Challenging Mindsets: From Reverse Innovation to Innovation Blowback June 19, 2010

I have just discovered Edge Perspectives and the post Challenging Mindsets: From Reverse Innovation to Innovation Blowback which begins:

"Views on innovation in developing economies are evolving rapidly, yet they still do not capture the full significance of what is going on. Executives in the West are still prisoners of a mindset that equates innovation with technology and product innovation. This blinds them to significant alternative forms of innovation that can profoundly disrupt their businesses in the years ahead."

I love reading posts that describe things I know about from a completely different perspective (but with the same vision of reality) - so I commented:

I am new to this site, and welcome the ideas in this post and the terminology "reverse innovation". I have blogged about this idea - but did not have the terminology - http://www.dadamac.net/blog/20091015/pam-we-want-street-lights

The blog relates to my experiences in rural Nigeria and back home in the UK. I believe it is harder to introduce new solutions to problems where the old solutions still seem to be working okay (such as in the UK) and therefore there is more opportunity to explore innovative solutions where the old solutions have not yet been implemented (such as rural Africa).

I believe there are huge potential benefits to be gained if "developed world" designers and developers see people in rural Africa as collaborators and consultants. I invite anyone who takes this idea seriously to contact me pamela.mclean@dadamac.net to explore how http://www.Dadamac.net can help you to access the local knowledge that you need, through our networks and well developed communication systems - including weekly online UK-Nigeria meetings.