A TALE OF TWO ETHNOGRAPHIC CASES

The practice of ethnography is making a slow move from academe to private enterprise. Taking ethnography's customer-centered approach (emic) instead of a company-centered approach (etic) can yield unique insights into product and service design. Christensen's (1997) Innovator's Dilemm...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inProceedings of the International Annual Conference of the American Society for Engineering Management pp. 1 - 8
Main Author Mallak, Larry A
Format Conference Proceeding
LanguageEnglish
Published Huntsville American Society for Engineering Management (ASEM) 01.01.2018
Subjects
Activation
Anthropology
Business competition
Computer & video games
Cultural anthropology
Disruption
Engineering
Ethnography
Innovations
Product development
R&D
Research & development
User needs
New York
United States > US
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Summary:The practice of ethnography is making a slow move from academe to private enterprise. Taking ethnography's customer-centered approach (emic) instead of a company-centered approach (etic) can yield unique insights into product and service design. Christensen's (1997) Innovator's Dilemma is an accepted model whereby a lowerfeatured, lower-cost product is adopted widely and eventually disrupts the incumbents. But what about when a product causes a disruption without lowering the price? Many R&D units, especially those operating at the high end of the market, can't afford to enter a low-price market after spending millions in development and having a reputation as a high-end market leader. This paper shares the strategies of Ethnographic Innovation (Ein) and Ethnographic Disruption (EDi)-two distinct modes of applied corporate ethnography-where new products either advance a market leader's position (Ein) or disrupt the competition (EDi). Ethnographic Innovation is when a market leader in the upper price tier of a mature market uses ethnographic tools within a research process to re-energize growth without reducing price. Microsoft's development of the Xbox controller illustrates the use of this strategy. Ethnographic Disruption is when a company enters a mature market (with large incumbents) and takes significant market share without reducing price. Samsung's development of the flat-panel television provides a rich case of Ethnographic Disruption. Through case studies and rich descriptions, this paper investigates strategies to conduct Ein and EDi in today's competitive, R&D-driven organizations.