more editable email templates for Pipeline and Action Item emails, offering flexibility over previously hard-coded communications. Admins can now edit and personalize more of the emails that are sent through the platform including: action item reminders, action item escalation notifications, and advance to next step email notification popups.
• Rules Engine Changelog: Admins can now access a history of changes to rules. Export the rules engine changelog to view a version history of changes to rules or see the last person who changed an item.

Our Hackathon Obsession Continues

We know, we know… we have been more than a little obsessed with Hackathon lately. That’s because we believe hackathons are the best way to give your team the time and space to embrace the possibilities of the AI revolution.

The time and effort we invest now will pay dividends for other areas of our platform. Many of the features we’re building and refining for Hackathon—including our scheduler, viral email alerts, and new dashboards—are immediately relevant and available to our other time-boxed activities like Pitch, Solve & Optimize.

We are also aiming to set a new bar for quality in our category for fully-designed, high-quality product experiences based on obsessive customer research and empathy.

Building on our Spring 2025 release of Hackathon 5, our goal is to develop the world’s best solution for organizing internal hackathons. Ten times better than the next best option. Here are a few updates to continue to progress toward that goal:

• Updated Registration: We’ve decoupled registration from onboarding for greater flexibility. The enhanced registration process, controlled by the “Event Live” phase, is now more streamlined and user-friendly to boost participation and great to capture interest while the event is “Coming Soon.”
• Onboarding Improvements: Controlled by the Scheduler “submission” phase and broken apart from the registration flow, updates to the onboarding process guides users effortlessly through initial hackathon setup, enhancing adoption rates.​ We’ve polished the project image screen, updated the complete flow with refined images, titles, and AI enhancements, as well as added expertise within onboarding.
• Scheduler Updates: We have two wonderful updates in the Hackathon Scheduler, including: 1) streamlining the setup wizard by removing the need to set every date/time for each phase of a hackathon. Admins only need to set the event date and the rest will be autofilled for you as a starting point, allowing for faster event setup, and 2) expanding the schedule screen, making it easier to view and configure your entire Hackathon schedule.
• User-Specific Time Zones: You can now set your system to display dates and times according to your users’ time zone. Once enabled, we’ll automatically detect and update time zones on log in. Always see your correct local times—no confusion, no conversions.​ This is extremely important when planning remote hackathons with phases that need to start and stop on participant timezones. (CER17356)

No release is complete without squashing our bug backlog! With that, we’ve taken input by customers and colleagues alike to resolve over 100 bugs since the previous release. Beyond the features and improvements listed above, we’ve also sprinkled a little every day magic across the core platform with additional maintenance and stability improvements which can be tracked on our product release notes.

Architect Your Future

Technology is evolving at a breathtaking pace. These shifting sands create an endless stream of challenges and opportunities for Innovation Teams.

Rest assured, the Brightidea Team is hard at work, to deliver you the most-advanced capabilities available. So you can continue to architect the innovation platform of your dreams.

We’ve also got a boatload of upgrades coming for the Innovation Cloud 5 release. We hope you get a chance to; relax, recharge and refocus this Summer. KEEP BUILDING! and we’ll see you in the Fall.

The most powerful tools leaders have are the voices from every level of their organization

Disclaimer: The opinions represented here are those of the individual and do not necessarily represent those of their current or former employer.

There’s always something to be said about the next big product launch or revolutionary bit of technology, but innovation isn’t just flashy tech and grand ideas. Improving how your organization works day-to-day to make a stronger, more stable company is also crucial. Few people understand that better than Matt Mueller, author of The Mindful Innovator and an advisor at Rethink Retail. Having helped clients like Disney, Target, Nestle, Pernod Ricard, and other giants refine their strategies, Mueller understands what it takes to make businesses run efficiently. And despite working with some of the world’s biggest companies, he has a refreshingly down-to-earth take on innovation: Focus on what your customers and employees tell you, and use that feedback to shape your company’s direction. Brightidea sat down with Mueller to talk shop in a recent interview.

Watch the full video below, or read on for a selection of key takeaways.

Key takeaways:

• Engage with front-line employees to determine business needs. Spend time where the work happens so strategy tackles real problems, not hypothetical ones.
• Elect an innovation champion. Companies need someone to helm innovation efforts, a deep thinker who can reflect on and be held accountable for initiatives.
• Solve real problems, drive change, and win acceptance to innovate. Use Mueller’s “three‑ingredient” test to keep innovations meaningful.
• Observe customer habits before reaching conclusions. User-level field data is a valuable way to identify the root cause of an issue.
• Co‑create with users and employees to make winning products. Invite employees and customers to build solutions with you; they already know what will work.

Break the “Ivory Tower” and Engage the Front Line

Modern leaders must bridge the gap between corporate strategy and frontline reality. Matt Mueller cautions against “white ivory tower syndrome,” where leaders push down initiatives without understanding daily operations. As a young deli manager, Mueller often thought, “What are they thinking? … Do they even know what it’s like to be in our shoes?” Later, as a corporate innovator, he caught himself making the same mistake.

“We misdiagnose the problems happening in our businesses, and our biases take over… So spend time with your employees, whether they’re on the front lines, whether they’re in different parts of your organization, or different teams within the corporate walls. But understand each point of view. What is their perspective? What are the true problems? And what do we need to fix to move the business forward? I think that’s really where leaders fall down when it comes to innovation.”

Mueller is right. Leaders can’t afford to ignore ideas from line-level employees. Amazon Prime began as an employee suggestion when engineer Charlie Ward submitted the concept to a digital suggestion box. The rest is history, with the service now boasting more than 200 million members worldwide, according to Statista. Billion-dollar ideas may be hiding in unsuspecting places, but leaders need to have open channels if they ever hope to discover them.

Find Someone to Champion Innovation

Businesses have to innovate to survive, but doing so requires a carefully calibrated approach. Mueller explains that the best way to pursue innovation is to assign the responsibility to an individual, a dedicated champion who can bring new projects to life. By coupling winning ideas with someone accountable for their success, it’s far easier to achieve real change.

“What I like to do after a hackathon is dissect all the concepts…Start to put every single component of the concept on a Post-it note…What are the nice to haves, what are the must haves… Your ideas become bigger and bigger— true winning ideas… If we have a person who can be the champion for that, and we say, ‘You are going to be our champion for innovation…We’re going to give you resources to do it. We’re going to give you a team.’ And you put that effort towards it, and you put metrics towards it, and that’s what you’re getting graded on for your job, that’s when you’re going to have real change happening in the organization.”

