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The Blue Ocean Strategy contends that innovation is not an ad hoc, unpredictable occurrence; in contrast, the authors contend through their research that it can be a learned & managed process. Further, the Blue Ocean Strategy and associated framework methodologies provide us with a clear pathway as to how to learn how to be continuously innovative in our approach. When faced with the need to differentiate, the Blue Ocean Strategy mindset tells us that we need to stop commoditization and looking for ways to cut costs to maintain our current margins and instead, look outside--to the blue ocean--to realize how we can tap into new markets that yield huge potential.
What's that have to do with a chair?
Blue oceans look blue because they are reflecting the sky. At HighRoad, we focus on blue skies to guide our decisions, our client work and next week, our 2014 Digital Training & Innovation Day conference. What we love about Blue Ocean thinking is that it gets us to stop thinking about the day-to-day, hamster-on-the-wheel level that most of us operate from on a daily basis. What we sometimes see as a problem with Blue Ocean is that it's too far flung from our day-to-day realities which won't go away by just ideating a different market or member type or job.
Our goal of our conference is to marry together the ideals of Blue Ocean thinking with the reality of being in the Blue Chair. The Blue Chair is the here-and-now. It's concrete, it's a real physical presence. It grounds us for the day while we hear from real association professionals who are putting Blue Ocean strategy into practice.
We all love to talk about the future, but our conference next week is about making the future a reality. It's about coming from the Blue Chair mindset--the actuality of incorporating new ideas and making them de facto in your organization. It's about hearing about the highs and lows of change management in association (and yes, it really can happen) and the results of such change.
Each speaker has been specifically selected because of the courage & conviction that they've shown in their association to move the organization forward. As we all know, it might not sound like a big deal to change an email newsletter if you've never worked in an association, but as our speakers will relay and many of us experience every day, it is a very big deal to do something new. To change, to tweak, to tap into Blue Oceans within membership, events, sales, publications and adult learning is a very big deal indeed.
How did our speakers do it? What were the issues? How can we emulate their success and how can we avoid the pains that they experienced? This is what the 2014 Innovation Day is all about. We will hear from speakers who have done such work including:
- Rachael Bell, New Jersey Society of CPAs
- David Martin, Electronic Retailing Association
- Felisha Battle, formerly of the National PTA
Additionally, we will hear from a growing crop of individuals who have innovation as one of the core duties within their organization's role. A new trend to hire an individual whose job it is to always be looking ahead and who's a pro at leading change and/or making change part of an organization's culture? We'll hear the opinions on individuals that innovate for a living, including:
- Jason Paganessi, Professional Convention Management Association
- Reggie Henry, American Society of Association Professionals
- Ann Johnson, Full Spectrum Learning
BLUE CHAIR LEARNING:
We invite you to come to the Blue Chair and learn with us next Thursday, November 20th. Today is the last day to register to attend in person, but you can also attend virtually as we are livestreaming the entire event.
Come to the Blue Chair and think big while staying grounded.
