Page 34 - Business Insights 2012-2013
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If you are interested in finding out more about
our Executive Education programme, please
contact us on:
T:
+44 (0)20 7594 3702
E:
NEWS
T
he journey began in 2005, when Professor David Gann, Deputy Principal for
Research and Business Engagement, along with Dr Linus Dahlander and their
team, embarked on a research project exploring the combined benefits of open
innovation and external collaboration.
In 2009 IBM invited Professor Gann and Dr Ian Mackenzie, Chief Executive at
Think Play Do Group and Senior Research Fellow at the Business School, to
undertake a consulting project looking at how the findings from this research
could be applied to shape the innovation capabilities and technology brokering
roles of senior technologists at IBM. As a direct result of this project, and building
on the Business School’s research on innovation and understanding of IBM,
Professor Gann and Dr Mackenzie were asked to develop an Executive Education
programme for senior technologists to support the introduction of 600 new Client
Technical Advisor roles in the organisation.
“This is a very good example of what Executive Education is all about at the
Business School,” explains Jerome Couturier, Director of Executive Education at
the Business School. “It is about putting research into practice, first through truly
applied consulting work and then a structured process of learning, knowledge
sharing and experience transformation, then application.”
Rolled out in 2011, the programme is designed
specifically to enable senior technologists to
foster client-centric innovation to leverage IBM’s
thinking, technology and capability and apply it
to benefit individual client situations. It is also
structured to enhance their brokering skills and
ability to span business boundaries, strengthening
relationships with clients and facilitating new
technology‑enabled opportunities.
The programme was structured around three
key tasks:
1. Identifying valuable opportunities
2. Finding and advocating viable solutions
3. Driving fulfilment and adoption
Kem Ferag, Sales Leader, Europe Internet Of Things
and UK and Ireland, IBM, praised the Executive
Education programme: “It has actually improved the
way we work and the way we engage with clients as
well as broadening skills.”
Initially tested and launched in the UK, the
programme is already having global reach and is
being taught in Beijing, Europe and the USA.
“The Executive Education programme really closes the
loop between generating ideas, understanding how
to implement them and helping an organisation to
put those ideas into practice,” said Professor Gann.
Shaping
innovation
AT IBM
Our research outcomes are having a major influence on
business practices, transforming strategy, organisation
and project management practice. By applying research
carried out by our Innovation and Entrepreneurship
Group, we have co-created a
to help change innovation processes in one
of the world’s leading technology companies, IBM.
BUSINESS
INSIGHTS
2012 – 2013
34
