How do you master innovation? Through the powerful story in this video clip, I point out the challenges that organizations face with the different generations in the workplace — and introduce the concept of “generational collaborative capability” as being a key component of successful innovation.
How to get faster when the world is faster…
What should innovative organizations do? When everything is faster still, focus on these things:
- build up experiential capital – think big, start small, scale fast. The experiential projects are the “start small” part of the equation. Know what you don’t know, and set out to learn those things
- master collaboration and share: the world is changing too fast, and things are too complex, to do it all on your own. Innovators have mastered the skill of learning from others
- focus on tactical to strategic transitions: innovators don’t have staff who perform a lot of routine tasks. Each and every single person helps to achieve the core strategic goals of the organization, even if just in a small way
- monitor global idea cycles: your future is being invented all around you, and you success comes from your ability to plug in, tune in, and turn on
- fuse generational insight: we’ve got really disparate viewpoints, capabilities and levels of patience amongst generations. Innovators bring these differences together in order to get the best from each generation.
- take on anticipatory projects: one thing is certain: tomorrow won’t be like today. Innovators look at what might happen tomorrow, and try those things out, in order to be better prepared for when the future arrives.
- be a farmer: it’s all about growth, and learning how to relentless focus on that mission
- displace indecision: it’s simply unacceptable to waver, wait, and pause. Innovators get things done.
- implement quicker: there’s not a lot of time to get things done when markets, customers, expectations, competitors and business models all change at a furious pace. Innovators are religious on agility and speed.
- think bold: this isn’t a time for small visions and small ideas. We’re witnessing the birth of transformative new industries, companies, careers and ideas. Jump on board and go for the big win, not just the small stuff.
If five years, your business, markets, products, customers, industry and structure will look nothing like they do today. What are you going to do about it?
Location intelligence, financial industries and business model change!
I had quite a few financial oriented keynotes through the last year, for banks, mortgage groups, credit unions and others. If there was a key theme as to the insight my clients were seeking, it was this: what are the BIG trends that are going to impact us (I’m a futurist), and what do we need to do about it (I specialize in insight on what global leaders are doing in the area of innovation.)
The scope of some of these engagements is pretty significant; Diners’ Club featured me as the opening speaker for their global franchise conference; my focus was on the big trends that would impact the organization into the future.
I guess I had generated enough buzz on my theme within the financial services industry such that I was booked for a keynote down into a major bank in Sydney, Australia, via a fibre optic link. (I couldn’t make a flight connection work!)
What should financial executives be thinking about? There are dozens of significant trends. Perhaps the most important has to do with the fact that 2010 is the year that location intelligence is coming to the industry as a significant business model disruptor.
Here’s a snippet from an article that captures a bit of what I’ve been talking about. The world of banking is going to witness massive change as mobile and location intelligence technology becomes married together. Consider:
Jim pointed to an Australian study that found 65 per cent of children in preschool today will work at jobs that don’t exist today.
“Think about the concept of a location intelligence professional.”
He discussed the possibilities presented by marrying smartphones equipped with global positioning systems to spatial-oriented information websites such as Google Maps.
“In the not-too-distant future, it’s quite likely some real estate organization is going to roll out an iPhone app that you will go through and you will pre-identify the types of properties that you’re interested in. It’s going to use the location capabilities built into the iPhone to build you an interactive tour of those properties. And you’re going to use your (iPhone) to drive around the neighbourhood and look at these homes through your phone.”
The same application might refer users on to a mortgage broker, he said.
“What do you do when the essence of your business model and the nature of the referrals that you get into your business begin to change?”
Halifax Chronicle Heradld, “Expert: Essence of life is change”, November 25, 2009
Give me any financial organization, and I can give you an organization that likely isn’t prepared for the fact that their innovative agenda is going to be subject to some pretty significant change.
What I’ve been doing is outlining for my clients the trends that are going to impact them, and the innovative thinking they need to pursue to capitalize upon those trends.
Video: The future of customers and branding
“Do you we truly appreciate just how quickly things are going to evolve?”
What should brand leaders be thinking about in terms of the velocity of change with customers and branding.
This clip takes a look at the trends impacting brands….
What do innovative companies do that other companies don’t do?
Innovative organizations focus upon the concept of agility: they can manage fast change, new risk, business market turmoil, staffing challenges, and market commoditization. They can do this because they are relentlessly focused on the future and the trends that will impact them.
They ensure that they innovate and adapt based on rapidly changing circumstances, on a continuous basis. Innovation isn’t just about a new product; it’s an inclusive mindset, in which everyone knows that they must stay relentlessly focused on the religion of innovation: how do we do things differently to run the business better, grow the business, and transform the business.
How do they do this? By adopting several key guiding principles that form the basis for all corporate strategy and activities going forward:
- plan for short-term longevity: No one can presume that markets, products, customers, and assumptions will remain static: everything is changing instantly. Business strategies and activities must increasingly become short-term-oriented while fulfilling a long-term mission.
- presume lack of rigidity: Many organizations undertake plans based on key assumptions. Agile organizations do so by presuming that those key assumptions are going to change regularly over time, and so build into their plans a degree of ongoing flexibility.
- design for flexibility: In a world of constant change, products or services must be designed in such a way that they can be quickly redesigned without massive cost and effort. Think like Google: every product and service should be a beta, with the inherent foundation being one of flexibility for future change.
- build with extensibility: Apple understood the potential for rapid change by building into the iPod architecture the fundamental capability for other companies to develop add-on products. Think the same way: tap into the world. Let the customer, supplier, partners, and others innovate on your behalf!
