What Would Reverse Innovation Look Like in Your Not-for-Profit?

Essentially, reverse innovation takes something as it is now, strips out all of the ‘bells and whistles’ that may be nice but are not essential to have, and turns it into something that fits the local market and delivers the same result or output.

Take G.E. for example, which, among many other things, makes medical equipment. They develop high end products for North American and other ‘developed’ countries, and then reverse-innovate the expensive versions to fit the needs of emerging nations. 

I am just back from an eye-opening two weeks in India where I had the opportunity to tour the G.E. Healthcare facility in Delhi and see what they are doing, firsthand. The ECG seen here in this commercial has been reverse-innovated to be lightweight, portable and sells at a fraction of the price to meet the desperate need for basic medical equipment in rural villages across the country.

Here’s another, non-profit example of a reverse-innovation called “Embrace.”  What looks like a miniature sleeping bag is actually a portable and affordable alternative to an incubator. It is designed to help premature babies in developing countries survive by retaining their body heat. Oh yeah, and it costs $25, which is about 1/800^th of the price of a hospital incubator.

...So simple and yet still effective...AND well-targeted to the needs of the communities they are serving. 

It’s no big surprise that all of this reverse innovation has gotten me thinking about NFP's.  So here is my big ‘What If’ for the week:

What if non-profits incorporated reverse innovation into their organizational model? 

Some questions to ask yourself:

-          Why do members really belong to your association?

-          What is your association doing to make sure you are delivering on that ‘why?’

-          What are the activities your association is doing that are absolutely critical to its success?

Now, how can you retain these core activities and deliver the same result while making it simpler? To take it a step further, how can you strip down what you currently offer while simultaneously deepening the value and meaning you are providing?

Is there room for reverse innovation in helping your association to:

-          Cater to the unique needs of your members by giving them only the things they want and not the things they don’t?

-          Simplify your association structure and make the barriers between the leadership, administration, and members more transparent?

-          Empower and take advantage of your most important asset – your members?

What would a little reverse innovation look like in your association?

Comments

[Joe Brown]

Thoughtful post, Carol-Anne. I feel I've seen the concept in action a couple of times recently. In renewing my subscription to the Chronicle of Philanthropy, and my membership in the Society for Human Resources Management, I was presented with the opportunity for "digital memberships", meaning that I would not receive hard copy publications, but would have full access to digital versions. In both cases, this meant that the annual fee was substantially reduced, which definitely served as an incentive for me to re-up, and not having to deal with their publications piling up around my office was an added bonus. I appreciated these examples of "reverse innovation" and hope that other associations and organizations follow their lead.

As an aside, I am curious about the two healthcare examples you cited. I am not disparaging them at all, because I can see them both helping to address needs in situations where any help = improvement, but I am wondering if you have any insight into how effective they are (quantitatively) relative to their conventional counterparts. It seems that in any specific argument for reverse innovation, the higher the effectiveness/value of the innovation relative to the original, the better.

Thanks again for the compelling post.

[Carol-Anne Moutinho]

Hi Joe.

Thanks so much for the comment and yes, lowering membership fees (and saving paper!) by providing digital versions of their publications is a very effective way to keep things simple while delivering the same output. My office is cluttered enough already and I am far more likely to read something related to my work online as opposed to in paper format, anyway.

Here is my (rather long) answer to your question:

I saw the newest version of this ECG. Unfortunately, I didn't see it in the field and am no healthcare expert. The project I was working on there was actually not related to health care, so I also don't have access to quantitative data as to its effectiveness, though it would definitely be interesting to see.

I do know that it was produced as a direct result of the feedback they were getting from the healthcare workers who needed them. The first requirement, of course, was that it provide the same output or result as the traditional version. I also know that it is lightweight and portable so that it can be moved from clinic to clinic, that it is very easy to use, and that it runs on a battery that will do something like 200 scans before it needs to be recharged.

I also saw another example of reverse innovation at one of the companies we visited: They showed us an operating table designed for the North American market that can be automatically adjusted and compared it to another version being developed for a fraction of the price simply because the adjustment part was manual (I'm a small person and could do it easily - think automatic versus manual car windows).

...I wish hugely wasteful health care markets like ours would incorporate some reverse-innovation of their own.

As for the 'Embrace,' I really don't know whether it achieves the same result as a hospital incubator. But I would agree with you in this case that perhaps it is better than nothing given the huge number of low birthweight babies in developing countries that would not survive without it.

Relating this tangent back to the nonprofit world, I would argue that given the huge amount of information and resources available to people and the growing number of nonprofits out there competing for attention, it is more important than ever for associations to cut out the fluff and zero in on providing the value. Those able to do this most efficiently and effectively are certainly going to have an edge over those who don't.

Thanks so much for the comment!