The Undeniable Power of the Garage Experience

The Lure of the Garage

If you're like us and a lot of other entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs around the world, then you've likely romanticized – at least at some point in time – about what it must have been like in great companies like Apple, HP, Google, and Cisco when they were just getting their start – in their founders' garages of all places (or in some cases in their parents' garages).

We, too, long for that same experience… those long grungy days tucked away in a hot stuffy garage experimenting, failing (time and time again), until eventually we hit upon the one big a-ha that ultimately leads us to business fame and fortune.   We call this – not surprisingly – The Garage Experience, and its pursuit – however potentially elusive – is a very powerful motivator for the self-starters out there.   So much of a powerful motivator in fact that it's one of the big reasons why so many startup founders hold such strong survivorship bias in their minds when starting out.

The reality, however, is that most people – even many highly driven ones – are never going to do this.   They are never going to invent the world's next great thing in their garage and become rich and famous in the process.   They just don't have everything it takes to do so, including in many cases the right timing and scenario in history.

And they know it.

And so they go to work.

In business organizations all over the world.   Day in and day out.

There Is Hope!

Fortunately there is hope yet for the world's would-be intrapreneurs.

That hope lies in the open corporate innovation lab.   This is not the cordoned-off workspace of the organization's formal Innovation Group (that's usually its closed Corporate Innovation Lab).   Rather, this innovation lab is wide open for everyone to use freely – to hack and to experiment in, in an attempt to find that one next big idea for the business to leapfrog on.   These are labs like the Google Garage for example, where anyone and everyone in the organization can come and try things out… a place so buzzing with activity that people can't help but bump into each other and compare their ideas, leading to further serendipity yet as they combine ideas and insights together.

Open innovation labs like this bring the ‘Garage Experience’ inside the four walls of the corporate business environment – freely available for everyone to use and experience.   And beyond the ideas it spawns, its impact on engagement is just as powerful – particularly when aligned with a compelling sense of purpose in the organization – one that produces absolute clarity around the WHY behind such efforts.

The real value of the lab, therefore, is not just in the potentially lucrative new business ideas it spawns (though that is often reason enough).   It is equally in the level of engagement it is able to drive inside the organization (which often experiences a noticeable bump when such labs are opened).   It thus carries a double-whammy impact for the organization, and almost always therefore represents a net positive investment for the business, so long as the organization is aligned culturally to supporting its endeavors – including funding certain of them for official development and consideration.

Designing the Open Innovation Lab Correctly

There is a clear argument to be made then, within most mid to large organizations, for having such an open innovation lab… for gifting your organization with the ‘Garage Experience’.   Indeed, in many cases, this decision is a no-brainer, assuming that other things are in place culturally and procedurally to support the lab's efforts.

But it is also equally important that these labs are designed properly, and that staff are trained on how to use them in ways that extract the greatest value from them for today's types of challenges.

More specifically, whereas the R&D lab of yesterday needed only be capable of mocking up and simulating products – and in certain cases services – the open innovation lab of today must be capable of mocking up and simulating customer and business experiences.   This means three things.   First of all, certain spaces have to be designed to accommodate new types of experimental activities, especially around user and design research.   Secondly, appropriate types of materials have to be stocked to use, along with appropriate tools to work with them.   And thirdly – and perhaps most importantly – the people using these labs must be taught how to go about building Behavioral and Experience Prototypes and how to thereafter undertake Design Methods like Bodystorming and Informance (role playing) with these mock-ups.   For the modern open innovation lab, this is often the minimum learning requirement (MLR) if it is to be the real cradle of innovation that actual garages have historically been.

Ensuring the Right Cultural Underpinnings

We can attest – from our own work in designing these labs – that when done right – and when underpinned with the right cultural foundations (mandatory, not optional) – these spaces really do deliver the Garage Experience – long grungy days and all – and they really do pull back the covers on lucrative new opportunities for the organization to consider.

There is one caveat however, and it is cultural in nature.   Do not institute such a lab if the organization is not truly serious about entertaining what comes out of the lab… if it is not going to give serious consideration to funding and supporting some of its ideas for at least more formal development and analysis – with hopefully a few being implemented and/or commercialized.   If the organization is not serious about doing something with this lab's outputs, then the lab will just become one more (soon forgotten) piece of ‘innovation theater’ that no one uses.   So, do not use these labs for ‘show and tell’ to your corporate investors.   Rather, use them for delivering real value to your customers and markets.   And use them to give your organization a sense of purpose, and something to be truly proud of.

Let's Go!

So get going!   Get your lab designed and set up right, get your people trained, and get busy creating the Garage Experiences that will engage your organization and reward your top line with significant new growth.   Most likely, you won't be sorry that you did.   Just ensure you've got the cultural part figured out first, as that is always the prerequisite to any such efforts.

Talk To Us

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