These Five Behaviors Can Create an Innovation Culture
Many companies want to establish a culture of
innovation, one that will encourage employees to take risks that lead to
breakthrough products. But how exactly to build this type of culture often
eludes senior leaders — threatening the success of their innovation
initiatives.
Interestingly,
it may be that their focus on culture is what’s holding them back. They are
thinking about the big picture, instead of instituting the changes that would
actually enable that picture to exist. Culture is the net
effect of shared behaviors, and therefore adopting innovative behaviors must
come first. You change the culture by becoming more innovative — not the other
way around.
As Jon
Katzenbach has written, companies should focus on
changing a few critical behaviors — “a small number of important behaviors that
would have great impact if put into practice by a significant number of
people.” When it comes to innovation, adopting the following five behaviors can
help your organization to make the leap.
1.
Build collaboration across your ecosystem.
Innovation
is a team sport. It requires excellent collaboration among siloed business and
functional units and across geographies, as well as with external partners.
Finding the best resources inside and outside your organization and combining
them is a hallmark of successful innovation.
Internally, to find the best solutions, you
need to leverage the full range of expertise across your organization. This
requires you to pull capabilities from across the company; this doesn’t happen
when people are working separately instead of collaboratively.
External collaboration is equally important,
because there are billions of IQ points outside your company. If you can
harness them, you will establish a significant competitive advantage over those
who can’t. The best solutions come from working with customers to create a
breakthrough product.
2.
Measure and motivate your intrapreneurs.
Intrapreneurs are the folks in larger organizations who couple an
entrepreneurial mind-set with the ability to leverage company assets such as
channels, brand, and market savvy.To enable intrapreneurs
to succeed, you’ll need to measure and recognize their
innovative efforts. Three metrics play special roles.
The first are leading indicators such as the
percentage of employees trained in innovation processes and the size and
strength of the internal collaborative ecosystem. The second type of metric
measures the process. How many meaningful ideas are in your pipeline? Is your
portfolio balanced and robust? Are you commercializing your ideas at a fast
pace? Finally, there are lagging indicators, which are the ones most people
think about first. These metrics focus on the revenues from new products, the
impact on profit, and the effect of innovation on brand.
Metrics fuel motivation: You need to give
public recognition to innovators. Bonuses are great, but they’re private — no
one in the organization sees the check. However, when you promote someone based
on their contribution to and collaboration on successful innovations, coworkers
take note. Moreover, it signals management’s commitment to the people who
demonstrate truly innovative behavior.
3.
Emphasize speed and agility.
Innovation
happens best when people move quickly. This doesn’t mean slapdash product
development. Innovation requires a blend of real-time data gathering and smart
decisions on whether to invest more now or change course.
Successful startups seem to know this
intuitively, and that agility often helps them disrupt established companies
that have far more resources. For big organizations, it’s important to develop
similar methods to quickly identify and select ideas and then commercialize
them through prototyping.
4.
Think like a venture capitalist (VC).
VCs
tend to focus on big ideas that make the risk worth taking. You should do the
same. When you hear a new idea, ask if it can make a significant difference. If
not, hand it to someone in operations; it’s still a good idea, but you’re
looking for the next big thing.
When you find an idea that matters, the next
question in a traditional mind-set would be: What are the risks? This is where
most companies get stuck, because managers tend to say things like “we’ve never
done that before” or “that would mean big changes to the way we work.” But the
questions you want to ask regarding big ideas are: What are the challenges we
need to address to achieve the breakthrough? Which of those could kill the
idea? How will we mitigate them?
5.
Balance operational excellence with innovation.
Some
experts think big companies can’t prevail in the face of disruptive innovation,
even if they excel in operations. The truth is they not only can, but must. The
tension that comes from balancing operations with innovation drives true
success in today’s world. A recent PwC
survey of CEOs (pdf) worldwide found that 64 percent
think innovation and operational effectiveness are equally important. Companies
have proven they can achieve operational excellence, lift profits, and grow
revenue from existing products while also ideating and developing products that
help to reshape their own markets. In fact, innovation can help to bulletproof
your company from disruption. Authors
Charles O’Reilly III and Michael Tushman have
for years championed the notion of ambidextrous managers at companies like
Fuji, which thrived in the era of digital photography even as the the
shrinking film market left Kodak far behind.
Of course, not everyone at your company is
ready to change their behavior today. That’s to be expected. But companies that
build strong cultures of innovation don’t wait for that to happen. Their
leaders take charge and demonstrate that innovative behaviors generate
undeniable value to the business — and before long, others will follow.
Rob Shelton
http://www.strategy-business.com/blog/These-Five-Behaviors-Can-Create-an-Innovation-Culture?gko=85549&utm_source=itw&utm_medium=20160721&utm_campaign=resp
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