The debate between, can create new or should create new has both moral and technical underlying issues.

Should innovation be incremental or radical ? Both are welcome. I see no harm in car start key shifting from manual to a push button. Starting point of innovation has not to be what is wrong with the current alone, but also what is new with the new. Is it an improvement on the existing, should be left for the consumer to decide. From dress to shampoo, every single product is changing fast. The new is purchased for various reasons beginning true functional advantage to underlying psyche of few who always are eager to buy and try new products. To be different is not only marketer's fancy, it also is the fancy of the innovator and the customer.

Having said this, it sure is ideal if innovation helps society at large. Innovation should not manipulate the buyer, all the more if it happens in products where true consumer is not the decision maker in purchase, but has only to shell out money. The decision is taken by the other. Healthcare is one such segment. The price patient pays for new medicine or surgical technique may be many times the actual advantage. Cataract surgery shifted from old Blue Menthal technology to new Phaco technique. With outcomes being the same, the smaller incision by a mm or two, makes the patient pay four to eight times more. Same is true with medicines ranging from anti ulcerants to antifungals and so on.

I see two important dimensions wrt innovation. We need new discoveries and innovative improvements, since this would keep creativity go on and on. Every research or improvement shall keep gray cells active in society. Gaps would always remain and hence the room for the new. The other day my wife purchased a racket that looked alike a badminton racket, meant to kill mosquitoes through battery active wire mesh. Necessity sure is the mother of invention.

The second and the important point in the whole debate is, who decides the purchase. Is the product purchase a willing decision by the consumer or imposed. Morality should blend with innovation in cases where product is imposed on the consumer.

With patents granting exclusive presence to the product in the market, the attempt to be new and different is shifting from science as origin to commerce at it's root.

I remember reading an article here on Harvard Business Online suggesting that making the old look new (turning a key into a wireless pushbutton starter) was not innovation. In fact, I wonder if turning a mop into a Swiffer represents innovation. Design changes can make the mop look different, but it did not result in an incremental number of mops being sold each year. Swiffer sales just made up a portion of mop replacement sales. That's not innovation. LG Appliances has led the design and styling charge in American kitchens, and though the designs make appliances look more appealing, LG has failed to take a commanding market share lead in any appliance category. The designs themselves are not sufficient to mitigate consumer's perceptual wariness (Is it Samsung/Korean?) surrounding the brand. As an LG product manager told me, "making things look better is just what we're supposed to do. We let Home Depot sell it as an "innovation." We'd work with the company to develop that Perceptual Monopoly.

So just what is innovation?

Innovation is the realization of value from a new solution to a problem that rewrites the rules of the game. But very often, managers view any product, service, technology, or process that is new or different as an innovation. In order for something to qualify as a true innovation, it must meet three basic criteria:

1) It must engage a creative process,
2) It must be distinctive,
3) And it must yield a measurable impact.

By understanding how the three components combine to define an innovation, a company will be positioned to identify them and assess their effectiveness.

There are number of examples where being innovative has passed the customer need. I am not at all convinced the problem is too much innovation, but rather no connection between marketing intelligence and product decision-making. Every company is full of ideas, it is part of the innovation engine to be able to separate customer-centered decision-making from being innovative just because of being innovative.

Here's where I'm "overshot"
- My television remote control
- Microsoft Windows
- The dashboard of my car
- Blue jeans
- My cell phone
- My digital thermostat
- Movie previews in the theater
- Vitamins & health supplements

How about a one-night stopover that usually involves staying in a hotel with fruitbowls, fridge, dining table, bath, shower. For me, that's overshooting. Also, laundry detergent that's designed to "get the grease out" of clothes that have only been worn for half a day in a shopping mall.

in Winter, in cold weather, sometimes ,manual key does not work well. so this innovation is not overshooting.

and i think we should understand that the engineer who dreamed up that button probably believes fiercely in that button’s importance. there should be marketing-objected innovation and technical-objected innovation.

button innovation maybe part of some great innovation.

