Martin Gunnarsson

Martin is Product Director and ERP Evangelist at IFS R&D, with two decades experience of working with ERP software, and a passion for product strategies, innovations, marketing and sales. Martin has gained a broad experience of global business thanks to years spent abroad in Germany and Japan, involvement in company acquisitions, and customer and partner activities all over the world. Martin is also a frequent speaker at conferences and events. Martin is Product Director for Manufacturing, Supply Chain and Global Extensions, and a member of the IFS R&D Management Team.

| | Estimated reading time: 3 minutes | Creativity & Innovation
Tips for How to Make the Perfect Pitch

Sitting on a late flight heading west to the UK for a presentation to a board of directors, I read some official stats in the flight magazine that proved my personal motto when it comes to sales pitches. The stats showed the relation between the pitcher’s view of his own presentation and the clients’ view of the presentation. It’s founded on the premise that any pitch you make will be made up of four elements—style, format, content and chemistry.

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| | Estimated reading time: 2 minutes | Creativity & Innovation
Pick One, Strong or Different – Either One Will be a Winning Strategy

It’s often said that access to information is a competitive advantage. We are living in an information society and selling knowledge and services is seen as a future-proven business model. But who will win the battle for the customers’ pockets?

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| | Estimated reading time: 1 minute | Creativity & Innovation
Every Time I Do It, I Get a New Idea

Browsing magazines and books that are far away from your own business, and perhaps your comfort zone, is extremely productive if you are looking for new ideas, need to find solutions to a problem or want a new angle on things. Let yourself be influenced by ideas and emotions from businesses outside your own.

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| | Estimated reading time: 1 minute | Creativity & Innovation
Business KPI for Dreams and Emotions

How can you, as a company, share with investors the most important ingredients for new innovations, namely dreams and emotions? How can you, as a company, explain tools (e.g. company culture) and processes you have in place to mass-produce ideas that will later become profitable innovations? Is it possible to measure, communicate or even benchmark the ability of companies to create and share dreams in a financial document such as a quarterly report?

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| | Estimated reading time: 3 minutes | Creativity & Innovation
Tip for 2012: Be Specialized—It has worked the last 10,000 years

What happens when you cut off the ability for people to specialize and exchange? The answer is that you slow down technology progress—or even regress. There are studies to prove this, e.g. what happened Tasmania 10 000 years ago when it was isolated as the waters rose. But we don’t have to look back some 10 000 years. Look what has happened with societies such as North Korea or some of the Arab countries when people have been cut off from the ability to specialize and trade.

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| | Estimated reading time: 1 minute | Creativity & Innovation
The Tiny but Brutal Difference Between a Ta-Da and Oh-Oh

For some strange reason, kids (again) solve this creativity process so much better than both CEOs and business students.

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| | Estimated reading time: 1 minute | Creativity & Innovation
Idea Generation is a High-volume Business that Takes Time

The more ideas you produce, the higher is the probability that one of them is a bright one. But are you spending enough time and do you have the right processes in place to boost ideas within your company? So what does this YouTube clip tell you about your creative processes?

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| | Estimated reading time: 2 minutes | Creativity & Innovation
Communicate the Future to Drive the Present

Being creative and coming up with ideas is important, but having the skill to communicate ideas or a vision is business critical too. Being able to describe the future in rational terms (numbers or products) is just as important as describing the future in emotional terms (how it will feel for all concerned).

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| | Estimated reading time: 2 minutes | Business Technology, Creativity & Innovation
Business Apps Can Take You Faster through the Economic Downturn

At last weeks IFS VIP event I asked for a volunteer to try one of our existing apps. In the back, a lady waved intensively and shouted “I want to try, I want to try”. I gave her my phone and in a single click she had authorized her first travel expense and purchase order – and she was so happy. When she had completed her very first travel expense, including a photo of a taxi receipt, she was literally dancing on the stage…

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| | Estimated reading time: 2 minutes | Creativity & Innovation
How to Revive Commodity Products and Make More Profit

As a marketer you have a few parameters to differentiate your product against the competition. Take a scale for example. Some people might prefer a digital display and some prefer a retro analog style. Some people might want a black descret scale and someone else wants one in a strong and personal color – maybe purple. But does it really stop here?

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| | Estimated reading time: 0 minutes Less than a minute | Creativity & Innovation
Example of Smart Innovation

Innovation is often about finding effective and cost efficient solutions. The”Littre of Light” project in the Philippines brings indoor light…

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| | Estimated reading time: 1 minute | Creativity & Innovation
How to Generate 60 Innovations in 2 Hours

I don’t know if you’re familiar with Dragon’s Den, a reality television series featuring entrepreneurs pitching their business ideas to secure investment finance from a panel of venture capitalists. We used that concept at our R&D event last week—and the result was 60 ideas in 2 hours. Do you want to know how?

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