Champions of innovation shouldn’t be a foreign concept for anyone plugged into Silicon Valley’s culture. The most famous examples come from the big four (Apple, Facebook, Amazon, and Google), with the likes of Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and Sundar Pichai, but the role doesn’t need to be relegated to the CEO. What matters is putting someone in charge of innovation who is accountable for implementation, then giving them the resources to succeed.

Want to run high-impact innovation hackathons in your organization? Hackathon 5 can help you coordinate stakeholders, manage the event, and ensure those post-event action items are tracked to completion. Book a demo.

Innovation Comes From Three Key Components

Mueller emphasizes that flashy brainstorming and big-budget pilots won’t stick unless every initiative passes a simple but rigorous litmus test. In his experience, teams waste months tweaking prototypes that were exciting in the room yet disconnected from everyday pain points or lacked true sponsorship. To cut through the noise, he tells leaders to step back and measure each idea against three criteria that keep innovation grounded, purposeful, and adoptable:

“Truly, innovation is about three key components… The first one is that you need to be solving real problems… The second component is that there needs to be a change that’s going to improve… And the third thing… was that we need to get others to accept. Acceptance. We have to get others to accept that the change is going to solve that problem. And when we do those three things, that’s when we can have real innovation.”

Adobe’s “Kickbox” initiative is a strong example of how organizations can foster all three elements of successful innovation. Previously, Adobe would prototype 12 to 24 products per year, but in the first year of Kickbox, employees tested nearly 1,000 ideas for less than the cost of the old approach. By equipping every employee with a toolkit, funding, and a clear process, Adobe enabled people across the company to identify real problems they were close to. The structure encouraged purposeful experimentation, ensuring that changes were targeted improvements. And because ideas came from within teams and were shared openly, there was built-in buy-in: colleagues were more likely to accept and support innovations that originated from their peers.

Slow Down to Solve the Right Problem

In the rush to innovate, companies sometimes chase trends or quick fixes that don’t truly solve their core problems. Matt Mueller’s mantra is to slow down and be mindful in the innovation process. Mueller shared a story of a retailer with slumping bakery sales. The leadership’s initial hypothesis was that customers wanted healthier options, so they hurried to stock more low-calorie baked goods. But sales didn’t improve because the assumption was wrong. Mueller’s team took a step back and observed customers in stores. They discovered the real issue wasn’t health at all.

“We would walk over to the bakery department, and customers would kind of look at the case and then just walk on by… and put Oreos in their cart. I was like, ‘Whoa, what’s going on here?’… And they’re like, ‘You know what? Nothing looks fresh over here… That’s [pointing to the cookies] not made here. [The bakery] looks like a cafeteria in a hospital.’… We knew we had to create crave… If we slow down to be a little bit more mindful about what our consumers want, we can then become more purposeful about the innovation that we need to place.”

Instead of loading the bakery with healthy items, the bakery focused on baking cookies during prime shopping hours to create a smell that was irresistible and would bring customers back.

It reminded Matt of a lesson he learned from the work of his mentor, Martin Lindstrom—who also wrote the foreword to his book—about the danger of chasing ideas that stray too far from what customers truly value. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, LEGO nearly went bankrupt from pursuing too many ideas outside its core business. The company “lost its way” by chasing every new trend without pausing to consider if these innovations aligned with what customers loved about LEGO. Realizing the mistake, the leadership refocused on LEGO’s core “brick” products and the creative experience customers wanted. They also started working more closely with the LEGO fan community to ensure new products hit the mark. LEGO never stopped innovating; they just innovated in the ways their customers wanted.

Co-Create with Your End Users and Employees to Uncover Answers

Sometimes the fastest way to innovate is to ask your customers and employees directly. Matt Mueller reminds us that those who use a product or work with a process daily often have the best ideas on how to improve it. “The answers are there, it’s just a matter of uncovering them,” he says, referring to insights that surface when you involve people outside your immediate strategy team.

“I kind of think about it as a triangle, three points. One is the company perspective or company goals: What are we trying to get done? Another is the employee perspective: What are they trying to get done? And the third is the customer perspective: What are they trying to get done? When we look at all three together, right in the center is where powerful innovation happens. That overlap is where you’ll uncover the solutions that truly move the business.”

Computer goliath Dell has used similar tactics in the past. In 2007, Dell launched IdeaStorm to gather product ideas directly from users. It paid off almost immediately. IdeaStorm users overwhelmingly voted for Dell to offer computers with Linux. Dell didn’t just take the suggestion under advisement, they collaborated with those users to make it happen. They polled the community on which Linux distribution and support features were most wanted, getting over 100,000 responses detailing what customers expected. From there, the product team took over. Where it normally took 12-18 months to launch a new product, Dell could turn around the new offering in just 4 months. It was a symphony of collaboration between leadership, customers, and employees.

Good Ideas Can Come From Anywhere

If you’d like to dig even deeper into the principles covered here, pick up Matt Mueller’s book The Mindful Innovator. In it, Mueller unpacks the same frontline-first mindset and “three-ingredient” framework with step-by-step exercises, real-world case studies, and reflection prompts you can use to jump-start your innovation playbook.

If you’re looking to energize your company’s innovation program, especially through hackathons or idea challenges, don’t hesitate to leverage solutions designed for that purpose. Brightidea’s hackathon platform can jump-start your efforts by providing a structured way to collect, manage, and act on ideas. Get a demo today.

Simplifying communication and focusing on big bets are the secrets to unlocking huge returns

Disclaimer: The opinions represented here are those of the individual and do not necessarily represent those of their current or former employer.

The difference between incremental change and market‑shifting innovation often comes down to leadership habits. Few people understand those habits better than John Rossman, former Amazon executive, author of The Amazon Way and Big Bet Leadership, and long‑time advisor to Fortune 500 boards. In a recent Brightidea interview, Rossman pulled back the curtain on how high‑performing organizations create clarity, maintain velocity, and accelerate value while managing risk.

Watch the full interview below, or read on for a selection of key takeaways.

Key takeaways:

• Write narrative memos to de‑risk bold ideas. Written experiments force teams to clarify assumptions, align stakeholders, and validate value early.
• Repeat specific messages until everyone can recite them. Treat every memo as part of a communication portfolio that keeps objectives and milestones clear.
• Simplify processes and workflows with ruthless discipline. Redesign each operation to remove friction and unleash speed and creativity.
• Aim hackathons at high‑value, high‑risk challenges. Give winning ideas the authority, resources, and follow‑through needed to de‑risk and scale into business results.
• Run your innovation pipeline as a balanced portfolio, not a list of sure bets. Allocate resources across transformative ideas while accepting failure to secure wins.