Good comments everyone. I wanted to respond to Martin's comment about Swiffer. I personally consider Swiffer to be very innovative, because it change the rules of the mop category. Historically, a mop (or broom) was a one time purchase. Swiffer changes that game by introducing a consumable component. The model allows consumers to "clean quickly" in a way that just wasn't possible before. There's a reason why Swiffer is on its way to being a billion-dollar brand.

Vitamins and health supplements is an interesting one. I can see the perception of overshoot because there's all these things packed into vitamins that have questionable efficacy. But I bet you that people are actually far UNDERshot. The problem is we don't have precise diagnose that lets individuals know which vitamins will have desired benefits given their unique genetic and physiological makeup. As diagnosis gets more precise, I bet you that there will be a whole wave of new growth away from one-size-fits-none vitamins to more personalized medicines.

Keep the comments coming!

Scott Anthony

I see this "feature overshooting" a lot in software, especially for the enterprise. People buy software based on features, not usability, and often the two are at odds.

As software companies vie for more customers, they add more features to accommodate new customers, and this typically reduces usability. All the shortcuts added for each special use case results in a less-usable product for everyone, just like the 10 seconds you save pulling your keys from your pocket to start your car can keep your valet from parking the car for you.

We're starting to see smaller enterprise software vendors "push back" and question the requirements of their customers. Maybe making them do something in a more consistent way, even if it takes a little longer, is better in the long run if it reduces complexity and increases users comprehension of the product and usability as a whole.

There's a balance though, innovation is still important, and products must achieve their ends. There's a middle ground between radical simplicity and feature bloat. Apple usually nails this - My Apple monitor has a power button and a contrast button, but is missing the fine-tuning controls for color temp and pixel alignment that my less expensive Dell monitor has, but I prefer the Apple monitor because of its simplicity and elegance.

In a world where complexity in technology is the norm, Innovation is beginning to take the form of simplicity.

But why does this happen? One possible answer is found in this article: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/30/business/30know.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&ref=business&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin

all of the "limited edition" flavors of candy bars have turned them into plastic toys in my mind. they don't even seem like food anymore.

Hi

Its an interesting post and I recently read somewhere-

"The problem is that people will tell you what they want, but you actually have to build them what they need-not necessarily the same thing."

Its a very subtle difference but a very important one between what makes a successful innovation and whats a dud. To me innovation is value creation-nothing more, nothing less. The bigger problem is that value to somebody could be a nuisance to somebody else and that is where the "know your customer" comes handy. As Alan Wang said in one of the comments to this post-manual key may not work in extreme cold conditions (I have never stayed in a cold region but I would assume what he said is right) and hence the new key entry would be an extreme value creation for a person living in such conditions. Move that same innovation to a place like India where a third of the cars are driven by not-so-educated-and-technology-friendly chauffers and you suddenly are creating a innovation stumbling block.

So to add on to my definition of innovation - Innovation is value creation, nothing more nothing less; and value creation within the constraints of business needs, technological feasibility and people aspirations defined within the context of time and place.

So yes, I agree that innovation overshoot is a reality but most of the times a context is important to make that judgement.

Thanks
Pankaj Chawla

I purchase a car with the push button, I'm yet to see the benefits.
But here are some experience; I close/lock the door of the car with the engine still running(yes you can do it and go shopping, and if you are lucky enough to have enough gas the car will still be on other wise, bad luck, go find some gas before you can drive again). Also, it now spring the weather is warm, the bulky key (keyless key) does not fit well in my pants pocket so, I now save it in my winter/spring jacket, if it gets too warm I'll take of my jacket, and left it in the car, along with the key-less key, and lock the door, great, how do I get back in? So much for innovation, where are my benefits? I still need a small real key I can keep in my wallet for emergency, did the innovators think it would be nice to first make a dual system and improve on it.....no you are stuck with it the fist time its out.

