Is your SME an open one?

There are several strategic aspects you need to ensure to obtain benefits of Open Innovation. In other modules, you learned about some internal and external factors, such as an Open Innovation strategy, your SME vision and its relation to Open Innovation objectives, innovation mindset or external networks. In this module we will focus more on the internal aspects of your SME that are relevant for your Open Innovation capacity.

Let’s start from having a look at your SME at present.

Thinking question

When you think about innovation, what comes to your mind?

Take a moment to reflect. How would you answer, and how would you elaborate on your answer, if someone in your business environment ask you this question?

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There are different ways to look at it. Your first association can lead you to considering whether your organization is open to new opportunities or whether managers and staff share information about key aspects of company operations – is everyone well-informed about what is going on. Those are two aspects critical for any innovation. They are related to innovation capacity in general and specifically to, critical for any innovation, innovation culture.

However, in the scope of Open Innovation there are other and more tangible aspects to consider when trying to understand whether your company is considered as an open one.

1. Think about the number of external sources (such as customers, suppliers, research organisations and other organisations) in your network that your company uses to look for new opportunities, relevant knowledge, and support in your projects.
2. How often do you reach out to such sources? How often do you collaborate with external agents in your projects?
3. Do you have a network of partners with whom you exchange knowledge and information?

Those are some of basic ways to understand if your company is embracing the Open Innovation approach in practice.

Open Innovation in SMEs is usually not related with building specific departments that will be devoted to Open Innovation projects. In SMEs, it is rather about implementing the Open Innovation concept in the practice whenever the company is in the process of or need for adapting the company business model to changes in market requirements, customer needs or when searching for or seizing new opportunities[1]. It is about always keeping the open approach in mind and  analysing it as one of the options for strategic decisions. It is about being receptive to new external information and opportunities for building your network and paying attention to the trust and reputation that other organisations in the network associate with you.

Image by Mohamed Hassan from Pixabay

That is why in SMEs the Open Innovation mindset is more important that in larger organisations. It is critical to ensure that the Open Innovation approach is known and embraced as an option by the team in general, that relevant opportunities for benefiting from external knowledge and resources are not lost. You learned about the Open Innovation mindset in the module 4. But it is of high importance to always reinforce those behaviours and attitudes related to Open Innovation mindset, as next to the resource limitation the cultural mindset is one of the key barriers preventing SMEs from embracing opportunities related with Open Innovation[2].

So, to prepare your SME to handle Open Innovation, make sure that your team understands that it is the WIN for your company if you make the best use of both, internal and external ideas![3] .

You should embrace this approach not only internally. To be able to fully benefit from good opportunities in the scope of Open Innovation, make sure that it is well known that you embrace Open Innovation methodologies. Being recognized as a valuable Open Innovation partner will grant you access to better opportunities and will make the process of acquiring best partners for your innovation projects easier.