Author Archives: Braden Kelley

About Braden Kelley

Braden Kelley is a Human-Centered Experience, Innovation and Transformation consultant at HCL Technologies, a popular innovation speaker, and creator of the FutureHacking™ and Human-Centered Change™ methodologies. He is the author of Stoking Your Innovation Bonfire from John Wiley & Sons and Charting Change (Second Edition) from Palgrave Macmillan. Braden is a US Navy veteran and earned his MBA from top-rated London Business School. Follow him on Linkedin, Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.

Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2023

8 Replies

Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2023After a week of torrid voting and much passionate support, along with a lot of gut-wrenching consideration and jostling during the judging round, I am proud to announce your Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2023:

  1. Robyn Bolton
    Robyn BoltonRobyn M. Bolton works with leaders of mid and large sized companies to use innovation to repeatably and sustainably grow their businesses.
  2. Janet Sernack
    Janet SernackJanet Sernack is the Founder and CEO of ImagineNation™ which provides innovation consulting services to help organizations adapt, innovate and grow through disruption by challenging businesses to be, think and act differently to co-create a world where people matter & innovation is the norm.
  3. Greg Satell
    Greg SatellGreg Satell is a popular speaker and consultant. His first book, Mapping Innovation: A Playbook for Navigating a Disruptive Age, was selected as one of the best business books in 2017. Follow his blog at Digital Tonto or on Twitter @Digital Tonto.
  4. Mike Shipulski
    Mike ShipulskiMike Shipulski brings together people, culture, and tools to change engineering behavior. He writes daily on Twitter as @MikeShipulski and weekly on his blog Shipulski On Design.
  5. Braden Kelley
    Braden KelleyBraden Kelley is a Human-Centered Experience, Innovation and Transformation consultant at HCL Technologies, a popular innovation speaker, workshop leader, and creator of the Human-Centered Change™ methodology. He is the author of Stoking Your Innovation Bonfire from John Wiley & Sons and Charting Change from Palgrave Macmillan. Follow him on Linkedin, Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.
  6. John Bessant
    John BessantJohn Bessant has been active in research, teaching, and consulting in technology and innovation management for over 25 years. Today, he is Chair in Innovation and Entrepreneurship, and Research Director, at Exeter University. In 2003, he was awarded a Fellowship with the Advanced Institute for Management Research and was also elected a Fellow of the British Academy of Management. He has acted as advisor to various national governments and international bodies including the United Nations, The World Bank, and the OECD. John has authored many books including Managing innovation and High Involvement Innovation (Wiley). Follow @johnbessant
  7. Pete Foley
    A twenty-five year Procter & Gamble veteran, Pete has spent the last 8+ years applying insights from psychology and behavioral science to innovation, product design, and brand communication. He spent 17 years as a serial innovator, creating novel products, perfume delivery systems, cleaning technologies, devices and many other consumer-centric innovations, resulting in well over 100 granted or published patents. Find him at pete.mindmatters@gmail.com
  8. Geoffrey A. Moore
    Geoffrey MooreGeoffrey A. Moore is an author, speaker and business advisor to many of the leading companies in the high-tech sector, including Cisco, Cognizant, Compuware, HP, Microsoft, SAP, and Yahoo! Best known for Crossing the Chasm and Zone to Win with the latest book being The Infinite Staircase. Partner at Wildcat Venture Partners. Chairman Emeritus Chasm Group & Chasm Institute
  9. David Burkus
    David BurkusDr. David Burkus is an organizational psychologist and best-selling author. Recognized as one of the world’s leading business thinkers, his forward-thinking ideas and books are helping leaders and teams do their best work ever. David is the author of five books about business and leadership and he’s been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Harvard Business Review, CNN, the BBC, NPR, and more. A former business school professor turned sought-after international speaker, he’s worked with organizations of all sizes and across all industries.
  10. Shep Hyken
    Shep HykenShep Hyken is a customer service expert, keynote speaker, and New York Times, bestselling business author. For information on The Customer Focus™ customer service training programs, go to www.thecustomerfocus.com. Follow on Twitter: @Hyken

