Event Announcement: Diagnosing and strengthening local and regional innovation systems

On the 28th of August I will present a practical workshop in South Africa as part of the 5th Innovation Summit. Last year’s summit was one of the highlights of my year and I look forward to contributing to this event.

The workshop I will be presenting will concentrate on how to diagnose an innovation system, and then what to do about improving the innovation system. We will ONLY accept 20 participants, so early bookings are essential. The cost per participant is R3420 all costs included. For more information visit the workshop page here or click on the logo.

During the workshop we will cover the following content:

• Main theoretical principles of innovation systems
• distinguishing between national, local and regional and sector innovation systems
• understanding the difference between innovation within firms, and innovation systems
• The relationship between the region and innovative performance of industries
• 4 lines of inquiry to diagnose the factors that affects the performance of a specific innovation system
• Different analytical instruments that can be applied to understand elements of the innovation system
• aligning public and private supporting institutions to the innovation needs of an industry
• facilitating a process of incremental change within an innovation system

If you have already attended my workshop before, then take a look at some of the other great speakers that will be presenting pre-summit workshops before the Innovation Summit:

• * Claire Janisch will take delegates through Biomimicry which is a totally new and different way to look for innovative solutions based on nature’s problem solving capabilities. Claire is back after feedback on her workshop was outstanding and “we want more”.
  * Dan Buchner from the Centre for Creative Leadership is coming from the US to share his knowledge and insight on innovative leadership skills – leading innovation teams and how to create a culture for innovation to thrive.
  * Prof Deon de Beer will have his very innovative Idea to Product Lab set up and fully functional. You will learn about the basics of design right through to producing your physical prototype during the workshop. If you have an invention waiting to be made into a physical product, this is the workshop for you.
  * Klaus Schnurr from the UK will take delegates through a process where he will teach you how to synthesis transferable best practice methods, tools and techniques and will explain the key steps that companies in Africa can use to explore trends and generate scenarios to identify innovation platforms for future growth.
  * Vasintha Pather’s workshop is ideal for anyone who facilitates thinking, workshops and sessions as a full time job or within an organisation. Using graphic facilitation methods enhances the learning and take aways for everyone

During the main event of the Innovation Summit I will present a paper about the importance of moving from business model to business model innovation.

I will also launch my book titled “The fundamentals of innovation system promotion for development practitioners” during the Innovation Summit.