Innovation is friutfull if commercialized successfull. As per the examples it seems adding additional feartures either in keys or Vaccum cleaner does not give a impact in the market.
For impact it is imperative to understand the psychology and need of end user.
Adding values which create complexity may nor climb the ladder.
Radical innovation like touch screen watches may attract handfull customers, who admires to be seen different from others. But for successfull innovation it needs to hit the volume. like the PDA phone which is creating wealth not only to mobile phone manufacture but to service providers also.

Excellent read!

Steven Burda, MBA
http://www.linkedin.com/in/burda
Invite e-mail: burda.mba[at]gmail.com

I have found over the years that you can easily fall into this trap if you do not start with a clear problem statement that is recognized by your customer.

The comment on asking customers what they want vs. what they need melts away when you present them with the "what if I do this for you" question.

This argument is very similar to that of Kano analysis.
each product/service has 3 types of features- basic musts, performance attributes and unknown delighters.
overshooting on basic musts has diminishing return on customer satisfactoin.

more information:

http://www.isixsigma.com/library/content/c030630a.asp

There is an easy way to find out what JOB the customer is Hiring your add-on innovative feature to do, if any. Make it an option and ask a reasonable price for it. Engineers will hate you.

No Pay.

No Play.

Teaching Disruptive Innovation for the Entrepreneur at Kansas University Graduate School of Business.

Is it really overshooting customer requirements with innovation, or is it bundling a product with features for convenience?

Microsoft Word has features that I will never learn to use, but other users use on a daily basis. But, there are other features that I invoke and people ask, "How'd you get it to do that for you?"

I don't drive on interstate highways on a daily basis with my 3.3 liter-engine mini-van. I don't need fast acceleration for making safe merges. I do, however, carry equipment for coaching lacrosse and weekend scouting camp-outs. While the mini-van overshoots my requirements with excess acceleration and top speeds, I could appreciate additional room. Other users will never fill the back of the van and they want more speed and acceleration.

This is not a case of overshooting customer requirements with innovation, but instead it is a case for satisficing multiple users' needs with a single product.

Any type of innovation; innovation don’t need admirer or critics. I have seen that all valuable / well-known / well used / well admired innovations birth from some other innovation. So innovation is mother of further innovation, so INNOVATION is good should be appreciated always.

It is interesting that you have used push button starting as your first example. This belies the problem with much inovation - lack of marketing (or funds to market)the benefits to the customer. Keyless startings primary feature is removing the car key and house/work keys most often attached away from the side of the steering column where they are extremely damaging to your legs and knees in even a moderate low speed crash.

It can be very difficult to find a good balance between doing what is right for consumers and finding an engaging way to assist them in understanding all of the benefits of any product.

In consumer housing products such as those manufactured for the multibillion dollar heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) industry, innovation creates the perfect paradox...The more support from industry for innovation within industry - the worse it gets for product users.

Google search: A Business Case for Making it Simple...10 Rules for HVAC Control Manufacturers, Distributors and Contractors

Thanks for the continued great comments. Just to pick up a couple themes that I see:

1. Totally agree that context is king. There can be a feature / function / benefit that can be extremely useful in some contexts, or for a group of customers that has a particular job to be done. As a simple example, consider Netflix's traditional DVD rental service. Even Netflix's most loyal customers would say that service is not very good if the job to be done is immediate gratification (of course, Netflix is working on this with video on demand).

2. The notion of trying to find out how much people would actually pay for a particular feature by making it optional is an interesting one. Well executed conjoint analysis can help with this by determining the tradeoffs people are willing to make.

3. Couldn't agree more with a couple folks who say you have to start with the need. I'd add that you can't just go ask customers what they need, because they can't always articulate it.

Keep the good thoughts coming!

Scott

Geoff makes an interesting point and the discussion previous reinforces his observation.

In the example of the "keyless" (in quotes becasue the user still needs the electronic "key" to operate the vehicle), what is the innovation?

Is it the removal of the inserted key? or is it the additional safety of not having the small, (relatively) sharp objects in a crash zone?