    11. Build a common language of innovation on your team

  11. Howard Tiersky
    Howard TierskyHoward Tiersky is an inspiring and passionate speaker, the Founder and CEO of FROM, The Digital Transformation Agency, innovation consultant, serial entrepreneur, and the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of Winning Digital Customers: The Antidote to Irrelevance. IDG named him one of the “10 Digital Transformation Influencers to Follow Today”, and Enterprise Management 360 named Howard “One of the Top 10 Digital Transformation Influencers That Will Change Your World.”
  12. Dennis Stauffer
    Dennis StaufferDennis Stauffer is an author, independent researcher, and expert on personal innovativeness. He is the founder of Innovator Mindset LLC which helps individuals, teams, and organizations enhance and accelerate innovation success. by shifting mindset. Follow @DennisStauffer
  13. Stefan Lindegaard
    Stefan LindegaardStefan Lindegaard is an author, speaker and strategic advisor. His work focuses on corporate transformation based on disruption, digitalization and innovation in large corporations, government organizations and smaller companies. Stefan believes that business today requires an open and global perspective, and his work takes him to Europe, North and South America, Africa and Asia.
  14. Douglas Ferguson
    Douglas FergusonDouglas Ferguson is an entrepreneur and human-centered technologist. He is the founder and president of Voltage Control, an Austin-based change agency that helps enterprises spark, accelerate, and sustain innovation. He specializes in helping teams work better together through participatory decision making and design inspired facilitation techniques.
  15. Teresa Spangler
    Teresa SpanglerTeresa Spangler is the CEO of PlazaBridge Group has been a driving force behind innovation and growth for more than 30 years. Today, she wears multiple hats as a social entrepreneur, innovation expert, growth strategist, author and speaker (not to mention mother, wife, band-leader and so much more). She is especially passionate about helping CEOs understand and value the role human capital plays in innovation, and the impact that innovation has on humanity; in our ever-increasing artificial/cyber world.
  16. Soren Kaplan
    Soren KaplanSoren Kaplan is the bestselling and award-winning author of Leapfrogging and The Invisible Advantage, an affiliated professor at USC’s Center for Effective Organizations, a former corporate executive, and a co-founder of UpBOARD. He has been recognized by the Thinkers50 as one of the world’s top keynote speakers and thought leaders in business strategy and innovation.
  17. Steve Blank
    Steve BlankSteve Blank is an Adjunct Professor at Stanford and Senior Fellow for Innovation at Columbia University. He has been described as the Father of Modern Entrepreneurship, credited with launching the Lean Startup movement that changed how startups are built; how entrepreneurship is taught; how science is commercialized, and how companies and the government innovate.
  18. Diana Porumboiu
    Diana PorumboiuDiana heads marketing at Viima, the most widely used and highest rated innovation management software in the world, and has a passion for innovation, and for genuine, valuable content that creates long-lasting impact. Her combination of creativity, strategic thinking and curiosity has helped organisations grow their online presence through strategic campaigns, community management and engaging content.
  19. Robert B Tucker
    Robert TuckerRobert B. Tucker is the President of The Innovation Resource Consulting Group. He is a speaker, seminar leader and an expert in the management of innovation and assisting companies in accelerating ideas to market.
  20. Dainora Jociute
    Dainora JociuteDainora (a.k.a. Dee) creates customer-centric content at Viima. Viima is the most widely used and highest rated innovation management software in the world. Passionate about environmental issues, Dee writes about sustainable innovation hoping to save the world – one article at the time.

