EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. -- Innovations are improvements, new concepts, or transformative ideas that can help make things run more efficiently or save time and money.
Innovations can improve processes across the base, or can simply improve the way you carry out your daily tasks.
The 412th Test Wing is expanding its definition of innovation to include all ideas, big and small, that can improve our units; update our processes; enhance or protect our lives; or expand our ability to test and evaluate current and future capabilities for the warfighter.
A good framework can help guide people on their journey to coming up with innovative ideas. One framework is the Three Horizons of Growth based on research by McKinsey & Company, a global management and consulting company.
Horizon 1: Innovations tend to be process improvements people make to daily, routine tasks that make the job run smoother. Every day, Airmen walk into work and encounter obstacles to the mission. It’s part of the job to overcome obstacles.
Horizon 2: Innovations tend to create something new. Instead of making the current way of doing things faster and more efficient, these new ideas create new ways of doing things.
Horizon 3: Innovations that tend to transform industries. These tend to be disruptive, yielding significant changes that produce new concepts, leverage technology in new ways, or brings about revolutionary change.
In the coming months, stayed tuned for articles and information on new ideas involving each horizon and how you, as a member of Team Edwards, can submit an innovative idea and see it through to fruition.
Now’s the time to start thinking about innovation!
Check out this video to see an example of innovation: