Incubating Innovation: Three simple steps to bring your concept to life.

This article is kindly contributed by StudioSpace agency, Three Are One.

Businesses should prioritise time for innovation. While dedicating more time is often ideal, even a limited but focused effort can yield significant outcomes. With the right team, process, and mindset, ideas and concepts can be developed in a day.

Why is innovation important?
Innovation plays a crucial role in the long-term success and competitiveness of a business, offering a wide range of benefits that extend beyond just the development of new products or services. The most obvious advantages are the potential to generate breakthrough ideas that can disrupt the market, differentiate a company from its competitors and introduce entirely new forms of value for customers and clients. Whether through improved efficiency, enhanced user experiences or new solutions to existing problems, innovation drives growth and positions businesses at the forefront of their industries.

However, the impact of innovation is not limited to external market advantages; it also has profound cultural and organisational benefits. Prioritising innovation fosters a workplace environment where employees feel encouraged to think creatively, experiment with new concepts and contribute meaningfully to the company’s evolution. By making time for innovation, leaders send a clear message that they value new ideas and are willing to invest in them when they demonstrate potential and align with the company’s broader purpose and strategic direction.

This commitment to innovation not only strengthens employee engagement but also cultivates a sense of ownership and empowerment among teams. When employees see that their ideas are taken seriously and have the potential to be supported financially, they are more likely to take initiative, collaborate and drive the business forward. The benefits of this flow not just to the concept or idea itself, but to their broader role on the ‘core’ business.

In my role I’m not supposed to play favourites… but I have always loved working in the area of innovation. There is immense power in energising a business and tapping into the unexpected, often hidden ideas that emerge from all corners of an organisation. Some of the most innovative and transformative concepts come from places you least expect, surfacing when creativity is encouraged and given space to flourish. I love the spontaneity of this process—the way ideas can arise suddenly, sparked by fresh perspectives and diverse voices. There’s something exhilarating about the unpredictability of innovation, where breakthroughs can come from anywhere at any time.

I also love creating things from scratch and while I appreciate not all innovation requires completely new products or services this is the part that I’m personally drawn to.

At Three Are One, we have designed a program specifically for time-constrained organisations to unlock the full potential of innovation. This structured approach enables businesses to foster creativity and generate impactful ideas in as little as a single day. Beyond delivering tangible outcomes, the program strengthens team cohesion by creating an inclusive environment where employees can contribute beyond the usual scope of their roles.

Step 1: Build it up
The first stage of our process is dedicated to refining and strengthening an idea by leveraging cross-functional expertise. This ensures that it is developed into its most robust and compelling version before moving forward. Our approach focuses on four critical pillars: distinctiveness, scalability, repeatability, and profitability—each of which serves as a key determinant of long-term success.

To maximise the potential of each idea, we have established specific sub-criteria within each pillar. Distinctiveness ensures that the concept has a unique and compelling value proposition that sets it apart from competitors. Scalability evaluates whether the idea can grow efficiently with controllable costs. Repeatability ensures the concept can be successfully applied across different contexts, markets or business functions. Lastly, profitability assesses the financial viability and sustainability of the idea over time (how it is monetised).

By rigorously pushing the idea through these structured evaluations, we unlock two major benefits. First, this process removes constraints on creativity and ambition, allowing teams to explore bold, transformative solutions without the typical operational or bureaucratic limitations. This freedom encourages innovation and fosters a sense of ownership and ambition.

Second, it establishes a notional roadmap for execution by defining what a successful end-state could look like. This roadmap serves as both a vision and a decision-making framework, enabling leadership to determine whether the idea continues to meet the required scale-up criteria for further investment.

This structured yet flexible approach ensures that ideas are not only creative but also commercially viable, strategically aligned and scalable.

Step 2: Break it down
In the second stage of our process, we introduce feasibility criteria to assess the practicality of bringing the idea to life within the business’s current constraints. This involves breaking the concept down into different levels of required investment, allowing us to evaluate its execution under varying resource conditions.

Typically, businesses face two primary constraints when implementing new ideas: capital expenditure and the existing strategic roadmap (opportunity costs). Capital constraints dictate how much financial investment is feasible, while the current roadmap determines whether the idea can be prioritised without disrupting ongoing initiatives which have their own business cases. By mapping out multiple iterations of the idea—each with different investment levels and implementation approaches—we can identify the most viable path forward.

This process enables us to make informed trade-offs, ensuring that the idea is not only compelling but also achievable within real-world business limitations.

Our approach is always results-driven, meaning that an idea holds value only when it reaches customers and can be commercialised over time. By aligning innovation with both feasibility and long-term profitability, we ensure that the concept moves beyond ideation and into tangible business impact.

Step 3: Shout it out
This is where marketers have the opportunity to shine, and we craft a compelling yet intuitive proposition and outline a high-level go-to-market strategy. The goal is to shape the idea into a clear offering that resonates with its target audience.

A critical part of this process involves identifying test markets, target audiences and channels that allow for a low-risk, high-learning launch. By starting with controlled testing and limited initial investment, businesses can gather real-world feedback, refine the concept and validate demand before scaling further.

While it is beneficial to enter the incubator with a draft proposition and an initial understanding of the target audience, this stage provides the opportunity to fine-tune the messaging, positioning and strategic fit. The focus is on ensuring that the concept is not only market-ready but also aligned with the company’s purpose and long-term vision.