I would contend the removal of the inserted key to run the vehicle is not innovative, push button ignition is decades old and the implementation offers little operational benefit.

However, as a safety innovation, this might rank highly. By creating an interior that is inherently safer to it's occupant(s) IS something of value. Recognizing the root cause of injury, developing a solution, and implementing to a consumer willing to purchase the solution is innovative.

I use this example to show the importance of fully defining the problem the solution is intended to solve. Innovation implements solutions to a customer's need. This is (at least somewhat) independant of the customers' knowledge of the need.

If the need of the customer is a way to not use a key for starting, the push button is pretty much a trival solution (sorry engineers). If the need is to remove the safety hazard, the push button is a better innovation to that need.

I think that innovation and commercialisation are separate functions. Innovation is a divergent task, utilising the right brain to develop new things. Commercialisation on the other hand is the left brain function of trying to ascertain if there is a market for the innovation and would that market see value.

If we stifle innovation for fear of overshooting, we run the risk of losing huge steps in our evolution. Where would we be without our little post it notes?

Its the role not of innovation to have constraints, its the role of innovation to develop options. Its the role of commercialisation to determine whether or not to excercise those options.

Hello Sir

After reading your article what could be found out was the "overshooting". According to me it is about too much innovation. I am referring to previous articles made in Harvard Business Review by Gottfredson and Aspinall in Nov, 2005 edition. But before that I would like to define the word "Innovation" itself which I thought was missing in the above article.

Innovation is “an invention which can be conceptualized and exploited in the marketplace” (Trott, 2005). Innovation adds value towards the organization. For example, Product Innovation helps in Branding; Process Innovation helps in generating good customer service and reduces errors and cost.

Innovation helps in protecting market share, gaining competitive advantage on the rivals, organizational survival, and develops strategic competencies which are relevant and effectively respond to change (Trott, 2005; Gottfredson and Aspinall, 2005). Too much innovation affects the profitability by giving rise to complexity. For example, when Henkel increased the promotional activities, it affected the manufacturing processes as every product needed different type of packaging. This not only increased the cost by way of increased processes and additional inventory, but also increased the processing time as new processes need to be adopted for promotional activities.

Innovation fulcrum refers to “a point where the number of products or service offerings would optimize both revenues and profits” (Gottfredson and Aspinall, 2005).

Innovation fulcrum comes into picture when the organization is responsive to the changing environment and is a learning organization. There is constant innovation in products, process and system across the organization as a measure to combat change. The organization constantly re-innovates itself. The best example of innovative organization is 3M, which constantly innovates thousands of products every year.

The organization needs to innovate constantly due to shorter product life cycles, fast changing consumer needs, faster turnaround time, and technological changes. This can give rise to manufacturing issues and can easily divert the organization away from its objectives. For any organization to successfully implement Innovation Fulcrum needs the right people in Extra Ordinary Management and Ordinary Management. The extraordinary management prepares the vision, mission and strategy for the organization and ordinary management helps in implementing the same.

Even if the extraordinary management sets vision but without proper planning and forecasting the vision and easily become dilution. For example, Henkel’s manufacturing units suffered with the increase in sales and promotional activities. The absence of innovation fulcrum can affect employees as they need to adjust their work flow configurations, errors and redundancies increase in processes, inventories expand, shrinkage in profit margins and eventually lead to complexity within the organization (Gottfredson and Aspinall, 2005).

Points in favor of Innovation Fulcrum as per Gottfredson and Aspinall (2005):
1. It helps in reducing cost and increase profitability.
2. Processes are simplified so as to achieve optimum performance. (E.g. In-N-Out Burger restaurant with four colours, four cash registers and four items in the menu.)
3. Complexity is postponed at the end. (e.g. Home Depot modular furniture designed in such a way to meets customer needs and is made available near the marketplace)
4. Staying Balanced with quality and price. (E.g. Honda, 32 build combinations with four colours)

Points against Innovation Fulcrum:
1. Innovation fulcrum cannot ascertain complexity involved while downsizing the product line of Independent Variables and the link between the other Independent Variables.
2. Innovation fulcrum fails to assess the entry of “radical new entrants” (Hout, 1999).

