In this week’s episode of the Ask A CEO Podcast, Greg Demetriou is joined by Simon Hill, Founder, and CEO of Wazoku. They discuss enterprise tools for innovative business solutions, how to reach creative solutions to business problems, and the importance of understanding client’s pain points.
Key Facts
- Simon’s LinkedIn
- Wazoku’s website
- Simon is the Founder and CEO of Wazoku
- Simon is an author, blogger, speaker, and expert in collaboration, innovation, and cross sourcing
- Simon founded Wazoku in 2011
- Wazoku is an innovative SaaS that offers a modular enterprise suite of tools that empowers and provides innovation to global organizations
- Simon is the owner of InnoCentive
- Simon is the Commercial Director of Heatshrink Solutions
- Simon is a former Advisory Board Member at 383 (a digital products studio)
- Simon holds a Master of Science Degree in Management from The University of Bath
Key Takeaways
- Simon is a strategy and business consultant for businesses and teams. He had an accidental start in entrepreneurship and business leadership but now loves it
- After completing an MSc in Management, Simon began his career as a consultant at Deloitte Consulting. He later served in key Directorship and Commercial Management positions for companies like Heatshrink Solutions and 383 (a digital products studio)
- Throughout his career, Simon has provided innovative and creative solutions to business-related problems
- Simon founded Wazoku in 2011, which is an innovative SaaS business that offers a modular enterprise suite of tools that empowers global businesses through innovative solutions
- The word Wazoku means “great ideas,” which is what Wazoku stands for. Through Wazoku, Simon aims to change the world by adding a human element to cloud sourcing and technological innovation. Simon defines Wazoku as the home for great ideas that give voices and roles to everyone in the innovative process
- Wazoku helps businesses solve complicated and simple business problems. Simon explains that Wazoku connects the dots between problems and solutions. We learn and help others learn from the innovative ideas that people are working on and learn from their experiences
- Simon believes that everybody is creative in problem-solving; they just need a technological spark to reach the perfect solution
- Simon believes that collaboration should be conceptualized and understood thoroughly, as it is not just a buzzword. “We talk too much without considering that focusing on the problem is where the 90% of solutions comes from.” If he were to solve a problem in an hour, he would spend 55 minutes focusing on the problem so that it takes just 5 mins to solve it
- Simon makes his meetings productive by focusing on “the collective wisdom of the crowd”
- Simon believes that process, communication, and clear goals are the fundamentals to reach an innovative solution
- Simon tracks his clients through “creating stories.” He believes that every business has a unique set of problems. Creating stories while a client shares their problems leads to solutions and implementation of those solutions. So, results are generated by him tracking his clients
- Simon believes that it is crucial to understand the client’s “pain points” at the onboarding stage. This helps with client retention and building customized solutions
- Simon shares his “change-driven innovation approach for team building.” He trains his teams in-house and sends them to Oxford to learn, implement, and teach innovative solutions to clients
- Simon proudly shares that Wazoku has a 78% success rate in solving business problems
- Simon believes that to make readers understand technological innovation, we must speak to the readers in a language they understand. “Avoid industrial and corporate jargon”
Best Advice for CEO
“Stay Humble” – Simon teaches his kids to stay humble and to not get too carried away with their surroundings and pressure. He adds that humbleness builds up your network and adds more people to your life, from whom you learn a lot.
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About Explore Enterprise Tools for Innovative Business Solutions with Simon Hill, Founder and CEO of Wazoku
Simon is an innovation leader and expert; he is a co-founder of, Wazoku, an enterprise solution for Idea Management & Open Innovation, used by global businesses, governments, public sector organisations and charities. In 2020, Wazoku acquired US Open Innovation firm InnoCentive, which is now integrated with the Wazoku proposition creating a unique innovation at scale offering.
Simon is an active author, blogger and speaker on topics relating to collaborative innovation, crowdsourcing, co-creation, intrapreneurship and more. His expertise has been recognised extensively, being awarded the prestigious title of Guardian SME Leader of the Year and noted as a Top 15 influencer in crowdsourcing. He is also an Angel Investor and advisor to several B2B and B2C early-stage tech businesses.
“All organisations need to innovate, solve problems and generate new ideas to meet objectives. The transformational change, however, is accomplished through the remaking of the organization into the Challenge Driven Enterprise, where the most difficult problems can be solved, the effort is aligned with strategic goals, all talent inside and outside of the organization is brought to bear to deliver on the mission, and sustained performance improvement is possible.”
Simon is an active author, blogger and speaker on topics relating to collaborative innovation, crowdsourcing, co-creation, intrapreneurship and more. His expertise has been recognised extensively, being awarded the prestigious title of Guardian SME Leader of the Year and noted as a Top 15 influencer in crowdsourcing. He is also an Angel Investor and advisor to several B2B and B2C early-stage tech businesses.
“All organisations need to innovate, solve problems and generate new ideas to meet objectives. The transformational change, however, is accomplished through the remaking of the organization into the Challenge Driven Enterprise, where the most difficult problems can be solved, the effort is aligned with strategic goals, all talent inside and outside of the organization is brought to bear to deliver on the mission, and sustained performance improvement is possible.”