We believe interesting business ideas develop in a three-phased process. The MAC Partnership plays a key role at each stage.

1. ORIGINATION OF IDEAS

New business ideas are born all the time. Ideas develop from the insights of Managers inside corporations, who try new approaches in the field and distill them into frameworks. They originate in Academia, where business schools professors conceive of new frameworks. Concepts also emerge from the experience of Consultants who design concepts from their applied experience. There are a lot of ideas available at any given time, but only a few are worthy of a development investment.

The role of the MAC Partnership in the origination stage is to identify the interesting emerging models of Customer-Inspired Innovation, and partner with their authors in developing them. One of the key roles of our Advisory Board, comprised of leading corporate Managers, world-recognized Academics and highly experienced Consultants, is to identify issues faced by the business world, and to find innovative frameworks we can help develop. We invite a regular flow of intellectual property by conducting periodic "methodology fairs" where thought leaders of all origins introduce their ideas to us. In the end, we choose a very limited set of ideas for development.

2. DEVELOPMENT OF IDEAS

New methodologies are fragile. They often feature an intriguing framework, delivered in the context of a workshop that is highly dependent on the author of the framework. They often lack analytical or process tools to become "client-ready" in the field. Because thought leaders often work alone or in small teams, they seldom have access to a large enough field of experimentation for their ideas.

The MAC Partnership's role in the development stage is to provide, in partnership with the originators of the models, the tools and processes that help institutionalize the idea. By promoting these emerging ideas through our network of Managers, Academics and Consultants, we supply access to the field of experiments required to test these ideas with real-life organizations. We then draw the lessons from the experience of Managers who use these concepts in their organization, Academics who test these ideas in their classroom, and Consultants who advise their clients on the use of these ideas, to produce a field-ready package of tools and processes.

3. DISSEMINATION OF IDEAS

After methodologies have been turned into a usable package of tools and processes, they are ready for field dissemination. Most methodologies are propagated through a slow, apprenticeship-like process where the originator slowly converts one practitioner or client at a time. This is both time-consuming for the thought leader, and produces a slow distribution process for the methodology. Because the appetite for an exciting new methodology typically outweighs the dissemination capability of its authors, great ideas often become promoted by lower-quality practitioners who are insufficiently trained in the true use of the methodology, thereby creating a negative environment for the concept before it even has a chance to establish itself.

The MAC Partnership can then undertake the dissemination of the methodology. The MAC Partners who have participated in the origination and development of the framework typically lead the dissemination effort through a combination of marketing events, workshops, web promotion and publications. Because of its unique partnership with thought leaders and thnaks to its global reach, the MAC Partnership is able to scale up the distribution of new methodologies faster than any other organization, while allowing thought leaders to retain control over the quality of the work being performed.