Leadership and Innovation

How many ideas fail to launch because they will require big changes in the business? Could it be the result of a failure in leadership? Do good ideas turn bad? If an idea fails to produce, does that mean it was bad? How many good ideas will be applicable to your business? Do they fit your mission and the context of the market in which you operate?

Can an idea succeed without a leader and champion? How would you manage it with objectives and measurable results? If key stakeholders managing the change are not engaged, what then? Should you inform key employees of the change and its importance? Maybe employees will shy away from sticking their necks out for something that is a little different. Then you have a culture of fear and control in your organization.

A group of people in a brainstorming session can produce a hundred and fifty new ideas, or more, in just a few hours. Successful brainstorming, or idea creation, requires that there is no constraint on what makes an idea a good one. Choosing the best ideas and deciding which ones to act on comes after generating all the ideas. What makes a potentially good idea worth doing? Which ideas will really be the best providers to productivity improvements in your business?

Two key factors drive the decision on whether to pursue a new idea: the business context, and leadership. The business context is the scope and structure in which an idea can develop. Ideas are the raw material needed for innovation to occur. Much as raw material fed into a factory to create new products, the business needs the right raw materials in the right quantities at the right time. The factory has a definite structure and strict requirements for the raw materials it needs.

The business context makeup includes the purpose or mission, strategy (markets and customers, products and services), goal setting, leadership, change management, and communications. All of these combine to create both the filter for a valuable idea, and the support structure to execute the idea. Without a business purpose, or mission, a new idea is much like the result of a brainstorming session – a bunch of raw material that that may or may not have any value.

What is the difference between a good idea and an innovation? To produce any true value, an idea must be acted on and executed to completion. So what exactly is an innovation? In general, a business innovation is an idea that is developed and executed, resulting in a measurable improvement in performance.

To qualify as an innovation, it will effectively perform one of three major functions:
1) it must address an as-yet unmet need in the marketplace,
2) it must improve an existing process or function, or
3) it must solve a problem by eliminating the challenges posed by that problem.

Innovation means change. Generating the idea and the buildup of excitement about the idea is the fun part of the process. The real work begins in planning, developing, and executing the idea. Changes in policies and practices, new systems and technologies, and new products and markets all involve substantial change. Day-to-day work activities, behaviors, and performance expectations of every employee will also change. Many changes will take months or even years to execute completely.

This is where leadership commitment comes in.

Most business innovations that fail to deliver are the unfortunate victims of:
• insufficient leadership commitment,
• poor operational management,
• lack of objective setting,
• and, a general failure to communicate.

Even with strong leadership commitment, if the business context makeup is also missing the idea is likely to go astray and the innovation never achieved. Without business context, the odds of selecting the best idea or executing it in the best way are low. It will be subject to the changing priorities of management, the market, customer, and your employees. It will become increasingly irrelevant.

The process of creating the right business context and management process is simple. The challenge comes in maintaining your commitment as the leader over an extended period. Define your business purpose, or mission. Clarify your strategy. Personally commit to the idea as the champion. Develop expectations, outcomes, assign key people in roles, and then communicate regularly. Weave the new idea and the process for executing it into the operating processes of the company, and let the ideas begin to flow.

One caution: Not all ideas will deliver the desired results or live up to expectations. These are tremendous learning opportunities about what will work and how it will work in your business. They serve to sharpen the focus on good ideas and they help to make your people more experienced at executing them effectively. Resist the urge to treat these ideas, and the key people involved, as failures that must be eliminated. You will be throwing out the baby with the bath water.

Do you want to turn your business into an innovation machine where process improvements, problem-solving and bold new product ideas become the norm? Create the business context structure and focus on the long-term leadership commitment and communication activities required to execute them. Only with this structure and repeatable processes for managing change can you make the process of innovation a habit, and not a special project. With the right context, leadership, and communication, your best ideas will win – again, and again.