Why should your Innovation-Team be like Star Trek's Starship Enterprise

Star Trek - The show that's is a celebration of human adventures set in outer space. The protagonists of the series serve in a peacekeeping force,Starfleetpossess altruisticvalues; and is challenged and have to apply their ideals to difficult dilemmas; this forms the overall theme of Star Trek. If you think about it for a moment, in our daily liveswe're the same as the crew of Starfleet. We're bestowed with limitless capacity absolutely within our reach and doing anything less than what you can is a disservice. Now, that might have been a little philosophical or 'too deep'. But, to get back on track; what can your innovation, or research, or CoEs learn from Starship Enterprise, the mightiest spaceship ever showcased in StartTrek or all of sci-fi? Starship Enterprise or USS Enterprise is unlikeany spaceship created in the history of sci-fi movies, novels or series. Most spacevesselsare built with a purpose of intergalactic transportation; usually that is getting from point A to B somewhere in the universe. But, the Enterprise was not built for getting from A to B in the vastness of the universe, instead it was built to EXPLORE. Get out there and figure things out, change plans as circumstances change; this is the sole purpose of the Enterprise. If you were to map this to how NASA operates the picture will be clearer, NASA aims at expanding the frontier of space exploration. They can afford to do this because of govt. backed funding that works quite different from how private or venture capitalbacked companies operate. Private organizationsneed a clear definition of the value proposition that ultimatelytranslates to profit. Now, consider SpaceX, a private organization that replaces NASA in being a transportation provider for space exploration. SpaceX specializes as a space-transportation company that puts satellites in orbit, taking supplies to the International Space Station and such activities; something NASA used to champion. With SpaceX operating in this sector NASA has the possibility and opportunity to do what they dobest, which is expanding the frontier or play in the unknown-zone. In yourorganization, the CoE shouldbe attempting to explore and expand your horizons and the rest of the organization should attempt and make newly explored territories or activitiesinto routine. Much like, how SpaceX makes space transportation a routine activity that once was a new frontier for the world. Research centers in Microsoft or Google are classic examples of how innovation units expand thefrontiers in computer science. These units aren't tasked with solving a certain problem, instead they imagine a new future and attempt to build it. This is very different from getting a spec sheet and building as perthe requirements.Certain innovations thatcomes out as a consequence of such pursuits couldbe incorporated (even though not necessarily) with products or services that contribute to the bottom line of theorganization. Much like how StarshipEnterprise serves the Starfleet in space exploration and taking humans to mysterious corners ofthe universe.