    21. Accelerate your change and transformation success

  21. Arlen Meyers
    Arlen MyersArlen Meyers, MD, MBA is an emeritus professor at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, an instructor at the University of Colorado-Denver Business School and cofounding President and CEO of the Society of Physician Entrepreneurs at www.sopenet.org. Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ameyers/
  22. Ayelet Baron
    Ayelet BaronAyelet Baron is a pioneering futurist reminding us we are powerful creators through award winning books, daily blog and thinking of what is possible. Former global tech executive who sees trust, relationships and community as our building blocks to a healthy world.
  23. Leo Chan
    Leo ChanLeo is the founder of Abound Innovation Inc. He’s a people and heart-first entrepreneur who believes everyone can be an innovator. An innovator himself, with 55 US patents and over 20 years of experience, Leo has come alongside organizations like Chick-fil-A and guided them to unleash the innovative potential of their employees by transforming them into confident innovators.
  24. Rachel Audige
    Rachel AudigeRachel Audige is an Innovation Architect who helps organisations embed inventive thinking as well as a certified Systematic Inventive Thinking Facilitator, based in Melbourne.
  25. Art Inteligencia
    Art InteligenciaArt Inteligencia is the lead futurist at Inteligencia Ltd. He is passionate about content creation and thinks about it as more science than art. Art travels the world at the speed of light, over mountains and under oceans. His favorite numbers are one and zero.
  26. Paul Sloane
    Paul SloanePaul Sloane writes, speaks and leads workshops on creativity, innovation and leadership. He is the author of The Innovative Leader and editor of A Guide to Open Innovation and Crowdsourcing, both published by Kogan-Page.
  27. Phil McKinney
    Phil McKinneyPhil McKinney is the Author of “Beyond The Obvious”​, Host of the Killer Innovations Podcast and Syndicated Radio Show, a Keynote Speaker, President & CEO CableLabs and an Innovation Mentor and Coach.
  28. Ralph Christian Ohr
    Ralph OhrDr. Ralph-Christian Ohr has extensive experience in product/innovation management for international technology-based companies. His particular interest is targeted at the intersection of organizational and human innovation capabilities. You can follow him on Twitter @Ralph_Ohr.
  29. Jeffrey Phillips
    Jeffrey Phillips has over 15 years of experience leading innovation in Fortune 500 companies, federal government agencies and non-profits. He is experienced in innovation strategy, defining and implementing front end processes, tools and teams and leading innovation projects. He is the author of Relentless Innovation and OutManeuver. Jeffrey writes the popular Innovate on Purpose blog. Follow him @ovoinnovation
  30. Dean and Linda Anderson
    Dean and Linda AndersonDr. Dean Anderson and Dr. Linda Ackerman Anderson lead BeingFirst, a consultancy focused on educating the marketplace about what’s possible in personal, organizational and community transformation and how to achieve them. Each has been advising clients and training professionals for more than 40 years.

    31. Get the Change Planning Toolkit

  31. Shilpi Kumar
    Shilpi KumarShilpi Kumar an inquisitive researcher, designer, strategist and an educator with over 15 years of experience, who truly believes that we can design a better world by understanding human behavior. I work with organizations to identify strategic opportunities and offer user-centric solutions.
  32. Scott Anthony
    Scott AnthonyScott Anthony is a strategic advisor, writer and speaker on topics of growth and innovation. He has been based in Singapore since 2010, and currently serves at the Managing Director of Innosight’s Asia-Pacific operations.
  33. Anthony Mills
    Anthony MillsAnthony Mills is the Founder & CEO of Legacy Innovation Group (www.legacyinnova.com), a world-leading strategic innovation consulting firm working with organizations all over the world. Anthony is also the Executive Director of GInI – Global Innovation Institute (www.gini.org), the world’s foremost certification, accreditation, and membership organization in the field of innovation. Anthony has advised leaders from around the world on how to successfully drive long-term growth and resilience through new innovation. Learn more at www.anthonymills.com. Anthony can be reached directly at anthony@anthonymills.com.
  34. Paul Hobcraft
    Paul HobcraftPaul Hobcraft runs Agility Innovation, an advisory business that stimulates sound innovation practice, researches topics that relate to innovation for the future, as well as aligning innovation to organizations core capabilities. Follow @paul4innovating
  35. Jorge Barba
    Jorge BarbaJorge Barba is a strategist and entrepreneur, who helps companies build new puzzles using human skills. He is a global Innovation Insurgent and author of the innovation blog www.Game-Changer.net
  36. Chateau G Pato
    Chateau G PatoChateau G Pato is a senior futurist at Inteligencia Ltd. She is passionate about content creation and thinks about it as more science than art. Chateau travels the world at the speed of light, over mountains and under oceans. Her favorite numbers are one and zero.
  37. Jesse Nieminen
    Jesse NieminenJesse Nieminen is the Co-founder and Chairman at Viima, the best way to collect and develop ideas. Viima’s innovation management software is already loved by thousands of organizations all the way to the Global Fortune 500. He’s passionate about helping leaders drive innovation in their organizations and frequently writes on the topic, usually in Viima’s blog.
  38. Alain Thys
    Alain ThysAs an experience architect, Alain helps leaders craft customer, employee and shareholder experiences for profit, reinvention and transformation. He does this through his personal consultancy Alain Thys & Co as well as the transformative venture studio Agents of A.W.E. Together with his teams, Alain has influenced the experience of over 500 million customers and 350,000 employees. Follow his blog or connect on Linkedin.
  39. Bruce Fairley
    Bruce FairleyBruce Fairley is the CEO and Founder of The Narrative Group, a firm dedicated to helping C-Suite executives build enterprise value. Through smart, human-powered digital transformation, Bruce optimizes the business-technology relationship. His innovative profit over pitfalls approach and customized programs are part of Bruce’s mission to build sustainable ‘best-future’ outcomes for visionary leaders. Having spearheaded large scale change initiatives across four continents, he and his skilled, diverse team elevate process, culture, and the bottom line for medium to large firms worldwide.
  40. Tom Stafford
    Tom StaffordTom Stafford studies learning and decision making. His main focus is the movement system – the idea being that if we can understand the intelligence of simple actions we will have an excellent handle on intelligence more generally. His research looks at simple decision making, and simple skill learning, using measures of behaviour informed by the computational, robotics and neuroscience work done in the wider group.

