Locally grown innovation

I have the good fortune to have friends and colleagues throughout the world, many of them doing very interesting things to move the field of design forward. My friend Sonia, a Director of Idiom, pointed me to this article by Bruce Nussbaum describing an emerging network of innovation consultants in “emerging markets” countries.

As I touched on in a prior entry, the practice of innovation consulting is spreading, and changing as it is interpreted and reinterpreted into new business and cultural contexts. I’m happy to see that Bruce has raised this topic for conversation in the global venue of Fast Company’s new Co. Design channel.

What I find most intriguing in the article isn’t the simple notion that design thinking is happening outside the developed countries. It has been happening for a while, actually. The interesting bits to me are Carlos Teixeira‘s thoughts about:

1. how the global network of locally-owned innovation consultancies is actually networking, and working cooperatively, in ways that are nearly impossible in the hyper-competitive and somewhat adversarial US design space, and
2. the possibility of reversing flow… of changing the polarity of the conversation about innovation. This infusion of new ideas will help all of us to keep our own practice innovative.

We have a lot to learn from our emerging markets counterparts about how to do innovation, both for those markets and back here in the US. I personally welcome the conversation.

Nussbaum: China, India, Mexico, and Brazil Embrace “Design Thinking”

Some friends and colleagues Bruce mentions, I was lucky enough to spend time with at EPIC 2010, some I know from my time at Institute of Design:

• Luis Arnal and Roberto Holguin: In/situm (Mexico)
• Sonia Manchanda: Idiom Design and Consulting (India)
• Charles Bezerra: Gad’Innovation (Brazil)