- harness external creativity: In a world in which knowledge is evolving at a furious pace, no one organization can do everything. Recognize your limits, and tap into the skills, insight, and capabilities of those who can do things better.
- plan for supportability: Customers today measure you by a bar that is raised extremely high — they expect you to deliver the same degree of high quality that they get from the best companies on the planet. They expect instant support, rapid service, and constant innovation. If you don’t provide this, they’ll simply move on to an alternative.
- revisit with regularity: Banish complacency. Focus on change. Continually revisit your plans, assumptions, models, and strategies, because the world next week is going to be different than that of today.
Is it time for an innovation audit?
Is it time for an innovation audit within your organization? Maybe so!
After all, with rapid business model change, competitive disruption, fast paced technological developments, rapid and new branding challenges, customer churn, social networks and all kinds of other challenges! Right now, you need to make sure that you have an organization that is open to new ideas, and is thinking about innovative ways of turning challenge into opportunity.
Where do you start? Take the time to do this simple to test to determine if your organization is in the right frame of mind for remarkably new and innovative things, or whether you are stuck in a rut, unable to respond and deal with the change that is swirling around you.
Here are the signs I would watch for. If you are guilty of more than a couple of these indicators, then you’ve got an organization that has a significant change anti-virus in place:
- people laugh at new ideas
- someone who identifies a problem is shunned
- innovation is the privileged practice of a special group
- the phrase, “you can’t do that because we’ve always done it this way”is used for every new idea
- no one can remember the last time anyone did anything really cool
- people think innovation is just about R&D, and forget that it’s also
about the way things are done, and about deliverables - the organization is focused more on process than success
- there are lots of baby boomers about, and few people younger than 30
- after any type of surprise — product, market, industry or
organizational change — everyone sits back and asks, “wow, where did that come from?”
Innovative companies act differently. In these organizations:
- ideas flow freely throughout the organization
- subversion is a virtue
- success and failure are championed
- there are many, many leaders who encourage innovative thinking, rather than managers who run a bureaucracy
- there are creative champions throughout the organization — people who thrive on thinking about how to do things differently
- ideas get approval and endorsement
- rather than stating “it can’t be done,” people ask, “how could we do
this?” - people know that in addition to R&D, innovation is also about ideas about how to “run the business better, grow the business and transform the business,” an attitude that is equally applicable to associations
- the word “innovation” is found in most job descriptions as a primary area of responsibility, and a percentage of annual remuneration is based upon achievement of explicitly defined innovation goals
Every organization should work to develop innovation as a core virtue — if they don’t, they certainly won’t survive the rapid rate of change that envelops us today.
How can you do this? With some 80 keynotes under my belt through the last year, many of which have focused on instilling an innovative culture, I’ve seen some of the best and worst approaches to innovation and creativity. Analyzing what I’ve seen, I’ve come up with a quick list of 10 more things that smart, innovative organizations do to create an overall sense of innovation-purpose.
- Heighten the importance of innovation. One major client with several billon in revenue has 8 senior VP’s who are responsible for innovation. And the fact is, they don’t just walk the talk — they do it. The message to the rest of the company? Innovation is critical — get involved. You can do the same thing by elevating specific responsibility to various committee or executive members.
- Create a compelling sense of urgency. With product lifecycles compressing, markets witnessing fierce competition, and entire skills and professions changing overnight, now is not the time for studies, committee meetings and reports. It’s time for action.
- Simply do things. Now. Get it done. Analyze it later to figure out how to do it better next time.
- Ignite each spark. Innovative leaders know that everyone in the organization has some type of unique creativity and talent. They know how to find it, harness it, and use it to advantage.
- Re-evaluate the mission. You might have been selling widgets five years ago, but the market doesn’t want widgets anymore. If the world has moved on, and you haven’t, it is time to re-evaluate your purpose, goals and strategies. Rethink the fundamentals in light of changing circumstances. This is particularly important for associations in fast- moving industries.
- Build up experiential capital. Innovation comes from risk, and risk comes from experience. The most important asset today isn’t found on your balance sheet — it is found in the accumulated wisdom from the many risks that you’ve taken. The more experiential capital you have, the more you’ll succeed.
- Shift from threat to opportunity. Innovative organizations don’t have management and staff who quiver at the thought of what might be coming next. Instead, they’re alive from breathing the oxygen of opportunity.
- Banish complacency and skepticism. It’s all too easy for an organization, bound by a history of inaction, to develop a defeatist culture. Innovative leaders turn this around by motivating everyone to realize that in an era of rapid change, anything is possible.
- Innovation osmosis. If you don’t have it, get it — that’s a good rule of thumb for innovation culture. One client lit a fuse in their innovation culture by buying up small, aggressive, young innovative companies in their industry. They then spent the time to carefully nurture their ideas and harness their creativity. You might be able to do the same type of thing with a merger with a similar, smaller and more innovative organization, or by seeking out some new, creative talent for your executive ranks.
- Create excitement. I don’t know how many surveys I saw this year which indicated that the majority of most people in most jobs are bored, unhappy, and ready to bolt. Not at innovative organizations! The opportunity for creativity, initiative and purpose results in a different attitude. Where might your organization be on a “corporate happiness index?” If it’s low, then you don’t have the right environment. Fix that problem — and fix it quick.
You need to do this soon. Sit back and think about how different the world is going to be five years from now — in a world of hyper-change, it will be very, very different.
Is your organization in the right frame of mind to do what needs to be done to get there?
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