Idea Outsourcing Works in IT

Procter and Gamble employs almost 10,000 scientists in research and development. Even with that number of inside experts, P&G reaches out and sponsors international “challenges” for outside scientists to help solve their problems. These challenges are organized and manage by Innocentive a consulting firm that incorporates collective intelligence to help companies solve problems by brainstorming new ideas from a network of 140,000 scientists world-wide. Every week Innocentive publishes new challenges and offers a cash reward for the best solutions.

Can this same business model be applied to the IT industry?

Yes – we just need IT professionals to understand the benefits of collective intelligence and not be intimidated by the process. Think of collective intelligence as idea outsourcing. As IT professionals we fall in the habit of thinking they we know all the right answers. After all, managers come to us everyday and asks us questions. Our value is generally perceived in 1) how long since the last time the system failed and 2) how well we answer questions. If managers can easily go to other sources for solutions our value decreases. But as IT professionals we must go beyond this misconception. We can not fight emerging trends. It was foolish to fight the emergence of PCs, client/server technologies, Blackberries etc. I say we need to embrace collective intelligence and leverage the world to help us solve problems. To learn more about collective intelligence including posting your questions, challenges or if you are interested in becoming a Solver, go to ECMHUB.org