Use Narrative Memos to De-Risk Bold Ideas

Innovation starts with thinking. What’s the best way to capture thinking on complex problems and ideas? Putting them on paper and debating them. Rossman champions Amazon’s famous “working backwards” memo process, writing out ideas in a detailed narrative form, as an effective, high-impact way to flesh out big initiatives. By articulating the end vision, often as a mock press release or detailed proposal, leaders can clarify assumptions, identify risks, and align teams before significant resources are spent. This memo-driven approach forces teams to think through customer benefits, operational challenges, and unknowns early on, which de-risks high-ambition projects and sharpens their value proposition.

“Writing things out is the simplest, fastest, cheapest, most effective way to think things through and to do actual experimentation…Getting to the heart of the matter in a collaborative manner that taps the best everyone can contribute. And—as Brightidea says—allowing the best idea to win, that’s the whole goal.”

These techniques were pioneered at Amazon, where teams draft a press release for a new product before building anything. But the press release is typically a byproduct of hashing ideas out in other narratives and iterating through these memos. The practice has been credited with many of Amazon’s breakthrough innovations. Most of Amazon’s major products since 2004 were created using the “Working Backwards” process, which starts with defining the ideal customer experience and iterating on a narrative until the team achieves total clarity.

If you want to integrate a “Working Backwards” process into your team’s workflow, Brightidea’s Memo solution can help. Memo helps teams build comprehensive roadmaps that keep the customer top of mind while also making it easier to write, collaborate, review, approve, track, and measure the ROI of your entire program. Get your free demo today.

Turn Ambiguity into a Clear Strategy

Rossman stresses that systematic, repetitive communication is a hidden superpower for big‑bet leaders. Treat every memo, meeting, and status update as part of a “communication portfolio” that keeps priorities crystal‑clear and top‑of‑mind. By deliberately repeating the right messages—objectives, customer benefits, next milestones—you reinforce alignment, accelerate decision‑making, and help teams course‑correct quickly when distractions arise.

“You have to do the job of being the chief repeating officer… You have to know what to be repeating…Things like ‘We have to change,’ or ‘We have to do better,’ or ‘We have to improve the customer experience’ are harmful communication because… I’m not telling you what we’re doing. Instead, be specific: ‘Here’s the problem we’re solving, here’s our hypothesis for the future state, and here’s the agile, experimentation‑led journey we’re on.’ That’s what helps people understand the why, the what, and the how.” 

Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff nailed this type of communication when he created the V2MOM (Vision, Values, Methods, Obstacles, Measures) as a one‑page document that he shares company‑wide every quarter. Benioff credits “constant communication and complete alignment” around the V2MOM for keeping more than 70,000 employees rowing in the same direction, even as Salesforce scaled globally. By repeatedly cascading and revisiting the same five pillars, leadership ensures that every project, metric, and conversation ties back to the core vision and priorities.

Streamline Processes for Innovation

One surprising insight from Rossman is the strategic power of simplification. In Amazon’s 16 leadership principles, “Invent and Simplify” is well known, and Rossman emphasizes that the “simplify” half is the real gem. Simplification is hard, gritty work. It demands challenging assumptions and possibly redesigning core operations, but it creates an environment where big ideas can flourish without being strangled by complexity.

“I wrote The  Amazon Way about Amazon’s leadership principles, and the hidden gem is ‘invent and simplify.’ It’s actually… the ‘and simplify’ piece where most companies find real strategic leverage. Simplifying processes, procedures, requirements, jobs, cycle times, and quality—that is the hardest work… I’m constantly decalcifying enterprises: doing a zero‑base redesign of ‘What’s the input? What’s the output?’ and ‘How do we make that black box of work as fast, efficient, quality‑driven, and measurable as possible?’ I always ask, ‘If we were starting from scratch, is this how we’d design it?’ Usually, the answer is ‘no.’”

Many top companies consciously prioritize simplicity to drive innovation. Nike, for instance, has a management maxim, “Simplify and Go,” which focuses teams on streamlining efforts and moving fast to adapt to new trends. This ethos has helped Nike keep pace in digital and fashion innovation by cutting through red tape and focusing on what matters. Similarly, Ikea bakes simplicity into its products and operations, making it easier to scale new ideas. The lesson: whether it’s product design or internal process, simplifying requires discipline, but it enables speed, creativity, and better execution of innovative ideas.

Make Hackathons Count for Real Impact

Corporate hackathons and innovation programs are meant to spark creativity, but too often they result in “innovation theater,” lots of flash with no follow-through. Rossman calls this the “all hat, no cattle” approach. For leaders, the mission is to redesign these programs so that they truly feed a pipeline of valuable projects. Rossman urges organizations to tackle high-value, high-risk ideas with transformative potential and then systematically de-risk those ideas into viable initiatives.

“Most innovation programs suffer from an ‘all hat, no cattle’ symptom. They’re there to show that we’re innovative, but they’re not put in an environment with the decision-making capability to actually scale the things [that come out]. I’ve seen teams pursue high complexity, low-value concepts. What you want instead is to pursue high-value, high-risk ideas, and then de-risk those over to the low-risk, high-value quadrant.”

When supported properly, hackathons can yield game-changing products. Facebook is a great example: many of its signature features originated from internal hackathons. Facebook’s Timeline profile, the ubiquitous “Like” button, and even Facebook Chat all made their debut as hackathon projects before scaling up to billions of users. The company’s hackathons work because leadership actively reviews projects and allocates resources to develop the best ones. The key takeaway is that with executive backing and a bias for action, hackathon ideas don’t have to die on the vine. They can be nurtured into real business outcomes, turning a fun sprint into a strategic innovation pipeline.

Looking to jumpstart innovation within your team? Check out Brightidea’s Hackathon 5, a platform designed to help organizations run hackathons that turn creative sparks into tangible results.

Manage Innovation Like Investments

Rossman suggests that Chief Innovation Officers (or equivalent roles) should act like portfolio managers or venture investors within the enterprise. Rather than seeking certainty on every project, accept that many initiatives will fail. That’s okay if your overall portfolio yields a few big wins. To drive real growth, innovation leaders need to allocate resources across a spectrum of ideas, from incremental to transformational, and set expectations that a percentage of bold bets will fail.

“Most leaders grew up in an operational world where you’re expected to have success in most things – they think every concept should be a winner. With this mindset, you end up just pursuing low-risk, low-ambition concepts. The way the innovation officer role needs to evolve is to be seen as the portfolio and asset manager of the company’s high-value, high-risk bets.”

