Tech. Entrepreneur
Pre-reading Reading: “3M Post-It Notes: A Managed or Accidental Innovation?”
As you read this case story, think about the following two questions: 1. What were the critical factors that enabled 3M Post-it Notes to be successfully commercialized and what can we generalize about managing the innovation process from this case history? 2. What were the critical roles performed by some of the key individuals, including Silver, Oliveira, Nicholson, Fry, and Ramey?
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33 3M's Post-it Notes: A Managed or Accidental Innovation?
P. RANGANATH NAYAK AND JOHN KETTERINGHAM
In late 1978, the bleak reports from the four-city market tests came back to the 3M Corporation. The analyses were showing that this "Post-it Note Pads" idea was a real stinker. Such news came as no surprise to a large number of 3M's most astute observers of new product ideas, for this one had smelled funny to them right from the beginning! From its earliest days, Post-it brand adhesive had to be one of the most neglected product notions in 3M history. The company had ignored it before it was a notepad, when the product-to-be was just an adhesive that didn't adhere very well. The first product to reach the marketplace was a sticky bulletin board whose sales were less than exciting to a company like 3M. But why was this adhesive still around? For five years, beginning before 1970, this odd material kept coming around, always rattling in the pocket of Spencer Silver, the chemist who had mixed it up in the first place. Even after the adhesive had evolved into a stickum-covered bulletin board, and then into notepad glue, there was manufacturing saying that it couldn't mass-produce the pads and marketing claiming that such scratch pads would never sell. So by 1978, when the reports came in from the test markets, it seemed everyone who'd said disparaging things about the Post-it Note Pad was right after all. 3M was finally going to do the merciful thing and bury the remains. At that critical moment, it
As you read this case story, think about the following two questions: 1. What were the critical factors that enabled 3M Post-it Notes to be successfully commercialized and what can we generalize about managing the innovation process from this case history? 2. What were the critical roles performed by some of the key individuals, including Silver, Oliveira, Nicholson, Fry, and Ramey?
1
33 3M's Post-it Notes: A Managed or Accidental Innovation?
P. RANGANATH NAYAK AND JOHN KETTERINGHAM
In late 1978, the bleak reports from the four-city market tests came back to the 3M Corporation. The analyses were showing that this "Post-it Note Pads" idea was a real stinker. Such news came as no surprise to a large number of 3M's most astute observers of new product ideas, for this one had smelled funny to them right from the beginning! From its earliest days, Post-it brand adhesive had to be one of the most neglected product notions in 3M history. The company had ignored it before it was a notepad, when the product-to-be was just an adhesive that didn't adhere very well. The first product to reach the marketplace was a sticky bulletin board whose sales were less than exciting to a company like 3M. But why was this adhesive still around? For five years, beginning before 1970, this odd material kept coming around, always rattling in the pocket of Spencer Silver, the chemist who had mixed it up in the first place. Even after the adhesive had evolved into a stickum-covered bulletin board, and then into notepad glue, there was manufacturing saying that it couldn't mass-produce the pads and marketing claiming that such scratch pads would never sell. So by 1978, when the reports came in from the test markets, it seemed everyone who'd said disparaging things about the Post-it Note Pad was right after all. 3M was finally going to do the merciful thing and bury the remains. At that critical moment, it