If your favorite didn’t make the list, then next year try to rally more votes for them or convince them to increase the quality and quantity of their contributions.

Our lists from the ten previous years have been tremendously popular, including:

Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2015
Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2016
Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2017
Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2018
Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2019
Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2020
Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2021
Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2022

Download PDF versions of the Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2020, 2021 and 2022 lists here:


Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2020 PDF . . . Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2021

Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2022 . . . Top 40 Innovation Bloggers of 2023

Happy New Year everyone!

Subscribe to Human-Centered Change & Innovation WeeklySign up here to get Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to your inbox every week.

Top 10 Thanksgiving Innovations of All Time

Leave a reply

According to OpenAI, ChatGPT, and Tom the Turkey

Top 10 Thanksgiving Innovations of All Time

by Braden Kelley

Call me crazy, but I’ve always been a big believer in fun as a key component to the successful pursuit of innovation.

In the spirit of this belief and to celebrate this year’s Thanksgiving Holiday I thought I would ask OpenAI to make a list of the top ten Thanksgiving innovations of all time because I honestly have no idea what to put on such a list. So, in honor of the holiday, here is what it came up with:

1. Turkey Fryer: The invention of the turkey fryer revolutionized Thanksgiving cooking, providing a faster and delicious alternative to traditional roasting methods.

2. Canned Cranberry Sauce: The introduction of canned cranberry sauce made it easier to serve this beloved Thanksgiving side dish, eliminating the need to cook fresh cranberries.

3. Instant Pot: This versatile kitchen appliance has made Thanksgiving meal preparation much quicker and hassle-free, reducing cooking time for dishes like mashed potatoes and soups.

4. Green Bean Casserole: Created in 1955 by a staff member of Campbell Soup Company, the green bean casserole quickly became a Thanksgiving staple, providing a tasty and easy-to-make side dish.

5. Thanksgiving Parades: Starting with the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in 1924, Thanksgiving parades have become a cherished tradition, bringing joy and entertainment to families across the country.

6. Stuffing Mixes: Pre-packaged stuffing mixes have made it simpler to prepare the traditional stuffing, saving time and effort while still delivering the traditional flavors.

7. Pumpkin Pie Filling: Canned pumpkin pie filling has made it convenient for home cooks to make the quintessential Thanksgiving dessert, allowing everyone to enjoy a delicious pumpkin pie without the hassle of preparing fresh puree.

8. Thanksgiving Football: Thanksgiving football games have been a long-standing tradition for many families, providing entertainment and friendly competition after the big feast.

9. Online Recipe Resources: The availability of online recipe resources has made it easier than ever to find new and creative recipes for Thanksgiving dishes, expanding our culinary horizons and inspiring unique menu ideas.

10. Pop-Up Turkey Timer: This simple but effective innovation takes the guesswork out of roasting a turkey by indicating when it is done, ensuring a perfectly cooked bird.

Maybe I have been living in a cave, but I had never heard of Instant Pot so I had to Bing it. ChatGPT also suggested “Thanksgiving Themed Decor” which I thought was a bad suggestion, so I asked it for three more options to replace that one and ended up swapping it out for the beloved “Pop-Up Turkey Timer.”

I hope you enjoyed the list, have great holiday festivities (however you choose to celebrate) and finally – I am grateful for all of you!

What is your favorite Thanksgiving innovation that you’ve seen or experienced recently?

SPECIAL BONUS: My publisher is having a Thanksgiving sale that will allow you to get the hardcover or the digital version (eBook) of my latest best-selling book Charting Change for 55% off using code CYB23 only until November 30, 2023!

Subscribe to Human-Centered Change & Innovation WeeklySign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.

Simple Innovations Sometimes Are the Best

Leave a reply

Simple Innovations Sometimes Are the Best

by Braden Kelley

Innovations don’t have to be complicated to be impactful. They just need to deliver enough additional value that existing solutions become widely replaced, or flipped around, for the new solution to be widely adopted.

