Carving a Path Towards Innovation
Every organization desires to be innovative. Anyone paying attention to the stock prices of companies like Apple, Google, and Amazon is aware of the value of innovation, and everyone wants to get there. But a lot of organizations fail, and fail mightily, in their quest to be innovative. Maybe they're too concerned about the latest quarterly earning report, or maybe they simply don't have the resources to devote to anything not obviously tied to revenue.
In The Innovator's DNA, a great book by Jeff Dyer, Hal Gregersen, and Clayton M. Christensen, the authors rightly point out that innovation must be supported (italics mine) by senior leadership, and that organizations striving to be innovative must be prepared to fail on occasion. But not every organization has the bandwidth to fail, and not every organization has senior leadership support for innovation, even if they say otherwise. Let's call these organizations Innovator Wannabes.
So how can people within an Innovator Wannabe be innovative without leadership backing, time, resources? No one can create more time, and resources (human or capital) are usually not something everyone can impact. However, it's my belief that while innovation must be supported by leadership, it doesn't need to be driven by leadership, and this is where people in Innovator Wannabes can make a difference. Let's look at 5 things people can do in an Innovator Wannabe organization to make a move towards innovation.
1) Make Allies
It's probably true that someone in the organization has more credibility than you do. Find someone who has credibility with senior leadership and sell your innovation to them first. Get them to buy into what you're proposing and listen to what they say. If your idea doesn't move them, it's not likely to move leadership either.
2) Focus on Business Value
If your innovation will save the IT department time or money, that's great. But guess what - leadership doesn't care. They're willing to pay you to stay late instead and have you work on something that will increase revenue for the business overall. So don't focus on your innovations value to you or your department, focus on its value to the business. I'm not suggesting IT departments don't automate things, or pay off technical debt, I'm only suggesting that you won't often get rewarded for that outside of your department. Innovative ideas with business value will almost always win the day.
3) Capitalize on Small Wins and Don't Invent the Internet
A recent innovation from my team was a simple add-on to the applications main screen that would give users a view into who previously had owned a case. This was a small amount of work but it saves the nurses (I work in the medical management space) from having to read a bunch of case notes to determine who else had worked the case. Your innovations don't have to be huge overhauls of the system and in fact shouldn't be. Don't get me wrong, if you have a big idea, by all means go create a start-up and build it! If you show your ally the business value of your small innovative ideas...you're in the door.
4) Don't Lose Sight of Priorities
Don't anger your business partners by making your innovation a higher priority than the project work they've given you. You have to find the time in your schedule to do both - maybe work through lunch, or whatever...just don't tell your business partners that you'll get to their project request after you finish your really awesome innovation idea or you'll be looking for your next project in a different company.
5) Visual Innovation
When all else fails...document! It's sad but true that sometimes you can't get your ideas through and the only thing you will be able to do is make a list of them. A coworker of mine calls this 'visual innovation' - the concept of documenting innovative ideas even if you have little hope of actually implementing them. One might ask what the value of this is but it's really about keeping the innovation flowing and not getting bogged down in a negative mindset. A document is something that can also be presented if or when the climate of the organization changes.
So those are five things a person can and should do if they are in an Innovator Wannabe organization to at least get the ball rolling. It may not work completely but at least you can try and my guess is that if you focus on business value, create allies, keep your innovations small, keep up with your project work, and document your innovations, you'll make some headway towards being Innovative.
In The Innovator's DNA, a great book by Jeff Dyer, Hal Gregersen, and Clayton M. Christensen, the authors rightly point out that innovation must be supported (italics mine) by senior leadership, and that organizations striving to be innovative must be prepared to fail on occasion. But not every organization has the bandwidth to fail, and not every organization has senior leadership support for innovation, even if they say otherwise. Let's call these organizations Innovator Wannabes.
So how can people within an Innovator Wannabe be innovative without leadership backing, time, resources? No one can create more time, and resources (human or capital) are usually not something everyone can impact. However, it's my belief that while innovation must be supported by leadership, it doesn't need to be driven by leadership, and this is where people in Innovator Wannabes can make a difference. Let's look at 5 things people can do in an Innovator Wannabe organization to make a move towards innovation.
1) Make Allies
It's probably true that someone in the organization has more credibility than you do. Find someone who has credibility with senior leadership and sell your innovation to them first. Get them to buy into what you're proposing and listen to what they say. If your idea doesn't move them, it's not likely to move leadership either.
2) Focus on Business Value
If your innovation will save the IT department time or money, that's great. But guess what - leadership doesn't care. They're willing to pay you to stay late instead and have you work on something that will increase revenue for the business overall. So don't focus on your innovations value to you or your department, focus on its value to the business. I'm not suggesting IT departments don't automate things, or pay off technical debt, I'm only suggesting that you won't often get rewarded for that outside of your department. Innovative ideas with business value will almost always win the day.
3) Capitalize on Small Wins and Don't Invent the Internet
A recent innovation from my team was a simple add-on to the applications main screen that would give users a view into who previously had owned a case. This was a small amount of work but it saves the nurses (I work in the medical management space) from having to read a bunch of case notes to determine who else had worked the case. Your innovations don't have to be huge overhauls of the system and in fact shouldn't be. Don't get me wrong, if you have a big idea, by all means go create a start-up and build it! If you show your ally the business value of your small innovative ideas...you're in the door.
4) Don't Lose Sight of Priorities
Don't anger your business partners by making your innovation a higher priority than the project work they've given you. You have to find the time in your schedule to do both - maybe work through lunch, or whatever...just don't tell your business partners that you'll get to their project request after you finish your really awesome innovation idea or you'll be looking for your next project in a different company.
5) Visual Innovation
When all else fails...document! It's sad but true that sometimes you can't get your ideas through and the only thing you will be able to do is make a list of them. A coworker of mine calls this 'visual innovation' - the concept of documenting innovative ideas even if you have little hope of actually implementing them. One might ask what the value of this is but it's really about keeping the innovation flowing and not getting bogged down in a negative mindset. A document is something that can also be presented if or when the climate of the organization changes.
So those are five things a person can and should do if they are in an Innovator Wannabe organization to at least get the ball rolling. It may not work completely but at least you can try and my guess is that if you focus on business value, create allies, keep your innovations small, keep up with your project work, and document your innovations, you'll make some headway towards being Innovative.
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