(20:11)

In this podcast, Steve Shapiro, InnoCentive's vice president of strategic consulting, talks about how InnoCentive's open innovation model has helped companies solve the most challenging problems.

When the Oil Spill Recovery Institute in Alaska wanted to find out how to pump out the almost solidified oil at the bottom of Prince William Sound from the Exxon Valdez spill, the Institute did not turn to its researchers. Instead they posted a challenge to InnoCentive, an emerging company that specializes in open innovation, also called crowdsourcing. According to The New York Times, the Institute paid John Davis, a chemist from Illinois, more than $20,000 for his idea. Davis, an expert on cement, figured that if making cement vibrate can keep it from hardening, then a similar concept can be adapted to keep the oil in the tanks from freezing.

Founded in 1998 by three scientists working for Eli Lilly, the major pharmaceutical company, InnoCentive, became an independent company in 2005. To date InnoCentive companies, such as Dow Chemical and Procter & Gamble, and not-for-profits have posted more than 1000 challenges on InnoCentive. Research areas include everything from business processes to chemistry. Steven Shapiro, InnoCentive's vice president of strategic consulting, says that today's corporations cannot depend on their internal research and development departments to solve their toughest problems. "They need to look at external resources. InnoCentive enables these organizations to tap into a global network of more than 200,000 solvers who enjoy the challenge of competing for a cash reward. Our partnership with the Rockefeller Foundation is helping to solve problems posted by not-for-profits working in poor countries."

In this podcast, Shapiro explains the reasons for using open innovation to solve tough problems, InnoCentive's business model for generating revenue, some of InnoCentive's most successful challenges, the benefits of using InnoCentive, and the challenges this company faces in this economy.

Bio
Steve Shapiro is InnoCentive's vice president of strategic consulting. He founded the 24/7 Innovation Group, a management research and education company focused on helping organizations be more competitive. Before 24/7, Shapiro spent 15 years with Accenture, where he established and led its Global Process Excellence Practice. He delivered innovation training to 20,000 Accenture consultants. His books include 24/7 Innovation, Goal-Free Living, and The Little Book of BIG Innovation Ideas. He earned a B.S. in Engineering from the School of Operations Research and Information Engineering at Cornell University.

Resources
Open Business Model Player InnoCentive Radically Expands Its Markets, Opensource.Association

http://freethinkr.wordpress.com/2007/09/21/open-business-model-player-innocentive-radically-expands-its-markets/

If You Have a Problem, Ask Everyone, The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/22/science/22inno.html

Crowdsourcing Innovation: Q&A with Dwayne Spradlin of InnoCentive, Fast Company
http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/kermit-pattison/fast-talk/millions-eyes-prize-qa-dwayne-spradlin-innocentive

Production Credits
Elizabeth Ferrarini, Executive Producer
Content Strategy and Media Production by Tom Parish, Inc.

(25:22)

In this podcast, Hank Leingang, the former global CIO for the Bechtel Group and the former CIO for Viacom, talks about the leadership qualities global CIOs need in order to be effective across the enterprise.

Within the last five years, the qualities needed by global CIOs of Fortune 2500 companies have changed radically. The CIO role has become more pervasive, touching just about aspect of the enterprise, as well as every constituency the organization has. As a result, CIOs have to be more than  technologists. Of course, they need to understand how different technologies relate to one another to drive business processes. More important, CIOs need to be business leaders who can do the following:

• sit at the executive management table and collaborate with other team members;
• exhibit some depth around their opinions;
• understand how things get done in the organization;
• influence others;
• listen and learn;
• collaborate with business unit leaders;
• and communicate effectively with all constituencies from the start.

Hank Leinging understands the role of the global CIO for a major company. He spent five years as the global CIO of Bechtel Group, Inc. and seven years as the global CIO of Viacom. Today, he is a senior consultant at Korn/Ferry International, one of the world's largest executive search firms. He works with clients to identify their enterprise IT needs and to fill those positions with qualified executives, such as CIOs and CTOs, and people who report to them.

Leingang says that the assessment for CIOs, for example, goes far beyond the functional competencies an organization needs. He says, "We look at a candidate's leadership characteristics and reputation in the industry. A CIO's longevity in this environment requires the ability to develop and to execute a communications plan. CIOs need to understand their constituencies and proactively to communicate with them, rather than reacting to them. Because the CIO role now touches just about every part of the organization, you might provide products and services that meet customers' needs, you might drive new strategic opportunities for the business, or you might transform how the business operates."

So what is driving a CIO's increase need for this high degree of interaction? Leingang says it has to do with what he calls the commercial architecture.  While the technology architecture looks at all of the diverse technologies in the portfolio, the commercial architecture looks at all of the diverse, global relationships between the entities that supply these technologies. These suppliers could include in-house sources, third-party sources, or a combination of the two. Leingang says, "The commercial architecture manages all of the relationships with those suppliers across the global enterprise.  To this end, CIOs have to structure all of these relationships, and integrate them into the technology portfolio both locally and globally so there is no disruption. CIOs have to accomplish these things while driving innovation."

In this podcast, Leingang goes into more detail about what qualities global companies want in CIOs, how the CIO role has changed, why some CIOs have trouble achieving business impact of IT, and how the next generation of CIOs differs from current CIOs.

Bio
Hank (Henry) Leingang is a senior consultant and key member of Korn/Ferry International's Information Technology Officers Center of Expertise. Based in San Francisco, Leingang helps drive the firm's executive search capabilities around the CIO function. Before joining Korn/Ferry, Leingang was president, CEO, and a board member of ITM Software, before BMC Software acquired it. He previously was president and CEO of ThinkLift, a business and IT strategic consulting firm. He spent five years as the global CIO of Bechtel Group, Inc. and seven years as the global CIO of Viacom. He also had held IT leadership positions at Triangle Industries, Interspace, and Touche Ross. Leingang has a B.S. from the University of Illinois and an MBA from Southern Illinois University. He serves on the board of directors of New York Eye and Ear Infirmary.

Resources
Enterpriseleadershp.org Podcast – Hank Leingang, Former Betchel CIO:Get Ready to Maximize Business Impact of IT
http://www.enterpriseleadership.org/blogs/podcasts/2009/03/05/hank-leingang-former-betchel-cio-get-ready-to-maximize-business-impact-of-it

CIO 2.0: The Chief Impact Officer, CIO Update
http://www.cioupdate.com/insights/article.php/3739126/CIO-20-The-Chief-Impact-Officer.htm

Production Credits

Elizabeth Ferrarini, Executive Producer
Tom Parish, Host and Audio Producer

Audio Editing by Doug Marcis