There is an inherent bias against innovation despite the enormous value it holds for organizations. Corporate executives know that innovation is the only true long term growth engine for their firm. Yet innovation carries with it a certain stigma, a perception in the minds of executives, that it is "soft" and frivolous compared to other hard core business activities like productivity, quality, and demand generation. This stigma deters executives from taking risk and investing in serious innovation initiatives.
The innovation industry itself is partly to blame. Participants in the innovation space tend to perpetuate a mystique about innovation and creativity as though it is a deeply hidden secret that needs to be unleashed. Walk into many innovation sessions and what you see are cans of Silly StringTM, Slinky(R) toys, Frisbees, and funny nose glasses. The notion here is that people need to be more playful to have that "eureka" moment and invent the next blockbuster idea. People are conditioned to believe innovation requires "skunk-works" in a specially-designed room to pursue "white space opportunities." Innovation is voodoo.
In an effort to differentiate themselves, participants in the innovation space create novel names for their programs and services. Here is a very small sample: Innovations-Radar(R), Innovation Cube(R), Challenge AcceleratorTM, 360-IA(R), SpinnovatorTM, Idea BucketTM, AlphaStormingTM, Excursion DeckTM, Mindscan(R), IdeaSpring(R), Super Digilab(R), etc, etc. The list is overwhelming and it tends to confuse the market. More importantly, what is the efficacy of these tools? Do they work? The granddaddy of them all, Brainstorming, is certainly suspect given the many studies that suggest otherwise.
Is there an innovation bias? I am polling Fortune 100 executives to describe the characteristics of people who champion certain business causes. I ask them to describe the typical age, experience, credentials, aspirations, and personality of:
The early feedback suggests innovation champions, compared to the others, are seen as more eager, altruistic "dreamers" who are out of touch with the business. One executive described innovation champions as necessary but had low expectations of actual results. Of more concern is the perception executives have about themselves in this role. My sense is business people shy away from championing innovation because they believe the stigma of failing at innovation is more career-damaging than failing at other ventures.
The innovation industry needs to play a role in improving the image of innovation. Fortunately, there are resources like Innovation Tools and CREAX that consolidate the innovation space and help companies make sense of the different offerings. More prominence needs to be given to the classic researchers in innovation and creativity like Ronald Finke, Thomas Ward, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, and Jacob Goldenberg. We need to get back to the basics of what makes innovation work so we can skip the hype.
The innovation bias has to be overcome if companies want to make progress and grow. Leaders need to address this head on. How? Just as they learned to champion leadership by first becoming an authentic leader, they need to champion innovation by first becoming an authentic innovator.
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Recently we had a post on our blog (www.mahindrauniverse.com) where the writer describes the conditions in which she innovates - deadlines, pressure, lack of sleep and laziness.
What do you think of this?
Posted by: Priyanka | July 15, 2008 at 03:01 AM
I think the use of artificial constraints like deadlines can help her be more productive, but not necessarily more innovative. It depends on what ideation method she uses within those constraints. I use deadlines, for example, when I write blog posts, and it makes me produce. To be innovative, it takes more. That said, constraints can be an important driver of innovation. See the paper under the READING section of this blog called "A Structured, Facilitated Team Approach to Innovation." We use strict time limits in our SIT innovation workshops to stimulate more ideas. It works. Her technique of being lazy may be an effective way to invoke an SIT template called Task Unification. This is where you take components of the situation or problem and give them an additional job or task (so you can be lazy, I suppose?). Interesting approach. As for lack of sleep? My experience says people ideate better when they are fresh and rested.
Posted by: Drew Boyd | July 15, 2008 at 07:35 AM
There is a lot of evidence that sleep deprivation does not support creativity. For example - http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/01/21/tech/main594879.shtml
Moreover, I think that the motivation of innovators sometimes stems from laziness. Someone once told me: "Progress in not made by early risers. It is made by lazy men who are looking for better ways of doing things."
Of course that in not always the case, however I do think that formal tools and acquired creativity skills have to peppered with the right amount of motivation and desire for change in order for new ideas to mature into innovations and drive real change.
Posted by: Shahar Larry | July 17, 2008 at 09:01 AM
I think that lack of sleep does not boost creativity or the thought process but it increases the pressure for an output and probably for some people it works and they come up with out-of-the-box, innovative ideas.
The post I am talking about is http://www.mahindrauniverse.com/mahindra_universe/2008/07/ennui.html
do check it out and we would appreciate having your views there.
Posted by: Priyanka | July 18, 2008 at 01:31 PM