Google long used the “70-20-10” allocation model: about 70% of resources go to core businesses, 20% to similar product categories, and 10% to new, high-risk ideas that could become future breakthroughs. This portfolio approach explicitly budgets for uncertainty. Leadership knows that not all of the “10% projects” will succeed, but a few might revolutionize the company. The practice institutionalizes a healthy tolerance for failure and guards against the trap of focusing only on immediate wins.

Innovate and Simplify

Innovation isn’t a side project; it’s a disciplined system that blends narrative clarity, ruthless simplification, structured experimentation, and relentless communication. Rossman’s playbook reminds us that world‑class operators are also world‑class transformers: they write to think, simplify to scale, de‑risk to win, and repeat the right messages until everyone in the organization is rowing in the same direction. To learn more about John Rossman’s leadership strategies, read his book Big Bet Leadership or check out the Big Bet GPT.

If you’re ready to put this playbook to work, pair these leadership habits with the right tools. Brightidea’s Hackathon solution gives your teams the structure, governance, and visibility to turn sparks of creativity into scalable, revenue‑generating bets. Get a demo today.

Innovation Hub director Joanne Peter has been instrumental in helping foster creative healthcare solutions across the continent

Disclaimer: The opinions represented here are those of the individual and do not necessarily represent those of their current or former employer.

When it comes to innovation, especially in mission-critical industries like healthcare, the journey from idea to impact is anything but straightforward. For Joanne Peter, Innovation Hub Director at Jhpiego, it’s a journey she’s charted across medicine, development, and technology. Based in Cape Town, South Africa, Peter leads a robust innovation practice for a global health nonprofit affiliated with Johns Hopkins University, with a presence in 33 countries.

Her approach is a blueprint for sustainable, stakeholder-centered innovation in real-world conditions. BrightIdea sat down with Joanne to discuss innovation in healthcare, and how AI can help maximize the impact of limited resources.

Watch the full interview below, or read on for a selection of key takeaways.

Key takeaways:

• Clearly define the problem before hosting a hackathon. Focused challenges with specific needs and desired outcomes lead to stronger, more implementable solutions.
• Consider the full value chain from development to point-of-care use before launching innovations. Healthcare innovators can be challenged by policy or regulatory blindspots, or unexpected resistance from health workers.
• Scale external and internal innovation pipelines. Investing in both internal and external innovation efforts improves your odds of success.
• Give teams a stake in idea implementation. Ensuring team members understand how to follow-through with ideas is a key driver of success.
• Integrate small successes from larger failures. Failure is essential to the innovation process, and always succeeding means you’re taking too few risks.

Unlock Better Results with Focused Hackathons

While hackathons can generate a flurry of energy and creativity, their impact often hinges on one critical factor: clarity. As Joanne Peter emphasized, the most successful innovation efforts begin by precisely identifying the need at hand. Hackathons can become engines of rapid innovation with lasting impact when the problem is sharply defined and grounded in real-world urgency.

“Hackathons are most effective when there’s a very specific need and a clear solution to build toward. When the parameters are tight and the stakes are real, teams focus faster, collaborate better, and deliver stronger outcomes.”

For organizations looking to replicate that success, Brightidea’s Hackathon 5 Solution offers the tools to do just that. By helping teams establish problem clarity upfront, align stakeholders, and define execution plans during the event instead of after, Brightidea ensures that hackathons are more than idea factories. They become launchpads for solutions that are relevant, fundable, and implementation-ready.

Learn how BrightIdea’s Hackathon Solution turns inspiration into action with stakeholder alignment, execution planning, and structured follow-through.

Design for the Real World, Not Just the Drawing Board

It’s impossible to implement effective solutions without understanding all the factors that go into successfully introducing and scaling a new innovation within a health system. For Peter, the answer is to carefully consider the full value chain from early development of the innovation, through to manufacturing, distribution, delivery, and point-of-care use.

“Often we place so much emphasis on the design and development of the innovation itself, that we don’t pay enough attention to other factors like the policy and regulatory environment, distribution and delivery channels, training health workers, or building demand amongst end-users.”

One case in point was Jhpiego’s attempt to launch an e-pharmacy model for HIV prophylaxis in Kenya. The innovation seemed promising until policy roadblocks emerged. Regulations required HIV tests to be administered by health workers, which contradicted the pharmacy’s goal of decentralizing care out of health facilities. Rather than abandoning the project, Jhpiego worked with policymakers to update the regulations to allow HIV self-testing, unlocking the path for broader implementation.

For those operating across international or regulated markets, this story serves as a reminder: Without considering the policy and user ecosystem, even great ideas can fail fast.

Increase Impact By Improving Follow-Through

Hackathons generate energy and enthusiasm, but Peter notes they work best when paired with clear goals and follow-through. A motivated team is one thing, but great leaders ensure their team members are mission-driven and understand the implementation process once an idea is concrete.

“Your impact is a function of your idea and your implementation… Often the ideas are coming from all of these excited individuals, but they don’t have any stake in the implementation of that idea afterward.”

According to data from our recent hackathon survey, only 31.8% of employees who have participated in a hackathon have ever seen ideas successfully implemented into their company’s roadmap. For organizations looking to innovate in their space, the solution is to create roadmaps that bring ideas fully to fruition. That’s something that can and should be done during Hackathon sprints, organizations simply need to dedicate sprint time to building in-depth implementation plans.

Jhpiego’s success is directly tied to real-world problems, backed by resources, and driven by teams who have a stake in the outcome. These projects are major investments with cross-functional leadership, strategic alignment, and concrete deliverables. By copying Jhpiego’s homework, organizations can get better outcomes on their own initiatives.

Implement Internal and External Innovation Programs

Jhpiego’s innovation portfolio includes three key initiatives: Catalyst Fund (internal R&D), Jhpiego STARS (an employee recognition program), and Jhpiego WISH (a startup accelerator working with external innovators). This trio ensures a pipeline of ideas from all directions; top-down, bottom-up, and outside-in.

“The Catalyst Fund is our internal R&D fund… Jhpiego STARS is an appreciation/ acknowledgement program to recognize innovation that has emerged organically from within the organization… Jhpiego WISH… works with external innovators… So  across that spectrum, we’re placing an emphasis on internal innovation  and keeping a finger on the pulse of external innovation.”

This diversified model allows Jhpiego to foster a culture of innovation internally while tapping into grassroots ingenuity externally. A key strength of this multi-pronged approach is that it reduces reliance on a single innovation stream. It also helps uncover more context-aware, locally relevant solutions, which are particularly valuable for global companies or public sector agencies working across regions.

