Bridging Ethnography and Path‐finding Business Opportunities. Issue 1 (October 2015)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: ANDERSON, KEN; LEVIN, PETER; BARNETT, BRANDON; BEZAITIS, MARIA
• Is Part Of: Conference proceedings. Issue 1(2015)
• Page Start: 268
• Page End: 289
• Publication Date: 2015-10
• Subjects: Ethnology -- Congresses; 306.3
• DOI: 10.1111/1559-8918.2015.01055
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1559-890X

Abstract

Abstract : While ethnography has been integrated into the design research, new product development and corporate strategy, it has been less well integrated into path‐finding for new business opportunities. We've developed a model for path‐finding research that has three core parts: creating a business opportunity hypothesis from social flux, testing and validating the hypothesis, and catalyzing opportunities for the corporation. We provide a case study of how we used the approach around The Data Economy. We highlight three important aspects of the approach: shift of research focus from context to ecosystem; robust action, rather than funnel development for concepts, and present a tool we created called the Business Opportunity Canvas to convey research findings into action. We then highlight the direct implications of this shift for ethnographic projects, from a focus on how knowledge is produced and description of context, to an analysis of society and culture. We have not spelled out the entire process but have created a minimal viable product that can be experimented upon. Keywords: path‐finding, ethnography, business opportunities, methods, case study, ecosystem, robust action, innovation, transformation.