After looking at the above points in both favor and against of Innovation fulcrum, it can be said that one cannot take away the importance of Innovation Fulcrum within the organization. The innovation fulcrum can be achieved of the people in extraordinary management take a step back and look at a bigger picture in order to see the operational inefficiencies and complexity within the processes creeping in due to the introduction of a variety of products.

Again innovation fulcrum comes into existence due to the disequilibrium caused by the change in the environment. If change not handled properly can cause complexity and lead to chaos. For example, when Heinz faced with disequilibrium and complexity issues, it launched “Remove the clutter” initiatives to reduce the Stock Keeping Units (SKU) from 30000 to 20000 SKUs.

Conclusion:

After reading the article, one must know when to stop innovating about a particular product, i.e. rather than working on incremental innovation, start working on radical innovation. For example, Microsoft and Internet, by the time Microsoft realized the power of Internet, Netscape had already captured the market and Microsoft had to play the catching Game. Another example is Sony's Walkman, when it hit the market, it was a true innovation and Sony kept on making incremental innovation. But with the introduction of "iPod" by Apple, the market suddenly collapsed.

Overshooting happens when the organizations are having a tunnel vision while forecasting. The Best example is Hammer and Nail, i.e. if you consider "Nail" as a problem, then what you need is a hammer, and if you have a hammer, then you start finding Nails everywhere. This is the point where organizations need to rethink when to stop.

Any incremental innovation need to be considered as whether it is worth putting more time in increasing the efficiency by the inventor or is it worth looking at other issues and inventing in other areas of business as well. After all time plays a very important part and it is the choice to be made by the Managers what is the amount of time and resources to be spent on a particular product or innovation, which might lead to overshooting.

Hence, I would agree with Mr. Scott Anthony that it is not worth overshooting, be it products or processes.

References
• Gottfredson, M. Aspinall, K. (2005) “Innovation versus Complexity. What is too much of a good thing?” Harvard Business Review. November, 2005
• Hout, T. (1999) “Are managers obsolete?” Harvard Business Review. March, 1999
• Trott, P. (2005) “Innovation management and new product development”. London: FT/Prentice Hall

Thanks and Regards
Rohan Rane

Two of the die-hard camps of scholars and practitioners in business belong to what I call the cult of growth and the cult of innovation. They are interrelated in that economic growth is presumed to require innovation. And they are both detrimental not only to business but also to the society and environment in which business operates. Unbridled growth will eventually lay waste to our natural resources and also to our competitive engine driven by small businesses. Unbridled innovation produces unnecessary wants as opposed to the sustaining needs of humanity.

Zeroing in on the cult of innovation I recently examined the literature and second-hand data to see whether innovation was as crucial as its cultists would have us believe.

Among the lessons I learned from the literature is that a) raising current performance can be a viable alternative to creating unique outcomes, b) double-digit growth can be achieved by strategies that deliberately exclude innovative strategies, c) corporate life span doesn’t depend on innovativeness, d) the uses of technology, not innovation, lead to technological changes, and d) unchecked innovation can be both immoral and economically insane.

Turning to second-hand data, I compared a recent list of the world’s top 25 innovative companies with rankings of companies as “America’s most admired;” as “best performers;” as top stock picks for long-term wealth; and with citations of consistently double-digit growth companies. There was hardly any overlap in the comparisons. The largest was 50% for the popularity polling. The other three were 08%, 08%, and 23% respectively for the stock pick, performance, and growth comparisons.

My conclusion is that innovation is hardly a necessity for business success. What matters more is choosing and executing the right strategies for the right times and places and in recognizing that strategies betting on innovation are just that, a gamble, and worse, can keep better strategies from surfacing.