A strong example of this dual approach is General Electric (GE). GE has cultivated innovation internally through programs like GE FastWorks, which empowers employees to develop and test ideas using Lean Startup principles. At the same time, GE actively engages external innovators through Open Innovation Challenges, collaborating with startups, researchers, and entrepreneurs to solve complex engineering and technology problems.

Focus on Learning Rather Than Success

Not every idea needs to become a blockbuster. Peter believes that a healthy innovation practice should expect and embrace some level of failure. The focus should be on learning, not just implementation. A culture that pushes for every experiment to be a success is misguided, according to Peter.

“If you want everything to be a runaway success, you’re setting the bar too high, not taking enough risk. As an innovation practice, you have to know that some things are going to work and some things are not going to work. And the main thing is that you learn from why it didn’t work… If you can do something differently next time, it’s not a failure. It’s part of running an innovation practice.”

This philosophy allows Jhpiego to extract value even from short-lived pilots. A failed concept might still produce a research publication, new partnerships, or funding leads. 

When scrapping an idea, be sure to perform an in-depth analysis to determine what did work. By integrating minor workflow improvements identified while innovating, organizations can get 1% better each day. That compounding success can lead to new heights.

Delight Patients With Consumer-Focused HealthTech

Peter closed with a bold vision of what healthcare could be if we brought the same human-centered innovation we expect in consumer technology.

“You should be able to experience healthcare in a way that surprises and delights you… with technology that anticipates your needs and meets you right where you are in your own home.”

Joanne Peter’s work offers a compelling case for the kind of innovation that changes lives. She advocates for deep stakeholder engagement, consistent learning, and creating ecosystems that make implementation inevitable.

Whether you’re tackling a health equity challenge, building a smart city, or launching the next internal accelerator, her lessons apply: Structure your process. Build your relationships. Measure what matters. And never stop adapting.

Platforms like BrightIdea exist to make that possible by helping teams move from scattered ideas to systemic transformation. Request a demo today to learn more.

Informed by tenures at Intel and Amazon, Mark Francis prioritizes agile teamwork and mindful speed to shape the future of healthcare

Disclaimer: The opinions represented here are those of the individual and do not necessarily represent those of their current or former employer.

In the fast-evolving world of health technology, the pressure to innovate is immense. For Mark Francis, Chief Product Officer at Electronic Caregiver and former Amazon executive, innovation isn’t about flashy features or hype-driven disruption. It’s about building the right things, with the right people, at the right time. And doing so responsibly.

From leading product teams in the high-speed environment of big tech to navigating the highly regulated terrain of healthcare, Francis brings a rare blend of agility and intention to his work. In a conversation with us, Mark shared insights on what it takes to create impactful products in health tech. He explored why prototypes matter more than pricing studies, how real innovation demands sustained collaboration, and why speed must always be balanced with safety when lives are on the line.

Watch the full interview below, or read on for a selection of key takeaways.

Key takeaways:

• Stay agile, test early. Prototyping quickly and getting customer feedback is more important than nailing pricing or long-term financial modeling up front.
• Create mission-driven teams. Projects go further with unified participants.
• Start thinking about products before the hackathon begins. By laying a foundation with a business model canvas, teams can innovate more efficiently.
• Practice regulatory mindfulness. Health tech cannot afford to “move fast and break things.”
• Make innovation part of the culture. Programs framed as incubators or accelerators yield deeper learning and better outcomes.

The Amazon Ethos: Speed, Structure, and Customer Obsession

Before Electronic Caregiver, Francis honed his product thinking at Amazon. The company is known for its breakneck pace and rigorous customer focus, a model that resulted in disruptive innovations like Amazon Prime. The lessons he learned there continue to shape his approach to product development today, though a clear standout is to begin with the end in mind. If the customer’s needs are the focus of each product, the odds of a successful launch are much higher.

“At Amazon, if you go through that process of working backward, focusing on the customer’s needs, it starts with writing a press release. The company was very willing to give almost anyone who would go through that process resources to build. But it was all about customer obsession and moving fast. We got the resources to do things, but we had to get things in the market within a year.

We didn’t want to do a pricing study. We didn’t want to do just focus groups. We wanted to say, here’s something we built for customers. Will you use this? And using it was more important than ‘Would you pay for it?’”

At Amazon, the “working backward” process begins with a fictional press release for the product, forcing clarity around the customer value proposition before writing a line of code. This principle, combined with a culture that rewards rapid deployment, taught Francis the value of structured experimentation. Even in a large organization, speed and autonomy were possible if the customer remained the focus.

That’s the same spirit fueling Hackathon 5, the latest evolution of Brightidea’s Hackathon solution.

Hackathon 5 isn’t just about organizing events. It’s about creating structured spaces where teams can innovate fast, stay focused on real customer problems, and bring ideas to life quickly and with impact. Its features are purpose-built to support the kind of experimentation and focus Amazon is known for, like fostering team collaboration and adding structure to innovation via robust project management tools.

Request a demo today to see how Hackathon 5 can help your team innovate.

Create Mission Driven Teams and Be Open to External Innovation

According to our survey data, only 28% of companies that run hackathons include a clear evaluation and resource allocation process, and only 18% of respondents said that company innovation was their biggest benefit. Together, those numbers imply there’s a disconnect between running hackathons and ideas being successfully implemented in the real world. According to Francis, organizations must rethink how they structure innovation initiatives to bridge the gap.

“The most powerful hackathon I was involved in was when I was at AWS working with the robotics team… We worked with our technology to help NASA engineers create a simulation of the part of Mars where they were landing. We then had a simulated model of the rover… We did a public open-source hackathon to say, ‘Hey, look, the rover is designed to land at point A. Here are the points that NASA wants to explore. We’re going to give you all the tools, techniques, simulation engines.

We ended up having over a thousand teams from across the world participate. We announced a winner at one of the big AWS events, re:Mars at that time… It turned out that the upfront training and framing helped galvanize teams and make it more purposeful. So it helped address that issue of not just hacking for the sake of hacking, but doing something with a purposeful outcome.”

In this model, innovation is a cultural endeavor of applied learning, external iteration, and mentorship. These forces help hackathon solutions mature into viable products and skilled teams equipped to succeed. By adopting a similar mindset — one that encourages external and outside-the-box thinking — organizations can create solutions that overcome seemingly herculean initial challenges.

A prime example is Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals (CMN), which partnered with Brightidea to revitalize its innovation approach. Facing a decade-long stagnation in idea generation, CMN organized a live hackathon during their annual culture week, engaging over 150 of their 160 employees. This initiative led to groundbreaking projects, including a cryptocurrency donation platform and a new campaign that raised over $350,000. The hackathon not only produced immediate results but also fostered a culture of continuous innovation within the organization.