Recently I have been seeing a new simple, yet elegant, solution driving around the streets of Seattle.

It’s pictured in the photo above and it is quite simply the delivery of a temporary license for a newly purchased vehicle that can be printed and installed in a license plate holder in the same way that the eventual traditional license plate will be.

Now, perhaps your state or country already has this, but for me, every vehicle I have ever purchased was instantly defiled by a piece of paper and tape or tape residue that could be difficult remove after a couple months baking in the sun (especially in the summer).

This instant cheapening of a brand new vehicle is now a thing of the past!

Some may say that this is not really that big of a deal because you’re just moving the temporary registration from the back window to now live in the license plate frame, but there are several tangible benefits for multiple parties from this seemingly small change:

  1. Car Owner – improved aesthetics – the car just looks better!
  2. Car Owner – improved safety from increased visibility while driving
  3. State and Car Owner – increased toll revenue so everyone is paying their fair share
  4. Car Owner – improved safety – easier to identify hit and run drivers
  5. Police – improved safety – easier to identify vehicle during traffic stops
  6. Car Owner – improved convenience – easier to quickly find license number when it’s requested

What is your favorite simple innovation that you’ve seen or experienced recently?

Subscribe to Human-Centered Change & Innovation WeeklySign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.

The Power of Dreams

Leave a reply

A Veterans Day Innovation Story

The Power of Dreams - A Veterans Day Innovation Story

by Braden Kelley

On this Veterans Day I send my thanks to all of my fellow veterans for the sacrifices they and their families have made in support of the great nations of the world. Military science has long been a source of innovation that goes beyond the defense of a population. From duct tape, GPS, jet engines and the Internet to nuclear power, sanitary napkins and digital photography, there is an endless list of innovations that owe their existence to investments in military research.

Innovation has always been fueled by exceptional ideas that push the boundaries of what is possible. Some of the most groundbreaking inventions in history have originated from the most unexpected sources, proving that inspiration knows no boundaries. One such remarkable innovation that emerged from the realm of dreams is the M9 Gun Director, a groundbreaking concept envisioned by David Parkinson. Today, we explore the fascinating story of how an ordinary dream sparked an extraordinary revolution in military technology.

Dreams have long been a source of fascination for humanity, acting as the gateway to our subconscious minds, guiding our creativity and problem-solving abilities. Great minds throughout history, from Albert Einstein to Nikola Tesla, have attested to the transformative power of dreams shaping their inventions and discoveries. In the case of David Parkinson, the M9 Gun Director serves as a testament to the astounding potential that lies within our dreams.

The Birth of a Revolutionary Concept

In 1895, Parkinson, a modest engineer by profession, experienced a vivid dream that would forever change the world of military technology. In this dream, he envisioned a device capable of automatically predicting and adjusting the trajectory of a gun, enabling unparalleled precision in aiming and firing. This visionary concept would ultimately become the foundation for the M9 Gun Director and revolutionize artillery warfare as we knew it.

Pursuing the Unconventional

David Parkinson, driven by an insatiable curiosity and an unwavering belief in his dream, embarked on a journey to transform this abstract idea into a tangible reality. Despite facing skepticism and opposition, Parkinson remained undeterred, recognizing the immense potential in his concept. He tirelessly invested his time in research, experimentation, and collaboration, all the while fueled by the hope of revolutionizing military technology.

Bringing Dreams to Life

After years of relentless persistence, Parkinson succeeded in developing a prototype that embodied his vision of the M9 Gun Director. It incorporated advanced mechanisms, including gears, gyroscopes, and other innovative technologies, to predict and adjust artillery gun trajectories with remarkable accuracy. This revolutionary innovation significantly enhanced the efficiency, precision, and destructive power of artillery systems, forever changing the course of warfare worldwide.

Implications and Significance

The advent of the M9 Gun Director marked a turning point in military history, fundamentally altering the dynamics of armed conflict. By harnessing the power of dream-inspired innovation, Parkinson had unlocked a whole new level of precision previously unimaginable in the realm of artillery. This groundbreaking invention significantly reduced casualties, transformed strategic planning, and tilted the balance of power on the battlefield.

Embracing the Power of Dreams

The story of David Parkinson and the M9 Gun Director serves as a testament to the incredible creative potential that lies within each of us. It encourages us to embrace the unexplored territories of our dreams, recognizing them not just as fleeting nocturnal experiences, but as wellsprings of unmatched inspiration. Who knows what other world-changing ideas are waiting to be unleashed from within our subconscious minds?