Consumer segmentation is a critical component of being a "market first" innovative organization. Different segments will have core needs that needs to be addressed by any product, with additional required and/or desired capabilities that differ by market segment. This can be easily illustrated by the recent success of the the "Flip" video camcorder. This item has virtually no electronic features outside of the on/off switch. But its simplicty addressed a market need that had not been addressed. Manufacturers had over-innovated themselves right out of a large market segment.

The small size of the product also allows consumers to carry the item virtually anywhere, which provides the opportunity to spontaneously video events with better quality than a mobile phone. This demonstrates that the same camcorder user has different "jobs" that need to be addressed yet cannot be fully addressed by the same item. Clayton Christiansen identified this some years back when he began describing how "jobs" identify pent-up demand. His analogy is that some people do not go to a hardware store for a 1" drill bit, but rather because they need to drill a 1" hole. This is a subtle difference but opens the door to identify true needs-based innovation.

Whilst it is very logical to innovate so long as your customers are willing to pay for it, it is also true that companies often have to invest in innovation for future sustenance - for example retaining competitive advantage (and hence sustaining or improving market share) by introducing features that customers welcome but may not necessarly pay for the same.

Most companies fail to see things from user or customer perspective. A lot of Innovation is driven from the motivation to show the management that we have invented something new, and get those brownie points...

I thought we spend more time debating on keyless starting when perhaps some facts might help.

It adds one more line of security for your car
It may be helps conserve the battery, starter, fuel etc I do remember seeing this is some buses and heavy vehicles.

It may also be the precursor to not having put a key or push a button, but simply press the accelerator and get going.
Another innovation in the automobile industry is the paddle shift gears which helps customer have a better driving experience, never take the hand of the wheel and still shift gears.

Innovation is the key, if we insist on an acid test for all innovation, then i doubt if many would see the light of the day. As customer we have a choice of buying that or staying away from it, but making sure no innovation hits is surely disastrous. The first automobile was built without brakes, which came is as an innovation I presume. Software another flogging tom is hallmark on where innovation can take us, we user have adopted various modes of communication, how many us did actually use emails during our teens and early adolescence, but today we communicate over email and you are reading web posting.

If we ever judge an innovation i feel we are no doing justice to it. None knew what to with an airplane when it was invented, the army used it first for reconnaissance and commercial planes were flying ships, if I was judging it them I would have said perhaps another innovation gone wrong, can I say that today?

Consider the millions of good things we got because of innovation, because some engineer wanted us to use it, and someone else taking the idea from there. Mac gave the GUI, which the Windows adopted, when I think it was invented by Xerox, who perhaps did not find enough use for it.

I ran through the list of comments and I believe that each one of us have put in a lot of thought behind it.

Innovation for me, is as losely held as any other word describing performance.

There are 2 parameters that define Innovation and both are inter-related:
a. Gain in market / category share
b. Increase in perceived value by the customer.

Innovation has no boundary, it can be:
a. process and hence profitability improvement
b. customer perception plus

Both are key to the success of business. We are innovating to see tangible benefits - bottomline, profitability, positioning et al. All of these henc are yard-sticks to measurement of Innovation. If these tests fail, then Innovation has is as losely held as another jargon using in fancy presentation made by top management.

Innovation need not always be creative, but even financial. Tata-corus or Acleor - Mittal are examples of such 'Innovation'. Both these 'financial' innovations have given each parties involved the ability to move up to become dominant market players in their individual catagories.

Innovation and the attempts at innovation are critical to the growth of this country and our planet. Just as we should not be afraid to fail, because those who don't fear failure are likely more apt to succeed, we should also not be afraid to innovate!

I think you need to use a better example for your argument. My hybrid has a push button start but thats not what I care about. I absolutely cannot live without the keyless entry (RFID chip in the key that lives solely in the darkness of my bag) to my car. When I am holding my baby in her car seat in my arm and my shopping bags in the other hand, all I have to do is approach the car and my car unlocks. That is heaven for me all the time, especially in the harsh east coast weather of Boston when I do not like putting bags down on the ground.