Start Thinking About Products Before the Hackathon Starts

Hackathons give innovative ideas room to shine, but the ones with a clear vision shine even brighter. According to Francis, the easiest way to ensure product-market clarity is to get teams thinking about what the opportunities are before the hackathon ever begins.

“At Intel, when we would run hackathons, we’d start by doing a briefing and a training on what’s called the business model canvas. It’s a nice one-page tool to help frame up what a business concept is, the different channels, the different competitors, the go-to-market, and how to price it. We’d get people thinking about that before the hackathon even starts… Folks are pre-invested in what the concept is and what the opportunity is.”

The business market canvas is a tool that organizations can fit into their workflows with relative ease. By using that strategy, it’s easier to ensure that teams have a clear understanding of what they’re trying to accomplish. Not only that, but they’ll also be able to contextualize what they’re creating within the broader market. That can help identify minimum viable features, pricing, and more.

The Health Tech Caveat: Measured Speed, Not Reckless Acceleration

While Francis embraces agile development, he draws a hard line when it comes to applying “move fast and break things” to healthcare. In an industry where lives are at stake, recklessness isn’t just irresponsible: It’s dangerous. Unlike industries like transportation, delivery, and wearables, there’s a real need in the healthcare industry to shirk traditional Silicon Valley disruptor mindsets, and not everyone understands that yet.

“Everybody needs to come to an understanding that health tech is not a place where you can move fast and break things. Because if you break things in health tech, people can die. That doesn’t mean you can’t move fast, but you need to move fast in a measured way… You need to understand what the regulations are and work within those regulations from the very get-go.”

Francis’s stance reflects a growing consensus among health tech leaders: Innovation must be governed by ethical rigor and regulatory literacy. Moving quickly is still important, but not at the expense of patient safety. Instead, teams must operate within well-defined guardrails, aligning creativity with compliance from the very beginning.

Those rules have been broken in the past, resulting in tangible harm. A notable example is the Therac-25 radiation therapy machine incidents in the mid-1980s. Due to software errors and the removal of critical hardware safety interlocks, the Therac-25 administered massive overdoses of radiation to patients, resulting in severe injuries and deaths.

Innovation is a Team Sport, Not a Solo Sprint

Invention is often romanticized as the domain of lone geniuses working in isolation. But in practice, bringing a product to life is a collective effort. Francis underscores that it takes a diverse, mission-aligned team to carry an idea through to completion. When leaders give teams the resources to create innovative environments, they can stop working on prototypes and start working on products.

“There’s an old saying: If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. I think that’s so much the case when it comes to innovation and invention. You might have that brilliant inventor who comes up with concepts, but translating that into a sustained product is often very different.

The engineering building at Stanford, I think it’s named Terman Hall, after one of their engineering deans. And he said the biggest, most humbling thing for him was to learn how different it is to build a prototype and then build a product. And it takes a team to be able to do that. So as a leader of the team, your key is to pull together a diverse set of stakeholders that are mission-driven and want to go fast, then unleash them to build.”

Francis’s leadership philosophy centers on enabling others. By assembling teams with varied expertise—engineering, clinical, operations—he creates environments where innovation isn’t just possible, it’s inevitable. He sees his role not as a decision-maker, but as an orchestrator who clears the path for builders.

The Future of Health Innovation Is Measured, Mission-Driven, and Team-Centered

Mark Francis’s insights offer a roadmap for building responsibly in one of the most complex and high-stakes industries. By advocating for agile experimentation, mission-aligned teams, and regulatory respect, he challenges the Silicon Valley mythos of disruption for its own sake. To learn more about Mark Francis’ work, visit Electronic Caregiver’s website.

For more information on innovation initiatives, check out the Brightidea blog and stay tuned for the State of Hackathons survey.

Pushing the envelope is easier with AI and robotics on your side.

Innovation no longer needs to be a slow, incremental process. As all industries undergo rapid AI-driven transformations, we’re seeing massive shifts in how teams collaborate, communicate, and execute projects. Construction is no different.

For industry leaders like Hamzah Shanbari, Director of Innovation at Haskell, AI is an essential tool in optimizing construction workflows and ensuring that all stakeholders operate with the most up-to-date information. We sat down with Shanbari to discuss how to build a culture of innovation, run high-impact events like the Big Pitch, AI’s growing role in innovation technology, and his book, Paperless Builders: The Why, What, and How of Construction Technology.

Watch the full interview below, or read on for a curated selection of key takeaways.

Key takeaways

• Assign a dedicated team to own and implement winning ideas, rather than relying on idea submitters to carry them forward.
• Adopt a mindset of experimentation and be open to failure — this is essential to unlocking AI’s full potential and driving real innovation.
• Treat innovation events like cultural moments that bring cross-functional teams together and elevate idea contributors in front of leadership.
• Use AI-powered simulations early in the design process to predict risks, validate feasibility, and optimize outcomes before construction begins.
• Leverage AI and robotics to augment human labor, improve safety, and attract the next generation of talent to the construction industry.

Don’t Hand Off Ideas—Own Them

Many organizations struggle to turn hackathons or pitch ideas into real-world outcomes. Survey data tells us that only 29% of projects move beyond the event and are implemented. Therefore, the problem lies in follow-through. Hamzah points out a common pitfall: companies assume that the person who submitted the idea should also lead its execution. But innovators already have day jobs, and without structured support, ideas stall.

“That statistic is sad. A lot of companies try to give ownership to the outcome of a hackathon or event to the people who submitted the idea. And I think that’s where they mostly die — because those people have full-time jobs. What we did differently is that we, as the innovation team, even though we’re still small and nimble, take full responsibility for running the entire project. Yes, the idea owners are 100% involved as their time permits — they attend meetings, give feedback, and help shape it — but we’re the ones seeing it through to deployment.”

At Haskell, the innovation team doesn’t just facilitate the pitch event — they actively develop and implement the winning ideas. The original submitters stay involved as advisors and champions, but the heavy lifting belongs to the team that has the tools, time, and mandate to bring ideas to life. It’s a model that ensures momentum doesn’t end when the event does.

Execution matters just as much as ideation. That’s why we developed Hackathon 5: To help you turn employee ideas into implemented outcomes, faster and more reliably than ever before. Read our launch announcement to learn more.

