As many people have observed, the word ‘innovation’ is overused and little understood. In todays business environment, your chances of making sense of it are about the same as your chances of successfully translating the drinks menu at Starbucks for a non-coffee drinker*.

When this starts to happen with a trend – especially in the business world – the end result is a blend of confusion and scepticism. Business Week – among others – has noted a backlash against design and innovation. It was only a matter of time.

Bruce Nussbaum blogs about it here, and makes reference to the original article which has a couple of interesting quotes :

Kanter says that the most common mistake companies make is to focus on so-called practicality, or the application of traditional corporate processes to adventurous new projects. The problem, Kanter writes in an e-mail, is that applying tried and true processes to “fledgling ideas that are still unfamiliar, undeveloped” is problematic because truly innovative pursuits are “hard to forecast or measure in traditional ways.”

* I’m talking from experience here. As a non-coffee drinker I was recently offered a free tasting by a roving Starbucks evangelist. I tasted it. It was nice. I asked what it was. “Oh,” he said, slightly confused I’d even ask. “It’s a Decaf Light Toffee Frappuccino”. Like I’m going to remember that?