Image credits: Pixabay

Subscribe to Human-Centered Change & Innovation WeeklySign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.

Where People Go Wrong with Journey Maps

Leave a reply

Where People Go Wrong with Journey Maps

by Braden Kelley

When it comes to doing great customer experience work on behalf of HCLTech clients, journey maps are foundational. But it is harder to create meaningful, actionable journey maps than people might think. Here are a few ways people stray from the optimal path when it comes to journey maps:

  1. Not creating meaningful personas first
  2. Not talking to their chosen group of people before building personas and journey maps (do your research)
  3. Not validating the high-level journey phases internally and externally before beginning to map
  4. Building a journey map for multiple personas without consciously identifying and understanding the risks
  5. Accepting sticky notes during journey mapping sessions as-is — don’t probe to make sure meanings are clear
  6. Failing to cluster similar sticky notes and request permission to combine where appropriate
  7. Not having workshop participants vote on the importance of touchpoints, the intensity of pain points, and impact of experience improvement opportunities

A journey mapping workshop is an incredible opportunity to surface assumptions, uncover the hidden and build alignment, motivate action and create long-term momentum and commitment for people-centric improvements.

Creating Journey Magic

Improving customer experiences is an investment with real returns. These returns can go beyond the financial into the realm of psychological and social benefits. If you didn’t care about these people, you wouldn’t invest the time (and money) to go beyond your marketing or process funnel-based understanding of them and dive deep to understand what their experience and interactions with your organization really look like in a journey mapping workshop.

A well-researched, lovingly crafted journey map can be a thing of beauty that many organizations share far and wide and even print poster-sized and mount in the hallways of their headquarters so that everyone can remain anchored in the experience of those they serve and laser-focused on the latest experience improvement projects.

Continue reading the rest of this article on HCLTech’s blog

Image credits: Pixabay

Subscribe to Human-Centered Change & Innovation WeeklySign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.

An Introduction to Journey Maps

1 Reply

For Mapping Customer, Employee, Patient and Other Journeys

An Introduction to Journey Maps

by Braden Kelley

Journey maps are a key part of visualizing the experience of a defined group of people. Customers may be the most typically selected group, but many other stakeholder groups are equally valid, including employees, patients, students and partners, to name just a few. This is why it is important to keep the term ‘journey maps’ as generic as possible.

They are incredibly useful for aligning project teams — and even the broader organization — around a shared vision of the journey a critical group of people go through from an agreed starting point to a common ending point. Journey maps also help to identify potential areas of improvement in the pursuit of an increasingly exceptional experience.

A journey map breaks down a journey into a handful of phases (typically 5-9), the steps the target group goes through in each phase and the touchpoints that occur at each step in the journey. Journey maps are the prerequisites for the powerful insight generation and analysis that comes next as you dig into the touchpoints and the relevant pain points and experience improvement opportunities within your working group.

Continue reading the rest of this article on HCLTech’s blog

Image credits: Pixabay

Subscribe to Human-Centered Change & Innovation WeeklySign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.

How to Create Personas That Matter

Leave a reply

How to Create Personas That Matter

by Braden Kelley

When doing customer experience work, better to create a range of personas based on where potential customer journeys are likely to diverge and what their behaviors and psychology are.

To create more impactful personas, leave out the demographics and instead choose a collection of representative photos (one per persona), name each persona, and create a descriptive statement for each persona. This is enough. And it will leave you more room (and focus) left for the kinds of information that will better help you not just step into the shoes of the customer, but into their mindset as well. This includes information like:

  1. THEIR business goals
  2. What they need from the company
  3. How they behave
  4. Pain points
  5. One or two key characteristics important for your situation (how they buy, technology they use, etc.)
  6. What shapes their expectations of the company

Focusing more on what the customers think, feel and do will enable your customer experience improvement team to better understand and connect with the needs and motivations of the customers, their journey and what will represent meaningful improvements for them.

Continue reading the rest of this article on HCLTech’s blog

To download a PDF flipbook of this article, click the image below:

Image credits: Pexels

Subscribe to Human-Centered Change & Innovation WeeklySign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.

Customer Experience Personified

Leave a reply

Customer Experience Personified

by Braden Kelley

When it comes to doing great customer experience work on behalf of HCLTech clients, personas are foundational. But it is harder to create meaningful, actionable personas than people might think.

