You Can’t Schedule Innovation

We are excited to be launching a magical experience with our Cisco Spark apps, the Cisco Spark Board, and the Cisco Spark cloud platform. It’s an experience that I believe will truly change the way people meet.

That’s because innovation doesn’t just happen at “9 a.m. next Tuesday.” Ideas are unpredictable. And with fast-changing markets, CEOs are worried about keeping their organizations relevant. So many companies are disrupting markets — or trying to — that every company urgently needs both to create new ideas and get things done fast. Do is the new disrupt.

But you need the right tools to speed innovation. Tools that inspire and engage teams. When was the last time you had an amazing experience with technology? You probably remember because it doesn’t happen very often. For me, it was when I first used Uber. More recently, it was the Oculus Touch. That’s a five-year gap, but we’re closing it with Cisco Spark Board.

https://youtu.be/aSkjoX_N1dY

The Un-Technology
Combining a great cloud platform with amazing software and beautiful hardware makes a magical experience. But the real secret is incredibly advanced technology that is entirely natural for people to use.

That means taking away the stuff that interrupts the innovation process or slows people down from getting things done. And that is before, during, and after a meeting.

With the Cisco Spark app, you can send messages and set up persistent team spaces where you can share files and whiteboard. Maybe that gets the job done. Perfect, the Cisco Spark app took away the need for a meeting.

But when you do need a meeting, you’ll want the Spark Board. It’s an all-in-one team tablet on the wall. Think of it as a physical extension of Cisco Spark. It brings together a stunning wireless display, interactive whiteboard, and industry-best conferencing system. And like a tablet, it has apps and a home button so everyone already knows how to use it.

Just Get On with It
I was fortunate to work with the team responsible for developing the Cisco Spark Board. We made it our mission to cut the clutter that keeps people from getting things done.

The typical conference room is full of disconnected tools, such as a conference phone, a projector/display, video system, old-school whiteboard, and flip chart. Wires and remotes are everywhere make some people even afraid to turn on the equipment. Connecting a computer to the display can take 10 minutes. Remote attendees can’t see or engage with a flip chart. And at the end of a meeting, someone takes a photo of the board, but often never sends it out.

From chaos to clean…

All these things are obstacles to creating and getting things done fast. We realized that they had to go. So, we changed the story:

We took away the disconnected tools and replaced them with the Cisco Spark Board. Now you have white-boarding, presentation-sharing, and conferencing all in one device. The wires and remotes are gone, along with the intimidation factor.

We did hundreds of iterations to get the right feeling when a pen hits the coating on the whiteboard’s touch screen. We’ve hidden the digital technology so that it feels and sounds like a marker in the analog world.

We’ve taken away the camera’s moving parts to help people forget they are on video. At the same time, we’ve implemented one of the best cameras on the market.

We’ve totally revolutionized audio — one of the most important aspects of a conference call. In doing so, we took away the table mics that can pick up the rustling paper or laptop noise that destroys attention.

In short, we’ve hidden the technology so you can just get on with what you need to do.

Less Clutter, More Creation
With these innovations, we have cleaned the clutter from meeting rooms. Allowing people to create content rather than looking for a marker that works. Allowing people to focus on ideas rather than being distracted by technology.

Help your teams focus on innovation instead of meeting tools. Learn more about Cisco Spark Board or watch the replay of our launch event to see more Cisco Spark innovations.

Get perspective from more of the Collaboration leaders in their posts.

Rowan Trollope on The Best Meeting Never Ends

Jonathan Rosenberg on White Boarding in Cisco Spark: Always Yours, Always Live, Always Secure

Jens Meggers on Continuous Collaboration

Tormod Ree on How Cisco Spark Board Enables Create-and-Do