Co-creative methods for customer engagement
In the article “Building the Co-creative Enterprise,” Francis Gouillart and Venkat Ramaswamy use Lego to illustrate the success of adopting a co-creative mindset and enhancing customer engagement. They explain how Lego invited customers to participate in the design and development of toy robots and construction models, and 
then shared these creations with other customers online. This increased customer involvement in the product design and delivery process ultimately resulted in highly successful initiatives.
Engaging all stakeholders in the co-creative process
Many innovative organizations, like Lego, use co-creative methods to increase customer engagement and incorporate customer insight into the product development process. However, the co-creative process needs to be expanded to include all other stakeholders. Gouillart and Ramaswamy assert: “Virtually all companies worry about their customers’ experiences with their products and services. But how many care about the experiences of their other stakeholders who directly or indirectly shape customers’ experiences—from employees, suppliers, and distributors, to NGOs and regulators?” They highlight how leading organizations, like Cisco, Dell, Procter & Gamble, Sony, Starbucks and Unilever, in embracing the notion of co-creation discovered that: “Generating new experiences for end customers often requires designing better experiences for internal players, a fact frequently overlooked in conventional process analysis.”
To adopt a truly co-creative approach to product development organizations need to re-think their product development strategy and focus on creating a process that enables the active participation and collaboration of all stakeholders, inside and outside the organization.
OneDesk: Leveraging the right technology for the co-creative process
Recognizing the value that all stakeholders can bring to the product development process is the first step towards building better products and services. The next critical step is to design and implement an effective co-creative process that leverages the right technology to ensure all stakeholders are involved.
OneDesk makes this happen.
By embedding the latest collaborative and social technologies throughout the application, OneDesk facilitates team collaboration, including employees and customers. We strongly believe that collaboration across all stakeholders internal and external to the enterprise is essential to a successful co-creative product development strategy.
OneDesk’s social collaboration tools include:
• Blogging
• Discussions
• Chat
• Real-time collaborative editing
• Email and RSS Integration
• Workflow tools and notifications
• Customer portal
Share your thoughts: Has your organization adopted a co-creative approach to product development?