On Innovation

Innovation has been behind every breakthrough in science, technology, culture and has been driving human evolution from its beginning. Some innovators have been celebrated to great length (see Steve Jobs) and some innovators were so far ahead of time that they faced reprimand or even loss of life. Innovation is driving change and change is driving innovation.

Social groups are often distinguished into innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards depending on their adoption rate of a new idea.

But what is Innovation exactly and how can we capture the essence of it?

The most common questions asked by innovators are:

Can we get this faster, better, cheaper?

But also:

Can we do this differently?

Innovation is the result of a process with a central element the quest for doing things differently, more efficiently or even more cheaply. It is this thirst that has been driving forward the world and in recent years there have been numerous articles written about how to manage or drive innovation. In many ways, innovation is and has been identified as “thinking out of the box”.

The key questions at the end of the day is: Can a corporation drive innovation? Can we really expect “thinking out of the box” while we have adopted best practices which encourages the following of predefined rules accepted by all as being the best way of doing something? What does exactly mean “thinking out of the box” and how do you recognize it as such? Is our quest to quantify the results of innovation attempts really a folly? Can it be done? When do we know if this is a success or failure?

All of the above questions have been extensively examined, analyzed and documented by a myriad of writers, consultants and experts. Some have even developed frameworks for driving and managing innovation.

Simply put Innovation is the process which allows humanity’s thirst for knowledge to drive forward evolution in every aspect of life.

Innovation or Best practice?

Governments, social groups, enterprises and individuals have celebrated innovation trying to formalize it as a process and try to emulate it and reap the benefits. However innovation is often conflicting with “best practices” adopted by the very same social groups who are trying to drive innovation.

Innovation is often driven by people who are non-conformist, are not afraid to break with the established ideas and practices and generally are original thinkers with a different viewpoint of a certain problem, product or process. They have conviction of their solution and are willing to stand up and defend it. More often than not ideas are shut down as not interesting enough or not commercially viable. The first trackball mouse (as became known worldwide) developed at Xerox Parc was not commercially utilized by Xerox but was successfully used in the first Apple Lisa Computer.

Key Factors driving Innovation

There are a variety of factors which affect innovation at different levels. However two main elements need to be there:

Knowledge Management – Any organization or Group need to apply the necessary processes which will allow the sharing of insights and experiences. Unless such a process exists which breaks down silos among other things and promotes sharing, innovation will not be materialize in any shape or form. Often innovation is simply the combination of more than one disciplines utilized in a common cause that creates breakthroughs.

Talent Management – People drive innovation. There is no question about it. However it is important to have the right mix in terms of skills, aptitudes and experience and the right processes to keep this talent in an increasingly competitive world.

Often these two elements are about mindsets as well as processes necessary to drive innovation.

Conditions necessary for Innovation

However, there are not enough in driving or promoting innovation. There are a number of conditions which are necessary in creating the right climate:

Clear Innovation Strategies

The innovation effort is driven by strategy. It is important to identify early on targets and tactics as well as what is in the pipeline. This will help innovators target their efforts.

Market Conditions

Market conditions are a very important factor and encompass both the legal & operational structure of a market as well as the available skills. Competition policy, red tape, development laws are all part of the structure. Equally important is the availability of skills and access to technology within a particular market.

Finance

Available finance is important to turn ideas into reality. R&D needs capital to transform ideas into products or services depending on the industry. Access to government subsidies and tax incentives coupled with a robust credit policy and culture are important aspects to consider.

Culture

Innovation often comes out of the unexpected. An organization should actively promote experimentation, risk taking and tolerance to mistakes. Unless you try you cannot find out and often enough trial is penalized if the right results are not there.

Questioning Existing Structures

Often missed or not recognized as a factor for driving innovation is the questioning of existing structures. Schumpeter’s creative destruction is a good start for companies which want to see themselves as innovative. Constantly questioning the way of doing things as well as flexibility can drive both monumental innovation as well as everyday innovation.

Cost & Value

An additional factor plays a big role especially in corporations and that is Cost. How do you manage the cost of Innovation and how do you provide recognizable value in a short period of time, something which is not always possible.

 The usual questions arise, and common phrases are uttered when facing the cost.

How much should we invest? – “No good throwing good money after bad money”

Do you need a big investment or a small investment?

Do you adopt the big bang theory, or do you manage Innovation through step change and thus recognize the value during the transformation?

Depending on the industry, it is not always possible to control cost and recognize value in the chunks which can be digested by corporate management. Innovation driven projects might take more than a year to complete and this fact alone generates complexity when trying to fit everything into annual capex & opex budgets. The end result might not be recognizable in financial terms as something producing value.

Success Factors

Ownership – Adoption -Absorption

Any organization from the smallest to the largest needs to be ready to accept innovation as a principle and then needs to have a good absorption and adoption rate for the new ideas generated. Some of the greatest innovations have not been successful per se as they were too much too early on the innovation cycle.

A series of micro changes can appear as a major change leading to the adoption of new processes, technologies or a combination of both.

Often people associate Innovation with technology only. However, Innovation is not only about technology but rather change of mindset. To be able to challenge yourself every day of your life of how to improve every aspect of your life often leads to innovation both on how we do things and how we think about things. It is about accepting that there is more than one solution to the same problem and that your solution is not necessarily the best.

We do not need to be philosophers to realize that what was until now accepted as reality maybe only be a perception of reality.

Mindsets need to change, and people need to take ownership of the successes and failures. People drive innovation and not the other way around. We have already mentioned the precondition for this – Talent Management which is an important process for Innovation. However this should not be a process which recognizes only talent but a process which will support both the successes and the failures of that talent.