Embracing Change Is the First Step Toward Innovation

Despite AI’s immense potential, many organizations struggle with adoption. The biggest challenge isn’t the technology itself, it’s the mindset shift required to embrace change. Many leaders are hesitant to implement new tools that could disrupt long-standing processes, especially in the construction industry. However, as Shanbari emphasizes, failing to adapt means failing to innovate. Without an open mindset, businesses cannot harness the full potential of AI to drive progress.

“I start the book with chapter one: Change Is Hard. Literally, chapter one, because if you can’t overcome that hurdle, everything else in the book is going to be irrelevant to you. Change is hard because it’s the fear of the unknown. It’s the fear of what else is on the other side of this technology implementation… I’m preaching that it’s okay to not know. It’s okay to experiment. It’s okay to fail and learn from that and do it again. And without overcoming that hurdle at the beginning, before you even embark on anything that has to do with innovation and technology, if you are not willing to fail, you are not willing to innovate.”

Shanbari’s perspective underscores a crucial point: Experimentation is key. AI thrives in environments where leaders and teams are willing to iterate, take calculated risks, and use failure as a learning tool. Those who hesitate to integrate AI into their operations risk falling behind competitors who embrace these rapid advancements.

Create a Cultural Moment, Not Just an Event

For Haskell, the Big Pitch isn’t just a pitch competition, it’s a cultural event. By bringing together leaders and employees from across business units, the event fosters connection, visibility, and momentum. It’s a space where everyone in the room shares the same goal: surfacing something innovative that could shape the future of the company. This sense of collective purpose has proven to be just as valuable as the ideas themselves.

“What I love about Big Pitch is it really gets a lot of people in the same room with one common goal — something different is going to come out of this. That’s what excites me the most. We’ve got BU leaders, vice presidents, even presidents in the audience. Not necessarily judging or participating, but showing up to support the people who are brave enough to bring their ideas forward and pitch to an executive panel. That visibility and energy is what makes the Big Pitch so unique for us.”

This format not only boosts engagement but reinforces the message that innovation is a shared responsibility. From executives to first-time contributors, everyone plays a role in making the event, and the ideas it generates, a success. That kind of shared ownership can’t be replicated in a suggestion box or one-off R&D meeting.

AI-Powered Simulation Is the New Future

As AI continues to evolve, its capabilities extend far beyond design. Simulation technology is transforming how projects are assessed before they even break ground. By using AI-driven simulations, teams can test the feasibility, safety, and community impact of projects, minimizing unforeseen issues and optimizing outcomes before construction even begins.

“There’s going to be a whole kind of mandatory step between design and construction. We can start as early as conceptual design, which is that simulation aspect. With all these advances in technology and AI, we can simulate. We can say, here’s the design: Is it constructible in the time frame and the budget that you’re setting for this? Is it safe for the employees or workers to be on that job site? What other impacts is it going to have on the local community? So there are so many different things that you can be simulating before you even step foot on the job site and start deploying people. I think that’s going to be a fundamental change.”

With AI-driven simulations, companies can anticipate obstacles long before they occur, leading to more efficient and cost-effective project execution. This predictive capability ensures that businesses are making decisions backed by data, rather than relying on intuition or outdated processes.

Robots Aren’t Our Enemy

A common concern surrounding AI is the fear that automation and robotics will replace human workers. However, Shanbari asserts that these advancements are designed to complement human labor, making jobs safer, more efficient, and ultimately more rewarding. Not only that, but the inclusion of advanced technology may help draw a younger audience to the field, a demographic that Shanbari believes is missing from construction.

“People kind of get wary [that] robots are coming for our jobs. No, they’re coming to augment your job, to make it easier, safer, more efficient, you know, and help us with the great labor shortage that we are dealing with as an industry, because it’s not attractive enough as an industry for the young generation to get into. Hopefully, with all this technology, robotics, AI, and different developments, we can start attracting more and more of the new generation in different fields that we don’t incorporate in the construction industry right now.”

Rather than eliminating jobs, AI-driven automation is filling critical gaps in industries struggling with workforce shortages. By taking on repetitive or hazardous tasks, robots allow skilled workers to focus on higher-value aspects of their roles, ultimately driving greater productivity and job satisfaction.

AI As a Catalyst for Change

AI is no longer a distant concept. It is actively transforming industries by enhancing communication, optimizing design, and streamlining operations. Leaders who embrace AI-driven tools will find themselves at the forefront of their fields, able to iterate faster, solve complex challenges, and execute projects with unprecedented efficiency. As Shanbari’s insights demonstrate, AI is not just a tool;  it’s a game-changer.

Brightidea helps organizations turn ideas into impact. Schedule a Hackathon 5 demo today to see how we can help revolutionize your next event at Brightidea.com.

Former Google, Atlassian, and McKinsey leader shares his perspective on fostering innovation, overcoming organizational blockers, and the role of AI in the future of high-performing teams.

Innovation doesn’t happen in a vacuum — it thrives in environments that encourage experimentation, rapid iteration, and real-world feedback. Few people understand this better than Dan Chuparkoff, a product management veteran who has spent over 30 years leading teams at some of the world’s most innovative companies, including Google, Atlassian, and McKinsey & Company. Today, as a keynote speaker and innovation consultant, Dan helps organizations navigate the evolving landscape of AI, remote collaboration, and the future of high-performing teams.

We sat down with Dan to discuss what separates high performers from the rest, how AI is reshaping the innovation process, and why hackathons are a game changer for companies that want to turn ideas into impact.

Key takeaways

• Structure hackathons around execution, not just ideation. Ensure that hackathons focus on building and shipping real prototypes that can be tested and refined.
• Test ideas in the real world, not just in meetings. Move beyond committee-driven idea selection and focus on gathering customer feedback as early as possible.
• Start with the smallest, most actionable version of your idea. Prioritize small, fast experiments over large, complex plans to accelerate innovation.
• Create a dedicated space for safe experimentation. Encourage employees to explore new ideas in a controlled, low-risk environment before committing resources.
• Use AI as a brainstorming partner, but trust human judgment for decision-making. Leverage AI to generate ideas, but rely on human experience and strategic priorities to decide which ones to pursue.

Structure Hackathons Around Execution, Not Just Ideation

Many organizations host hackathons but struggle to turn the resulting ideas into real products. They’re often treated as brainstorming events rather than platforms for meaningful innovation. While creativity and idea generation are crucial, hackathons should be designed to drive actual execution. Dan’s experience at Atlassian offers a valuable lesson into how hackathons should be approached.

“At Atlassian, we had ‘Ship It Days,’ which was different from the typical hackathon. The only way for an idea to count was if it got shipped — it had to be deployed and functional by the end of the event. A lot of companies assume they have an ideation problem, but in reality, they have an execution problem. The challenge isn’t coming up with ideas; it’s making sure those ideas don’t just sit in a backlog collecting dust. The best hackathons are designed to force real action.”

