There are two things I don't do much of these days. The first is watch the telly and the other is read books.
I should clarify. I do watch the telly but not when the people who make the programmes want me to watch the telly...
I watch Newsnight in the morning and Strictly, out of step, on a Monday or a Tuesday. Saturday morning I watch what happened last week and the new Top Gear the moment it comes out.
The fortunes of TV are based on advertising to the people the product is aimed at; when we know they will be watching. Coronation Street has a slot and an audience. Countryfile and the Antiques Road Show... they know who you are and when you'll be watching.
I watched all the episodes of Sky's Landscape Artist of the Year, back-to-back on a Wednesday morning. And, no I'm not entering next year!
I'm a scheduler's headache and that means I am an advertiser's nightmare.
Books? I gave up on them when I moved from a house to an apartment. I had a library. It's gone.
On-line, download, read anywhere... yes the ubiquitous Apple. I watch the telly on the iPad and read books on the iPad. I'm writing this on an iPad. I do emails, diary and notes on an iPad. Disruptive technology at its best!
Except... I confess, currently, I am reading a book. A proper book; now with dog-ears and tea-stains. Notes in the margins and underlining.
It is a dense, paperback with a font-size that I find troublesome (tempus fugit) by Navi Radjou and Jaideep Prabhu, published by 'The Economist Books'. The title; Frugal Innovation.
It's a sizzler! Must-devour. Ask Santa for a copy. It is ten quid's worth of roller-coaster read.
If you have to, steal a tenner to buy it. Break open the kid's money box. Go over your credit limit. Buy this book.
Cunningly adapted by Andrew and his uber-cool team of Apple-Troopers, Good Governance are developing a frugal innovation approach for the NHS. It is disruptive... like my telly watching!
They talk of the transference of skills from highly trained but also expensive personnel, to more affordable providers, embracing technology.
This is tough and challenges so much of what we think and expect the professions will always be like. Evolved over the years and fossilised, ever more narrowly specialised when so much of today's care cries out for the specialist generalist.
That's not all; it's also about shifting care from hospitals to clinics, office settings and people's homes. Away from costly complex environments into an NHS unplugged.
I know it all has a familiar ring to it. Maybe we've heard that before? Mmmm... not with this kind of traction and thought.
Frugal innovation is based on an Indian concept of Jugaad, translated roughly as making do with what you have got or an improvised solution.
We think of innovation as the partner of investment. 'If only we had some more money we could do this and that'. Invest to save... ever seen a ROI? We talk of innovation and transformation 'funds'.
Stop; can you think of innovation as the bedfellow of disinvestment and frugality?
I can. Who will do it? If we are smart we will call them STPs... they could become our frugal innovators.
This book reads like a thriller. It is a sexy book. Goose bump good. Leveraging off limited resources; his book has fifty ideas, key principles and objectives.
I could tell you a whole lot more, I could quote slabs of it but it would spoil it.
Frugal innovation an oxymoron? No. Frugal innovation is the future.
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