Open Innovation Requires Visibility

I had a meeting with a couple of innovation managers from a Danish company today. We got into a discussion on the open innovation efforts of Danish companies – or should I say the lack thereof.

I am still trying to figure out why Danish companies do not embrace open innovation more actively. I might also be wrong as some companies challenge me on this by saying that they do quite well with open innovation. They just do not talk that much about it.

Hold on! How can you really believe in open innovation and then more or less deliberately keep a low profile with your efforts? A key objective is to become the preferred partner of choice within your industry and ecosystems. This does not happen by staying quiet. Open innovation requires visibility and communication – internally as well as externally.