Dr Abi Hird is founder and Director at Defankle Innovation Limited. Defankle are an innovation consultancy specialising in helping organisations develop processes and configure and align resources for impactful innovation and sustained competitive advantage.
Over the last 15 years Abi has worked with businesses to develop and embed systems approaches to address a variety of complex innovation challenges. Having worked as an academic, with industry and for public sector, Abi has breadth of perspective on innovation.
Abi brings a Systems Approach to everything she does. Specific expertise gathered over the years includes bringing manufactured products to market, forecasting resource requirements for innovation and, the role of design in innovation.
Abi studied Product Design Engineering at the University of Strathclyde and has a Doctorate in Systems Engineering, awarded for industry-based research in planning innovation processes. Abi also has Post Graduate qualifications in Operational Research (the maths behind decision making) and Academic Practice. She is a Fellow of the RSA.
Related posts by Abi Hird
How N-squared diagram reveals innovation opportunities at the interfaces
The humble N-squared diagram brings a phenomenal opportunity for better insight, explains Abi Hird. “Its logic aligns closely with the realities of contemporary R&D: interconnected ecosystems, regulatory entanglement, distributed decision-making, and collaborative value creation, and directs attention to where value is created.”
