Month: February 2012

Innovation has layers that shear against each other.

“Slow constrains quick, slow controls quick”
There is so much built in tension, bias, barriers, mindsets, mental model conflicts, and all types of friction seemingly going on around us, you must sometimes think all our organizations can only be totally dysfunctional.

The Scream by Edvard Munch for Dysfunctional Organizations

Has anyone not come across some or all of these?

Dysfunctional leadership symptoms and those typical warning signs of dictatorial leadership, no feedback on performance, personal agendas, more ‘political’ compensation than ‘performance related ones, inefficient use of resources, empire-building practices, unequal workload distribution, too much management, fragmented organization efforts.

There is simply just too much talk, ineffective and incessant meetings, a lack of collaboration across departments, ‘selective’ low productivity when you are working way beyond the normal, feeling in a constant crisis mode, watching a morale deterioration take place before your eyes, the backstabbing, starving projects of essential resources and finally, working in highly stressful workplaces.

A pretty depressing list isn’t it? I’m sure you can think of a few more besides. Continue reading “Innovation has layers that shear against each other.”

Finding space for growing innovation

Making innovation a constant daily task for everyone in finding time and space to become involved in, is certainly a real problem for many organizations.

Innovation does not sit comfortably alongside efficiency or effectiveness as it requires a much looser structure. It constantly ‘flies’ in direct conflict too much for many within organizations to create resistance and adoption.

Innovation is looking to increase variability, nearly everything else in the organization is the exact opposite. How do we address this resistance and make innovation part of the daily working routines?

Where can we start?
We have to open up our thinking to a number of “possible paths” to allow it to flow. I believe innovation should not be highly structured; it should be more loosely structured to allow the possibility.

For a start individuals and organizations needs to explore multiple ways to learn and find the right pathway for innovative learning as they progress.

This needs a more ‘dynamic social fabric’ to allow it to flow, it needs organizational encouragement. It needs mutual adaption and mutual adjustment. The understanding of the absorptive capacity framework I’ve outlined before helps structure this.

Three simple rules have great intent. Continue reading “Finding space for growing innovation”

The Real Need Is Achieving Innovation Fitness

So how do we achieve a greater innovation fitness?

This begins to show you the way www.innovationfitnessdynamics.com is new and perhaps your possible innovative workout gym.

Firstly stop and survey our world from a new advantage point

Can you imagine standing on top of a mountain, looking out across a vast expanse of nothing but mountains and valleys stretching out before you? If you squint hard enough you can just make out that somewhere in the hazy distance, the endpoint of your travels.

The distance you have to travel towards that much-needed innovation understanding, that is made up of so many different dynamics that make you and your organization that much fitter to compete in today’s challenging world seems really far off, or actually is it?

Exhilaration can quickly turn to reality.

Clearly, while you are on top of this mountain you feel exhilarated to have even got up to this point. To even get there you have already made a decision that you and your organization need to become more innovative.

One that needs to look beyond what you have, to what is possible, you are curious to explore this further, you have to, innovation is a strategic imperative for, adding value, growth and improved wealth creation.

You have innovative choices Continue reading “The Real Need Is Achieving Innovation Fitness”

A recognition that innovation is a complex adaptive system

Maybe I’m taking on more than I can chew here but I’m going to attempt to explain why innovation can be so complex and requires an adaptive system.

I apologise if it does not work for you, or you simply just give up on this but I am going to try to explain innovation as a complex adaptive system.

Why- I like the pain involved!  I’m certainly not in any shape or form an expert or even that much of a student of complex systems, and what it fully consists of, but I do need to explore this more, and a little shared pain helps in this as I go.

This issue is one that I consistently come across many references to innovation being a complex system. The trouble is I’ve never been fully clear on what determines the make up a complex system for innovation. I’m not sure anyone does for complex systems either!

So my aim here is to establish a direct and clear set of links across innovation and complexity without it involving me in ploughing through incredibly ‘dense’ academic papers on this subject. Continue reading “A recognition that innovation is a complex adaptive system”

Shifting paradigms, refreezing the organization for innovation

I would like to continue on “unfreezing the middle” for innovation to really take hold and have a greater momentum in organizations, we often have to unfreeze them.  Largely it is about our ability to unlock those ‘frozen innovation moments or the assets associated with them.’

To radically redesign the approach to innovation that today is constantly occurring in ‘discreet parcels’ of innovation activity within organizations. It is this ‘selective’ approach I certainly believe needs changing.

To achieve this I believe the middle manager in organizations needs to make some significant changes within their perspectives of ‘how’ innovation must fit within the design of their organization.

This will allow them to achieve a fundamentally different organizational state than many seemingly need but perhaps are stuck with existing designs at present.

Perhaps they are not seeing a different perscribed pathway to take- the innovation pathway suggested here http://bit.ly/dnCj1m and built upon here http://bit.ly/ikgR4f can serve as thoughts

Innovation in organizations does need fresh perspectives.

Jeffrey Phillips argues in his recent blog that “middle managers need new perspectives, new skills and new directions”. “We need to unfreeze the middle so the rest of the organization can adapt and change. Only then can innovation become what is needed it to be”- taken from his blog: “From smooth and steady to rough and ready”.  (http://bit.ly/OVsuX)

The question is how to unfreeze what we do today and relearn? Continue reading “Shifting paradigms, refreezing the organization for innovation”

Unfreezing the middle, seeing a different innovating prospective

This past week we had a #innochat tweet session(www.innochat.com) around Jeffrey Phillip’s book “Relentless Innovation”( http://amzn.to/xXoHof ).

The chat was framed around a set of questions here (http://bit.ly/Awvh5E ) but basically the premise of Jeffrey’s thinking was “can it be possible to shift from business as usual (BAU) to innovation business as usual”?

He suggests that one of the most significant challenges for innovation is the fact that many firms have spent years, if not decades, creating business models and operating processes that are exceptionally efficient and effective but neglect the essential part that innovation plays.

Equally the middle manager is so focused on the delivery of short term results through effective organization and pursuing efficiencies they have little ‘slack’ within the system to learn and build innovation into it.

I would possibly argue the very people that we are expecting to manage the ‘dynamics’ within organizations, the Middle Managers, are seeking the very opposite- doing everything possible to keep it as stable and consistent as it can be.

So how can this change? Continue reading “Unfreezing the middle, seeing a different innovating prospective”

Your dominating innovation design is?

Each organization seems to favour one design approach over another when it comes to how they innovate. It favours either the more comfortable repeatable zones or is determined to push the boundaries out on its innovation activities.

We often talk about simply incremental and radical, yet we do have other choices such as a more ‘distinctive’ design or one that sets out to be ‘disruptive’.

Let me offer this for thinking through on your fits on the innovation path you want to take and ‘flag’ some areas you need to consider. Each degree of innovation (or type) has considerable organization design issues to think through. Continue reading “Your dominating innovation design is?”