An Introduction to Personas

Personas are a key part of bringing the customer experience, and the customer, to life. Personas set the stage for the activity that most people associate with customer experience work – the journey map. But for most organizations, not all customers have the same journey. So, it is important to identify the relevant and distinct customer groupings that it is critical to build personas for. Personas serve a number of important functions:

  1. Validate customer segments are sufficiently different from each other
  2. Capture key details about each customer segment on a single page
  3. Serve as a quick reference for the chosen customer segment(s)
  4. Visualize each customer segment as a representative individual people can relate to
  5. Empower people to put themselves in the customer’s shoes (and ideally – their mindset)

For optimal results, personas should be built AFTER conducting research to better understand the customer’s experience via interviews, focus groups, and panels directly with customers across a range of customer sizes and types to understand where their journeys, needs and expectations diverge.

Continue reading the rest of this article on HCLTech’s blog

Image credits: Pexels

Subscribe to Human-Centered Change & Innovation WeeklySign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.

Generation AI Replacing Generation Z

7 Replies

Generation AI Replacing Generation Z

by Braden Kelley

The boundary lines between different named generations are a bit fuzzy but the goal should always be to draw the boundary at an event significant enough to create substantial behavior changes in the new generation worthy of consideration in strategy formation.

I believe we have arrived at such a point and that it is time for GenZ to cede the top of strategy mountain to a new generation I call Generation AI (GenAI).

The dividing line for Generation AI falls around 2014 and the people of GenAI are characterized by being the first group of people to grow up not knowing a world without easy access to generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools that begin to transform their interactions with our institutions and each other.

We have already seen professors and teachers having to police AI-generated school essays, while the rest of us are trying to cope with frighteningly realistic deep fake audio and video. But what other impacts on people’s behavior will we see as a result of the coming ubiquity of artificial intelligence?

It is important to remember that generative artificial intelligence is not really artificial intelligence but collective intelligence informed by what we the people have contributed to the training/reference set. As such these large language models are predicting the next word or combining existing content based on whatever training set they are exposed to. They are not creating original thought.

Generative AI is being built into nearly all of our existing software and cloud tools, and GenAI will grow up only knowing a reality where every application and web site they interact with will have an AI component to it. Generation AI will not know a time where they cannot ask an AI, in the same way that GenZ relies on social search, and Gen X and Millenials assume search engines hold their answers.

Our brains are changing to focus more on processing and less on storage. These changes make us more capable, but more vulnerable too.

This new AI technology represents a double-edge sword and its effects could fall on either edge of the sword in different areas:

Option 1 – Best Case

  • Generative AI will amplify creativity by encouraging recombination of existing images, text, audio and video in new inspiring ways using the outputs of AI as inputs into human creativity

Option 2 – Worst Case

  • Generative AI will reduce creativity because people will become reliant on using artificial intelligence to create, creating an echo chamber of new content only created from existing content, leading to AI outputs becoming the only outputs and a world where people spend more time interacting with AI’s than with other people

Which of these two options on the impact of AI reliance do you see as the most likely in the areas where you focus?

How do you see Generation AI impacting the direction of societies around the world?

Are you planning to add Generation AI to your marketing strategies and strategic planning for 2024 or beyond?

Reference

For reference, here is timeline of previous American generations according to an article from NPR:

Though there is a consensus on the general time period for generations, there is not an agreement on the exact year that each generation begins and ends.

Generation Z – Born 2001-2013 (Age 10-22)

These kids were the first born with the Internet and are suspected to be the most individualistic and technology-dependent generation. Sometimes referred to as the iGeneration.

EDITOR’S NOTE: This description is erroneous, the differentiating factor of GenZ is that they experienced the rise of social media.

Millennials – Born 1980-2000 (Age 23-43)

They experienced the rise of the Internet, Sept. 11 and the wars that followed. Sometimes called Generation Y. Because of their dependence on technology, they are said to be entitled and narcissistic.

Generation X – Born 1965-1979 (Age 44-58)

They were originally called the baby busters because fertility rates fell after the boomers. As teenagers, they experienced the AIDs epidemic and the fall of the Berlin Wall. Sometimes called the MTV Generation, the “X” in their name refers to this generation’s desire not to be defined.

EDITOR’S NOTE: GenX also experienced the rise of the personal computer and this has influenced their parenting of a large portion of Millenials and GenZ

Baby Boomers – Born 1943-1964 (Age 59-80)

The boomers were born during an economic and baby boom following World War II. These hippie kids protested against the Vietnam War and participated in the civil rights movement, all with rock ‘n’ roll music blaring in the background.

