Innovation Defined

The word innovation is pervasive in business today. So pervasive, in fact, that the Wall Street Journal has identified something called innovation fatigue, which IBM lampooned with its Innovation Man Ad. But most of us know that real competitive advantage is the de facto product of some form of innovation. So which is it - lampoon or savior? The problem is that innovation as a business discipline has come with its share of hucksters and snake-oil salesman who define innovation as "facilitating a culture of out-of-the-box, goal oriented, value added, disruptive, web 3.0" thinking. For all of us in the business of innovation who are not selling snake oil, I propose the following basic definition:

Business Innovation (biz'-nis in'-e-va'-shen) n. a significant change to an existing business process, program, product or service that leads to profit growth

Note that under this definition innovation is well beyond "product" and, above all, it must lead to profit growth. Lampoon or savior? Profit growth sounds much more like savior to me.