In today's business environment, constant reinvention is needed. While breakthrough products or concepts can make an organization ahead of the competition, in these fast-paced times, this advantage is often short-lived.
While major product or service breakthroughs are headlines, it is a gradual innovation that employees innovate every day, providing organizations with the continued growth they need.
Sustainable innovation comes from developing a collective sense of purpose; releasing people's creativity through your organization and teaching them how to identify non-traditional opportunities.
With the emergence of innovative ideas, a clear sense of mission enables frontline employees to adopt new ideas that further drive the company's goals.
It starts from the top
Leaders have created a psychological environment that promotes continuous innovation at all levels. The challenge is that as organizations grow, management structures and bureaucracies designed to promote growth often create obstacles to small-scale enhancements.
Although there are exceptions, in large organizations, employees often feel disconnected from innovative functions and are less likely to take independent actions or provide revolutionary ideas.
The commitment to building innovative, correct psychological conditions begins at the highest level. This means that as leaders, you need to consider your own assumptions about innovation and their role in creating and changing organizational culture.
You need to understand the value of incremental and significant innovation, understand the psychology of innovation and take the lead in promoting a culture of innovation. Otherwise, it will not happen.
While your organization's ability to innovate depends on many factors, there are a few steps you can take to create a psychological condition that is conducive to creative thinking, regardless of the size of your industry or organization.
Establish a clear sense of direction
Changing culture requires changing minds, which takes time. But like any initiative, a clear sense of purpose helps speed up the journey.
The mission of your organization helps to organize and guide the creativity of its employees. What is the purpose of continuous innovation in the enterprise? Is to increase the customer value of existing products and services... speed up delivery... increase the on-time arrival rate?
With clear and clear information, everyone can focus on the innovation that delivers the most value. As Peter Drucker defines, innovation means creating a new dimension of performance. A sense of mission clarifies the direction of performance and helps determine which new ideas to focus on.
Open communication
Open communication between management and employees lays the foundation for a climate of trust. However, if you want to build a new, more trusting culture, you can't expect employees to take the first step.
Company leaders initiate the process of open communication by sharing information with employees on a regular basis. This includes good news and bad news.
Southwest Airlines' information sharing policy enabled the company to respond to the sudden increase in fuel costs during the 1990-1991 Gulf War. Due to the soaring fuel prices, the company is always available to everyone. Southwest Airlines CEO Herb Kelleher sent a memo to the pilot asking them for help. Through creative thinking, pilots have found ways to quickly reduce fuel consumption without compromising safety or service.
Organization leaders who maintain innovation provide a variety of communication opportunities.
While not every company can provide an open policy for its senior executives or even provide them with regular face-to-face contact opportunities, each organization can make plans to enable front-line employees to hear their opinions. From CEO lunches with employee cross-sections to monthly branch meetings between employees and general managers, open internal forums for idea sharing and feedback, leaders can communicate their openness and listen to innovative ideas that are closest to their customers.
Reduce bureaucracy
While larger organizations are often considered less entrepreneurial and creative than their smaller counterparts, not the size of the company hinders innovation - it is the system. Bureaucracy slowed down action and seriously hampered innovation.
Smaller organizations can often implement innovative ideas faster because they have less bureaucracy. When Jack Welch redesigned GE, he said, "My goal is to make the soul of small companies and the speed of small companies inside our big companies."
Faster implementation encourages further creative thinking. think about it. If you have innovative ideas and need 6 weeks to clear the channel and need to get funding for another 3 weeks, will you lose the motivation to contribute further?
Instill a sense of ownership
The ownership mentality creates a powerful impetus for creative thinking. When a person is clearly aware of how his or her interests are consistent with the company's interests, he or she has good reason to "double efforts" to further complete the task.
For employees, equity is an important, if not necessary, incentive. But for its part, profit sharing does not guarantee that your employees will think like the owners.
When employees don't understand how their personal efforts affect the company's profitability, they are often passive and passive. To encourage more participation, make sure each employee knows how his or her work affects company performance.
Southwest brave pilots are free to design and implement plans to reduce fuel consumption because they are in the best position to determine effectiveness. Pilots are passionate about investing because they understand the impact of their actions on the bottom line and are extremely dependent on their own future.
Ensure that recognition and rewards are consistent
While financial rewards are often associated with innovation, they only reward individuals or teams responsible for "significant creativity" or their implementation, creating a competitive competitive atmosphere that hinders smaller, less significant improvements.
If teams build competition with each other to get rewards, even team-based compensation can have the opposite effect. These incentives hinder cross-functional collaboration that is critical to maximum performance.
Companies that successfully cultivate innovative cultural design rewards can strengthen the culture they want to build. If your organization values integrated solutions, you cannot compensate for team leadership based on unit performance. If your company values the development of new leaders, you cannot build on short-term performance.
Tolerance to risk and failure
Tolerating a certain degree of failure is an essential part of growth and an important part of encouraging innovation. Innovation is a risk. Employees don't take risks unless they clearly understand the goal, have a clear but flexible framework to operate and understand, and failure is considered a simple step in the learning process.
Toyota's production system transfers quality management and innovation power to first-line factory workers. If employees see opportunities for improvement, they can adjust their work. If innovation is effective, it will be incorporated into the operation, and if not, it can be used to experience it.
One of the main psychological benefits of the Toyota approach is the development of trust. Employees who trust their bosses are more likely to take on the intellectual risks of potential benefits to the company.
Eliminate projects and processes that don't work
As your organization innovates, you need to practice what Peter Drucker calls "creative giving up." Projects and processes that no longer contribute should be abandoned to make room for new, progressive activities.
While no organization wants to waste money on unprofitable activities, if the company insists on the old way of doing things, it is actually an irreplaceable resource for time and employee energy.
Innovation needs optimism. It is about constantly achieving higher performance. If employees feel forced to continue their current activities, you can't expect them to remain optimistic.
©2007 Dr. Robert Karlsberg and Dr. Jane Adler
Orignal From: 7 continuous innovation strategy
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