Corning Incorporated : the Growth and Strategy Council

CORNING INCORPORATED: THE GROWTH AND STRATEGY COUNCIL Company Background : Corning Glass Works was founded in 1851 by Amory Houghton, in Somerville, Massachusetts. The company was known as Corning Glass Works until 1989, when it changed its name to Corning Incorporated. Corning Incorporated is an American manufacturer of glass, ceramics, and related materials, primarily for industrial and scientific applications. In 1998 Corning divested itself of its consumer lines of Corning Ware and Corelle tableware and Pyrex cookware.As of 2008 Corning had four business segments: Display Technologies, Environmental Technologies, Life Sciences, and Telecommunication. Innovation was the core of corning’s Identity, because coning is a science based company, Innovation is the engine for the company. Fact 1 : The Formed of Growth and Strategy Council Corning has formed the Growth and Strategy Council (GSC) in 2001 the core group member are CEO, COO, CTO, heads of research, development and engi neering and the head of HR. The role of GSC is varied from making decisions about pacing and investment, advising businesses on pricing strategy etc.The GSC is about establishing best practices and getting all innovation programs to the same level of rigor. Lesson learned 1: GSC as Change Agent Management. Corning needs to maintain their performance in a long term condition. It needs strategy and great people who involved and have willingness to improve the performance for sustainability. The individual or group that undertakes the task of initiating and managing change in an organization is known as a change agent and that what’s corning did when fomed GSC.In many innovative-driven companies, managers and employees alike are being trained to develop the needed skills to oversee change (Tschirky, 2011). My experience I am working at bank bjb which the ownership is 100 % by the government of west java province and Banten province. By 2010 the company had their IPO so some of t he ownership goes to public. And it makes change to the company business overall. To make the company keep sustain my company formed change agent management program that include the director, Groups head, and Branch Managers that made decision about varied company problems. Fact 2 : Corning’s Stage Gate Innovation ProcessInnovation at Corning followed what was called the ‘innovation recipe’ its involved the management that used Corning’s gate innovation process that’s are : Stage I : Gather Information, build knowledge Stage II : Determine feasibility Stage III : Test Practically Stage IV : Prove Profitability Stage V : Manage the life cycle Advancing to the next stage required meeting deliverables and advancing through the ‘Decision Diamond’ Lesson learned : Innovation as a Process and Philosphy For Corning Innovation was as much a set of principles as it was a process, innovation is about idea creation.Innovation at Corning also about being willing and able to take failed ideas and apply them elsewhere Innovation is much more than invention – the creation of a new idea and its reduction to practice and it includes all the activities required in the commercialization of new technologies (Freeman and Soete 1997) Others company experienced We can learned from 3M company that produce the product Post It from accident. A man named Spencer Silver who worked in the 3M research laboratories in 1970 was working on developing a strong adhesive to incorporate it to some of 3M’s current products.After some trial and error he finally developed an adhesive, but for his own disappointment, it was even weaker than what 3M already manufactured at the time. It stuck to things but could easily be lifted off. A couple of ants could lift it up. Then four years later, another 3M scientist named Arthur Fry was singing in his church’s choir. He used markers to keep in the hymnal but they kept falling out of the boo k. Then he remembered Silver’s weak adhesive and used to coat his markers. With the weak adhesive the markers stayed in place, yet lifted off without damaging the pages.Fact 3 : The Concept of Patient Money in Corning Key businesses Corning lost money for 14 years before becoming profitable in 1999. And optical fiber took 20 years to become profitable despite the hundreds millions of dollars the company invested during the 1960 – and 1970s. In 2001 the company approved the appropriations request for a $250 million new factory for the diesel business at a time when telecom business was crashing and the emission regulations for 2007 were not yet in place.Lesson learned : Sustainability investment on Technology Innovation . Innovation at corning meant being willing to make significant. Sustained investments knowing that the payback would likely be well into the future. Corning’s Emphasis on innovation and its long term outlook-made the company unique. Unlike conven tional investments in plant and equipment, which generally have declining returns over time, technological investments are argued to produce positive returns through creating new knowledge, options and opportunities (Arthur 1990). My ExperienceIn early 2011 bank bjb cooperate with western union to facilitate customers who wants to transfer their money to other countries. One of the problems sometimes the transfer didn’t get on time and many system failure. So to solve that problem bank bjb do the research to choose another vendor that more appropriate. Bank bjb also develop their own Information Technology system to create independent remittance to other countries. The result are bank bjb has cooperate with BNI in remittance and also will launch independent remittance system in 2013 that will serve customer better in the future.