The findings appear in the latest Intuit Future of Small Business Report, sponsored by Intuit Inc. and written by Emergent Research. It focuses on the key factors that drive, enable, amplify and shape the outcome of innovation, and the six characteristics of innovative companies. The report is part of the ongoing Intuit Future of Small Business series, conducted by Emergent Research and the Institute for the Future.
Innovation is common among the 77 million people employed by the nation’s small businesses, the report found, but entrepreneurs don’t see themselves in that light. Yet that doesn’t diminish the critical role innovation plays in their business or the effect they have on the U.S. economy.
"Innovation isn’t restricted to science labs and corporations. It’s the driving force behind small business entrepreneurship," said Roy Rosin, vice president of innovation at Intuit. "“Small businesses instinctively use innovation to create new products and services, efficiently manage their business or find and acquire customers. These innovations are the keys to their future."
Small business owners are natural innovators, the study found, with their inspiration driven by three needs: necessity, opportunity and ingenuity. Whether prompted by changes in the marketplace, competitive pressures or simply the desire to create something bigger and better, small businesses are constantly refining and redefining how they work and what they produce.
Innovation Enablers
Compared to large corporations, small businesses have a number of innovation advantages that enable them to more readily identify opportunities, quickly react to changing conditions and remain competitive. Their smaller size makes it easier and cheaper to try new approaches faster than larger businesses. These six enablers include:
- Personal passion: Personally invested, most small business owners are willing to try new approaches to make their business more successful.
- Customer connection: A deep and direct relationship with the market and customers helps small businesses understand customer needs, identify new opportunities, and fix problems quickly and efficiently.
- Agility and adaptation: Unlike large corporations, small businesses can quickly adapt to changing market conditions and implement new business practices.
- Experimentation and improvisation: When pursuing new opportunities, many small business owners and managers aren’t afraid to experiment and improvise, accepting failure as part of the path to success.
- Resource limitations: Small businesses are adept at doing more with less. And these resource constraints lend to their innovative mindset.
- Information sharing and collaboration: Small businesses traditionally rely on strong social networks to share information and inspire innovative thinking.
In addition, other factors amplify the ability to innovate. They include use of technology, access to capital, fostering a culture that values experimentation and building market knowledge. Also, government regulation can spur or rein in innovation.
Innovation Outcomes
Innovation occurs at all levels of small business, from the front office and dealing with customers, to the back room and producing products. Its outcome can also extend beyond the business, with effects that either sustain or change entire markets.
Market-sustaining innovation describes the ongoing refinements, or incremental innovation, in products and processes that most businesses regularly churn out to improve productivity and financial performance, increase customer satisfaction and save time. It includes about 80 percent of a firm’s innovation efforts, driven by an opportunity to make something better, not create something new. This type of fine-tuning may be as simple as offering a customer the chance to lease a product or service, rather than purchasing it outright. While not widely visible, it creates a new playing field that keeps small businesses competitive.
In contrast, market-changing innovation occurs on both large and small scales, and represents fundamental product, technology or business model changes that shift the competitive landscape of an industry. eBay is a classic example of a breakthrough company that changed a market by disrupting traditional retail systems. While rare, these innovations are highly visible and industry changing, essentially rewriting industry rules.
"Innovation is in small business DNA. Yet, many entrepreneurs don’t realize that some of the great offerings and processes they create are innovations," said Steve King, partner at Emergent Research. "Small businesses are the foundation of the economy, and they need to continually embrace new ideas and have the courage to pursue them to survive and thrive in any economic climate."
