Fostering a culture of innovation is crucial to enhance productivity. It is also essential to enable businesses to provide more value to consumers, users, and society, especially in dynamic market conditions like the pandemic era. Embracing agility, digitalization, and sustainable business models contributes to such a culture. Innovation demands a comprehensive mindset, addressing environmental concerns, sustainability, and social well-being. Embracing design thinking approaches can nurture innovation, as they are holistic, intuitive, and customer focused, maximizing impact and profit for shareholders. Additionally, developing national policies that promote open innovations, with a focus on investing in startups, can boost creativity and progress.

To explore these driving forces and enhance creativity and employee engagement, the China Productivity Center (CPC) in collaboration with the APO Secretariat organized a virtual multicountry observational study mission on Service Innovation, 12–13 July. Attended by 44 participants from 12 member economies and facilitated by three resource persons from the ROC and one from Japan, the study mission delved into various methodologies for driving innovation, emphasizing design-thinking approaches and design-driven company culture. Participants gained insights into creating a culture that fosters service innovation and encourages creative thinking, while also learning about employee-led initiatives and public–private partnerships that accelerate innovation. Virtual site visits to the Design Research Institute and iNSIGHT Center at National Taiwan University in the ROC enabled participants to understand operations and processes, sparking discussions on driving innovation in their own contexts.

The study mission aligns with the APO Vision 2025, which highlights innovation-led productivity. Employee-led open innovation has gained popularity in the Asia-Pacific region, establishing platforms to systematically generate social value and business growth. As the service sector gains prominence, APO economies need to create enabling environments that support service providers in pursuing innovation-led growth, delivering better, more efficient services to customers.