Silent Generation – Born 1925-1942 (Age 81-98)

They were too young to see action in World War II and too old to participate in the fun of the Summer of Love. This label describes their conformist tendencies and belief that following the rules was a sure ticket to success.

GI Generation – Born 1901-1924 (Age 99+)

They were teenagers during the Great Depression and fought in World War II. Sometimes called the greatest generation (following a book by journalist Tom Brokaw) or the swing generation because of their jazz music.

If you’d like to sign up to learn more about my new FutureHacking™ methodology and set of tools, go here.

Build a Common Language of Innovation on your team

Subscribe to Human-Centered Change & Innovation WeeklySign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.

Mystery of Stonehenge Solved

1 Reply

Mystery of Stonehenge Solved

by Braden Kelley

Forget about capturing and reverse engineering alien spacecraft to gain a competitive edge in the innovation race. Sorry, but the universe is billions of years old and even if some extra terrestrial civilization millions or billions of years older than our own managed to travel here from halfway across the galaxy and crash, it is very likely that we would be incapable of reverse engineering their technology.

Why?

When the United States captures a downed enemy aircraft we can reverse engineer it because at its core it is still an aircraft made of similar materials to those we use and made using similar manufacturing processes. Meaning that we already have the capabilities to build something similar, we just need a physical example or blueprints of the aircraft.

But, when you are talking about something made using technology thousands, millions, or billions of years more advanced than our own, it becomes less likely that we would be able to reverse engineer found technology. This is because there would likely be materials involved that we haven’t discovered yet, either entirely new elements on the periodic table or alloys that we don’t yet know how to make. Imagine what would happen if a slightly damaged Apollo-era Saturn V rocket suddenly appeared circa 50 AD next to the Pantheon in Rome. How long would it be before the Romans would be able to fly to the moon?

If a large, and overdue, solar event were to occur and destroy all of our electricity-based technology, how long would it take for us to be able to achieve spaceflight again?

Apocalypse Innovation

There is no doubt that human beings developed a different set of technologies prior to the last great apocalypse and most of this knowledge has been lost through time, warfare, and 400 feet of water or 20 feet of earth. Only tall stone constructions away from prehistoric coastlines or items locked away in dry underground vaults survived. History and technology are incredibly perishable.

Twelve thousand years later we have achieved some pretty remarkable achievements and ground penetrating radar is giving us new insight into the scope and scale of pre-apocalypse societies hidden undersea and underground.

But, there are a great many mysteries from the ancient world that we are still struggling to reverse engineer. From the pyramids to Stonehenge, people are hypothesizing a number of ways these monuments may have been built and what their true purpose might have been.

Nine years ago researchers from the University of Amsterdam determined that the blocks on stone moved around on the Giza plateau on sledges would have moved easier if someone went before them wetting the sand.

Eleven years ago, American Wally Wallington of Michigan showed in a YouTube video how he could move stones weighing more than a ton up to 300 feet per hour and then stand them up vertically all by himself.

He didn’t invent some amazing new piece of technology to do this, but instead eschewed modern technology and showed how he can do this using basic principles of physics and gravity. First let’s look at the video and then we’ll talk about what apocalypse innovation exercise is:

The apocalypse innovation exercise is one way of challenging orthodoxies and is quite simple:

  1. Identify a technology or input that is key to your product or service achieving its goal
  2. Concoct a simple reason why this technology no longer functions or this input is no longer available
  3. Have the group begin to ideate alternative inputs that could be used or alternate technologies that could be leveraged or developed to make the product or service achieve its goal again (If you are looking for a new technology, what are the first principles that you could go back to? And what are the other technology paths you could explore instead? – i.e. acoustic levitation instead of electromagnetic levitation)
  4. Pick one from the list of available options
  5. Re-engage the group to backcast what it will take to replace the existing technology or input with this new one (NOTE: backcasting is the practice of working backwards to show how an outcome will be achieved)
  6. Sketch out how the product or service will change as result of using this new technology or input
  7. Brainstorm ways that this change can be positioned as a benefit for customers

Apocalypse innovation can be a valuable innovation exercise for those products or services approaching the upper flattening of the traditional ‘S’ curve that pretty much all innovations go through and represents one way that can lead you to the steeper part of a new ‘S’ curve.

What other exercises do you like to use to help people challenge orthodoxies?

If you’d like to sign up to learn more about my new FutureHacking™ methodology and set of tools, go here.

Build a Common Language of Innovation on your team

Subscribe to Human-Centered Change & Innovation WeeklySign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.