A recent study conducted by Booz-Allen and Hamilton reports that business executives in all sectors of the U.S. economy believe that innovation will be the major source of corporate growth and profitability in the coming decades. In fact, product and service innovations are expected to generate a third of business growth and 40% of business profits in the United States. Innovation is also likely to be the key success factor for developing nations such as China, Brazil, and India in their desire to industrialize their economies. New products and services will continue to be an important mechanism by which corporations cope with changing customer needs, changing governmental regulations, and increasing competition. As in the past, most of these innovations will be based on technological advances. Our objective, though, is not to praise the significant role of high-tech innovations, but to explain why corporations and customers resist innovations even though they are considered necessary and desirable. We will briefly examine the role of technology in the innovation process, identify the major corporate and customer barriers to innovations, and suggest strategies to hurdle these barriers.
