Innovation work does not begin with idea generation but much earlier. It begins in the front end of the innovation process – also known as the Fuzzy Front End of Innovation.

"Fuzzy" means "blurred", "indistinct" or "unclear". The Fuzzy Front End of Innovation therefore describes the beginning of your innovation work. Here, different innovation paths still lie open before you and many directions seem possible.

Your work in the Fuzzy Front End of Innovation determines your later innovation success. If the front end has not been worked through cleanly, nothing solid will come out the other end.

Senior Innovation Consultant Torsten Rehder in the Innovator’s Webinar on the connection between trend and innovation management in the front end of innovation – register for an upcoming webinar for free now!

In the Fuzzy Front End of Innovation, you create impact for your innovation management

Before classic innovation management comes systematic trend management in the Fuzzy Front End of Innovation. This lets you spot new trends and relevant changes, which you observe and assess continuously. You translate the results of your trend work into your organization on an ongoing basis. In doing so, you create impact in the subsequent Back End of Innovation.

Trend management in the Fuzzy Front End of Innovation gives you answers to the following questions:

• Which changes are relevant to my company and why?
• Which opportunities and risks arise from them?
• Which scenarios are we heading toward?
• What are the most relevant innovation fields for my future business?

Through your work in the Fuzzy Front End of Innovation you gain a regularly updated picture of possible futures for your industry and business areas – creating the ideal fertile ground for innovation and a strong working basis for effective innovation management.

Whitepaper: Innovation Is Measurable

The TRENDONE whitepaper "Innovation Is Measurable" reveals the 10 most important KPIs in trend and innovation management.

Innovation KPIs help you assess your success, serve as a strong communication tool, and underline the importance of trends and innovation within your company.

Important steps in the Fuzzy Front End of Innovation

From trend management in the Fuzzy Front End to innovation management in the Back End of Innovation

Every company that engages with trends in the Fuzzy Front End of Innovation goes through several steps with different levels of effort – depending on the company’s size, its specific innovation goals and the stakeholders involved.

1. Trend identification

To identify trends relevant to your company, you need a process and an approach for working with trend content. Do you search for trends yourself and capture them in files (e.g. Excel or PowerPoint)? Or do you review and document already curated developments using a tool, such as the Trendmanager?

Whatever your answer, what matters in this phase is that you run continuous environment scanning. You should scan primary and secondary sources of all kinds. Above all:

• Media (digital and analog magazines, newsletters, TV, social media, etc.)
• Markets (products, services, retail stores, advertising, etc.)

The principle here: look for irritations! What deviates from what you already know? Where does my understanding start to hit its limits? What sparks my curiosity? Anything that surprises could be a sign of something new.

2. Trend evaluation and prioritization

In this step of the Fuzzy Front End of Innovation, you place the identified trends in the context of your company. You group your individual observations under overarching trend currents, the so-called Macro Trends. The dominant questions here are:

• How do you assess trends in your company?
• Whom do you involve in the trend assessment?
• How do you deepen trend content for further use?

Trend evaluation should not be done from the gut or based on individual opinions. Define clear evaluation criteria for each Macro Trend – such as maturity, disruption potential or revenue potential. Proceed systematically and transparently with the involvement of relevant stakeholders. Various methods are available for this, which you can use, for example, in an innovation workshop.

Working on an interactive trend radar in our Trendmanager tool

Based on your trend assessment, you can sort the Macro Trends into three concrete recommendations for action: Act, Prepare and Watch. This also allows you to visualize the trends in a clear context, for example in the form of a radar. Innovation leads typically use digital tools such as the Trendmanager to manage their assessment results on an interactive trend radar.

3. From innovation fields to innovation projects

The most important step in the Fuzzy Front End of Innovation is, finally, the strategic derivation of insights from your analysis and evaluation of trends. For this purpose, we recommend creating innovation fields.

In the Fuzzy Front End of Innovation, innovation fields form an essential link between your trend management and your innovation management. With innovation fields derived from your evaluated and prioritized trends, you set the course for successful innovation projects.

But what exactly are innovation fields? Innovation fields contain different topics in which your company’s innovation activities must take place. They mark out the areas where you should develop, plan and execute concrete innovation ideas. In effect, they form the guardrails of your innovation strategy.

The three opportunity areas in an innovation field

To identify innovation fields, three opportunity areas are considered:

• Market Opportunity: Which customer needs must you address? What does the market environment look like? Which market shifts are relevant?
• Technological Opportunity: Which technological developments form the basis for your innovation projects?
• Productive Opportunity: What capabilities and resources do you need? Which already exist today and which will you have to build up?

With the results of the innovation fields, you can ultimately, through a multi-stage evaluation process, draw up an innovation plan – a so-called Innovation Roadmap. The roadmap helps you arrange the necessary measures of your innovation activities along a timeline. This gives you a practical overview – of how to distribute your budget, for example, or how much personnel effort to plan for.

Fuzzy Front End of Innovation: A clear focus for your innovation strategy

With systematic trend management and the creation of innovation fields, the Fuzzy Front End of Innovation shows you not only the opportunities and possibility spaces for your business area. It also provides the decision-making basis you need to execute your innovation projects. From the openness and flexibility – the "fuzziness" – of a constantly shifting trend landscape, you ultimately derive a clear focus for your innovation strategy that pays off in business terms.

Whitepaper: Innovation Is Measurable

The TRENDONE whitepaper "Innovation Is Measurable" reveals the 10 most important KPIs in trend and innovation management.

Innovation KPIs help you assess your success, serve as a strong communication tool, and underline the importance of trends and innovation within your company.