By shifting the focus from brainstorming to building, hackathons become powerful tools for driving measurable impact. Instead of merely celebrating creativity, organizations should integrate hackathons into their long-term innovation strategy. This means structuring hackathons in a way that ideas are not only generated but also validated, tested, and refined. When executed effectively, hackathons empower employees, fuel innovation pipelines, and drive meaningful business outcomes.

Test Ideas in the Real World, Not Just in Meetings

Many organizations fall into the trap of spending too much time debating and analyzing ideas rather than acting on them. Companies that succeed in innovation prioritize rapid experimentation, allowing real customer responses to dictate direction rather than internal debates. This approach helps avoid bias, ensures a more agile strategy, and allows for faster adaptation to changing customer needs. Many organizations rely on internal committees to vote on ideas, but Dan believes that’s a flawed approach.

“The companies that really do it well are the ones that get the little seeds of ideas into the market as soon as possible and start paying close attention to customer reactions. It’s not about debating which ideas seem best in a boardroom — it’s about putting something in front of real users and letting their responses shape the direction. Customers don’t always articulate exactly what they want, but their behavior tells you everything. Capturing data, identifying early excitement, and iterating based on real-world use — that’s what separates successful companies from those stuck in endless planning cycles.”

Instead of relying on opinions, the most innovative companies use customer feedback to validate ideas. They shift from a mindset of perfection to one of continuous improvement. By engaging real users as co-creators in the innovation process, companies build products and solutions that are more aligned with market needs.

Start With the Smallest, Most Actionable Version of Your Idea

A common misconception about innovation is that big ideas need big launches. Many companies hesitate to take action because they believe their ideas need to be fully formed before going to market. This mindset often leads to prolonged development cycles, unnecessary complexity, and missed opportunities.

Instead, successful teams focus on what Dan calls ‘finding the smallest, most actionable version’ of an idea. This approach reduces risk, accelerates learning, and increases the likelihood of success. By breaking down a big vision into smaller, testable components, teams can rapidly validate assumptions and iterate based on real-world feedback. This method also ensures that resources are spent efficiently, focusing only on what truly resonates with customers rather than what seems good in theory. Dan argues that truly effective teams focus on finding the simplest version of an idea to test first.

“People often get caught up in making something perfect before they share it, but that’s the wrong approach. The only thing that really matters is getting something tangible in front of customers as quickly as possible. The best teams are the ones that understand how to strip an idea down to its core — what’s the smallest, simplest thing we can test right now? If you wait until you’ve built everything, you’ve wasted valuable time. The key is to release, gather real-world data, and iterate. That’s where real innovation happens.”

This philosophy is deeply rooted in agile principles, but many teams lose sight of its essence. Instead of embracing agility as a means of fast learning through iteration, they become bogged down by overly rigid frameworks, excessive documentation, and unnecessary bureaucratic processes. True agility isn’t about following a prescribed set of rituals, it’s about learning as quickly as possible through small, incremental experiments. Successful innovators create feedback loops where each small test informs the next step, leading to faster adaptation and a better end product.

Create a Dedicated Space for Safe Experimentation

One of the biggest blockers to innovation is the lack of a safe space. Many organizations, particularly those in highly regulated industries, are reluctant to take risks. True innovation requires a balance, allowing room for safe failure while maintaining strategic oversight. Companies that encourage controlled experimentation benefit from rapid learning cycles, where employees can test bold ideas in a structured but low-risk environment.

Creating a culture where experimentation is encouraged, rather than penalized, is key to long-term adaptability and success. Dan believes that organizations must be intentional about building ‘sandboxes’: Dedicated spaces for teams to explore new ideas, refine emerging technologies, and iterate without the fear of repercussions.

“The most innovative companies foster a culture of experimentation. Whether it’s AI, automation, or any other emerging technology, teams need the ability to play, iterate, and experiment without immediate high stakes. If a company’s first exposure to a new technology happens only after it’s already widely adopted, they’re already behind. The best organizations give their people the space to explore — whether that means personal projects, dedicated R&D time, or internal hackathons — so that when the time comes to make a strategic decision, they’re prepared.”

Encouraging employees to test new tools and approaches in a low-risk environment accelerates learning and helps organizations adapt faster. Companies can implement experimentation frameworks, such as innovation labs, pilot programs, or cross-functional ideation sessions, to ensure that new ideas don’t just sit in a backlog but get actively tested. Organizations that cultivate this mindset gain a significant competitive advantage, as their teams develop a deep familiarity with emerging trends before they become industry standards.

Use AI as a Brainstorming Partner, But Trust Human Judgment for Decision-Making

AI has made it easier than ever to generate ideas, but Dan warns against treating it as an automatic decision-maker. While AI can quickly produce thousands of suggestions, its limitations lie in its lack of human intuition, emotional intelligence, and strategic foresight. The real power of AI lies in its ability to augment human creativity by generating diverse perspectives, helping teams break through mental roadblocks and streamline ideation. Organizations that learn to balance AI’s speed with human discernment will find themselves making better, more informed decisions.

“AI is an incredible brainstorming assistant, but it doesn’t have the context or judgment to determine what’s actually valuable. If you need 150 new ideas, AI can give them to you instantly, but it won’t necessarily tell you which ones to act on. That’s where human judgment comes in. The best approach is to use AI to help with ideation — pulling from a wider range of possibilities than we might naturally consider — but then have people apply their knowledge, intuition, and experience to decide which ideas should move forward.”

The key is to use AI to enhance human creativity, not replace it. Teams should implement structured decision-making frameworks that incorporate AI-generated insights while ensuring that human experts validate and refine the final selection. Successful integration of AI requires organizations to establish clear guidelines for how AI-driven ideas are evaluated, tested, and refined. Companies that adopt this hybrid model of combining AI’s computational power with human creativity and strategic thinking will stay ahead of the competition and create more innovative, impactful, and sustainable solutions.

Turning Ideas Into Impact

Dan Chuparkoff’s insights reinforce the importance of real-world testing, iterative development, and creating a culture of experimentation. At BrightIdea, we help organizations put these principles into action. Our innovation management platform provides teams the tools to capture ideas, run experiments, and scale their best solutions. Whether you’re looking to optimize your ideation process or drive execution with hackathons, we can help you turn your best ideas into measurable impact. Contact us today to learn more.

Want to hear more from Dan? Follow him on LinkedIn and keep an eye out for his upcoming book, The Innovation Machine, coming fall 2025.