Innovation: The other "i" word associated with performance

The words "performance" and "improvement" show up together in articles, journals, institutes, and even international societies. The other "i" word, however, "innovation," is much less frequently coupled with the performance word. This article attempts to partially explore that relationship. It uses the dimensions of form and components, combined with associated changes in magnitude, to construct a simple 2x2 matrix for classifying innovation types. Type I innovations represent only very minor changes in both form and internal components. Type II innovations represent significant changes in form, yet only incremental changes to internal components. Type III innovation represents a fundamental change in internal components. Type IV innovations, commonly called "radical" innovations in the literature, represent both significant changes in form as well as fundamental changes in internal components. Although this observation of incremental and continuous performance accruals over time commonly occurs, it by no means always occurs.