I think that once you start imposing limits on people and telling them not to "innovate too much" you will destroy any creative spark and hence potentially destroy any wonderful idea that may have come out since now people are second guessing themselves and stopping.

Please think about others, and what is a great innovation to them too. As a person who is constantly losing things, and it has been a time saver to know exactly where my key is at all times. I have been known to spend 30 minutes searching for things, only to find them in some obscure place where I stopped to read something. I now only take my key out of it place in my purse to hand it to the valet or someone working on my car. Other than that, it stays in one place. If the car could recognize me through my finger print or some other physical means, that would be better. One man's treasure is another man's junk! I hope innovation keeps going even with things that seem silly to some people!

When it comes to a push button vs. manual key what truely has changed? Both are momentary switches that are only used once in the operation of the cars' starting process. Innovation is not just to be changing the process, it is improvement. I am boldly stepping into the 21st century with the purchase of my first cell phone, and at this point just dialing the thing is an accomplishment for me, this thing has more computing power than the Apollo space crafts and yet the uses are too many and the buttons are too small. Solve these problems, and that will be innovation.

I think environment has an effective influence on the type of innovative ideas created.Maybe in some countries, the push-button starters be a ridiculous invention that nobody cares but in some places, it really is something.
Another thing that I like to point out is that innovation comes from thinking out of the box which this came from having a creative mind.So maybe some products seems awkward , but still attract people.
Remember iPod?nobody thought that for listening to music, they have to purchase a beautiful,sexy(if u can call it) device but we see that not only people did that but also it has changed the music industry.
Steve J is a creative fellow but I don't think he himself thought that iPod revolutionized the music industry.
we have to let creativity flows and give customers the chance to choose!

@a Homayoun

Putting aside the issue of innovation, I must comment that in my experience, which judging by posts has is not the universal experience, the keyless ignition is truly innovative and has significantly changed my experience of the product (an 07 Nissan Altima). I believe this is in fact SO innovative, it is something you need to become acclimatized to and cannot fully appreciate on paper, where it may appear as overshooting.

Note the next time you walk to your car that at 10 paces to the door you begin fiddling for your keys to manually or remotely unlock the doors - you then hold them as you get into the car. I no longer do that (note my fob unlocks door as well as starting engine). In the case of the Nissan, the car WILL NOT lock your doors, if your key is inside. In fact, if you somehow leave them in the trunk/boot, the trunk will pop back open when you close it. The car sounds a notification if you leave thecar with the engine running.

The benefit is more than the few seconds saved, it's a better product experience. When I drive someone else's car, it seems almost old fashioned to have to go through the manual processes of unlocking and starting the engine. It's remarkable, that something that even I may have taken as a "bonus feature" when I bought my car one year ago has now made any other way of experiencing this type of product (car) feel like an anachronism.

Don't be too quick to judge a new feature!

The point made about how sometimes companies ask, "Can we?" instead of asking, "Should we?" reminds me of a phrase I often use to describe the same principle.

Where I live, it is all too common to observe out-of-shape cyclists wearing spandex bike shorts when propriety, humility, and a sense of public decency should have dictated otherwise. From these observations evolved the "spandex rule", which states, "Just because you can, doesn't mean you should."

Interesting article and thought process behind the questions we should be asking before developing a new product.

But throw-out Maslow's hierarchy.... let's not forget about the COOL FACTOR.

There's a series of undertones here that rides the message geared at men - "I don't do it because I should, I do it because I can".

We don't need over-sized drivers for golf, or 8-cylinder 500HP cars - we WANT THEM.

The case of overinnovation comes in only when you force innovation before the real reason is really felt.

For instance, push button starters of any bike is for a reason to avoid the manual kicks especially when there are a lot of traffic signals. This avoids the irritation of manual kicks as well as the time.

On the other hand, as mentioned by scott, push button starters hardly saves any time in cars. Rather it makes things complicated.

Therefore I am of the opinion is that innovation must be need based. They are largly accepted by the mass which in turn gives you the competitive advantage.