Publications
Publications
- November 2021 (Revised January 2022)
- HBS Case Collection
Nicole M. Jones and The Hangar℠: Delta Air Lines' Global Innovation Center
By: Linda A. Hill and Emily Tedards
Abstract
In 2016, Nicole M. Jones was hired to lead The Hangar, Delta Air Lines’ new innovation center in Atlanta, Georgia. Delta’s leadership had intended for The Hangar to catalyze a new approach to innovation at the company. After conducting three months of research on existing corporate innovation lab and accelerator models, Jones learned that most fail to scale impact across the core business. Drawing on her learnings, she established the values, strategy, and methodology for The Hangar to ensure just the opposite. Over the next three years, Jones and The Hangar’s diverse team of design thinkers, technologists, and strategists brought together partners from Delta’s core business and Atlanta’s start-up and academic communities to execute a number of breakthrough innovations. After Delta’s debut at the 2020 Consumer Electronics Show, Jones was invited to share her experience of setting up a corporate innovation lab with a consortium of innovation leaders. In preparation, she and her team are conducting a post-mortem of their three-year journey and reflecting on the lessons learned from one of their earliest projects—a Biometric Boarding Pass prototype they executed with CLEAR, a biometrics identity start-up.
Keywords
Innovation Lab; Breakthrough Innovation; Biometric Technology; Innovation and Invention; Leadership; Innovation and Management; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Innovation Strategy; Technological Innovation; Georgia (state, US)
Citation
Hill, Linda A., and Emily Tedards. "Nicole M. Jones and The Hangar℠: Delta Air Lines' Global Innovation Center." Harvard Business School Case 422-042, November 2021. (Revised January 2022.)