Alex Slawsby
Alex Slawsby is a Senior Researcher & Strategic Advisor at Innovation Leader. Alex is a former Director of Innovation at EmbraerX, the disruptive innovation group at the Brazilian aerospace company Embraer. He previously was a Co-Founder of Forg Acceleration, an innovation consultancy, and also worked at Innosight, IDC, and IDG Ventures. Alex is a graduate of Brown University and MIT's Sloan School of Management.
VideoVideo: How eSports and New Licensing Structures are Driving Disruption in Sports
Alex Slawsby of InnoLead and Jack Elkins of Sidekick Innovation discuss how “name image likeness” deals and eSports will impact the future of college and pro sports.
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Video: How NFTs and Mobile-First Content are Changing the Sports World
Alex Slawsby of InnoLead and Jack Elkins of SideKick Innovation sit down to discuss how mobile-first content consumption, online betting, and non-fungible tokens are impacting the world of professional sports.
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What’s a Wizard of Oz Prototype? iRobot’s CTO Explains
iRobot Chief Technology Officer Chris Jones discusses how the company keeps tabs on important technologies emerging from academia and the startup world — and the role that “minimum viable products” play, even if they’re controlled by a Wizard of Oz in the next room.
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Leveraging Analytics and Envisioning the Future of VR at the Indianapolis Colts
For decades, sports teams have relied on stats to track their performance on the field. Today, a growing number of teams are using more sophisticated data and analytics software to optimize their business performance as well. That includes the NFL’s Indianapolis Colts, where Charlie Shin serves as VP of Data Strategy and Analytics.
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How Pharma Distributor AmerisourceBergen Prioritizes and Pilots Emerging Tech
One key is to success with emerging tech is working closely with customers, says SVP of Strategy and Innovation Jason Dinger: “Sometimes, we identify hidden value where a customer sees a way to deploy a technology that we didn’t see.”
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How One Retail VP Scores Emerging Technologies
“There will always be new, cool, shiny things that we could bring to life in our stores,” says Heather Paquette of Retail Business Services, a subsidiary of the grocery giant Ahold Delhaize. “But we’re really here to help our brands achieve their goals by implementing new solutions that create measurable value.” Here’s how Paquette scores emerging technologies…
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3 Key Slides to Help You Deliver Innovation Value
Looking to find better ways to drive innovation value? The team at Innovation Leader wanted to share three slides that we have been using recently as part of our Best Practices Briefings, to help you think about how well you’re aligned with your organization’s overarching strategy.
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What Matters in Innovation — Feb. 12, 2021
In this installment: the launch of a disruptive new innovation consulting firm; Clubhouse starts attracting more than just Silicon Valley cool kids; and traditional automakers playing catchup on electric vehicles.
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Stop Innovation Superhero Syndrome
Corporate innovators should avoid falling prey to “Superhero Syndrome,” argues Alex Slawsby, a former innovation director in the aerospace industry. Instead, they should think more like football scouts or orchestra leaders. ”As an innovation leader, you need to be involved in identifying people throughout the organization that can help you achieve something great,” Slawsby writes.
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Making the ROI Case for Digital Innovation Tools
Amy Kramer of Maritz Global Events shares the Executive Dashboard structure she uses to clearly communicate the value her team is creating in the current climate.
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Sanofi Pasteur’s Chief Digital Officer on Making Virtual Collaboration Work
As Chief Digital Officer for Sanofi Pasteur, Natalija Jovanovic leads a global, cross-functional team responsible for developing and executing the digital strategy of the largest vaccine developer in the world. In late July, the US government awarded Sanofi and GlaxoSmithKline up to $2.1 billion to accelerate the development and manufacturing ...
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Digital Tools for Innovation Can’t Just Be “Vitamins”
When it comes to digital tools, some offer real solutions. Others provide “vitamins” that are nice to have but not essential. Learn how to find the tools that solve real challenges.
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New Data About the Market for Innovation-Related Jobs
We asked 159 innovation professionals about the hiring happening in their organizations — or how long they’ve been hunting for a new role.
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Peloton Exec: Emerging From the Crisis Stronger Than You Went In
Few companies have experienced more of a surge of customer interest than Peloton Interactive, the maker of Internet-linked exercise bikes. We spoke to Rick Paster, Peloton’s VP of M&A Integration…
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How COVID-19 Prioritized Digital Innovation at Wahlburgers
As the coronavirus pandemic spread, Wahlburgers SVP Dan Wheeler says it required careful thought about people’s safety, but it also “accelerated…my innovation agenda.”
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Maintaining C-Suite Support: The Four Key Questions
For many innovation teams, this is a chance to create significant short-term value for business unit leaders who may become your long-term allies. Unfortunately, when it comes to cutting costs, it is all too easy for senior executives to simply put innovation teams and their budgets on the chopping block.
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New Resource: Strengthening Your Case for Continued Investment
Will you need to defend your initiatives in 2020? Is it possible to make the case for continued, or even increased, investment in innovation right now? Here’s a new downloadable resource to help.
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What We Stopped: 16 Activities That May Not Improve Culture
As part of our recent research, we asked 259 leaders of innovation if there were activities they’d stopped doing that were initially intended to influence organizational culture…
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The First 5 Things to Do When You’re Given Responsibility for Corporate Innovation
There are major risks of failure that surround every new innovation program. But there are also ”clear steps that innovation leaders can take to mitigate these risks, while increasing the likelihood that they can generate a concrete ROI for their company,” writes Alex Slawsby, a Director of Innovation at the Brazilian aerospace firm Embraer. He lists the first five inside…
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How to Win Over the Two Kinds of Customers That Matter
Every idea needs a strategy to win over two kinds of customers in parallel: internal customers and external customers. Alex Slawsby of EmbraerX, serves up five tips.
