Posted by Pete Hanik on Tue, Mar 09, 2010 @ 10:12 AM
I have had the opportunity to talk with many executives about innovation. Most say innovation is critical to the future of their companies. Many say it is one of their core values. However, when pressed about how they innovate, many executives struggle to tell me exactly how they make innovation happen.
We can't just wish for innovation to happen. We can't become innovative with rhetoric. There are skills, knowledge and experience that people need to conceive innovative problem solutions. Pretium offers such methods and other do as well. It is not my point here to argue whether our methods are best (they are!). Rather, if you have provided your employees methods and tools for inventive problem solving, what next?
The inventive problem-solving process lies at the heart of an Innovation System.
Once the system has been established and employees have been trained, the characteristics of the Innovation System will determine the organization required for effective implementation. Organizations require metrics and incentives. Metrics and incentives have a strong influence on employee behavior. Metrics and incentives induce employee behavior. Once proper alignment of the Innovation System, organization, and metrics/incentives have been achieved, employee behavior will enable the Innovation System resulting in a culture of innovation. Improper design or misalignment anyplace in this structure will result in employee behavior that disables the Innovation System and threatens the future of the organization.
Please comment and share experiences where proper alignment resulted in a self-reinforcing innovation system or experiences where innovation failed because all of these elements were not present or improperly aligned.