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A Definition of Innovation is a Critical Success Factor PDF Print E-mail
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Written by James A Gardner   
Friday, 05 March 2010 00:26
by JamesAGardner


Though it seems like common sense, many organisations don't define what they mean by innovation before they start innovating. Then, they wonder why there are few decent innovation outcomes they can show to stakeholders.

Organisationally, it is the source of many arguments when you utter the word "innovation". Everyone has such strongly held beliefs on what the word means that getting to a consensus is usually impossible. It is even harder if the prospective innovation effort is likely to touch the personal turf of powerful people.

Arguments on this subject can go round and round for so long that inevitably someone will suggest that "we don't need a definition of innovation... can we please just start innovating?". This is a mistake.

The presence of divergent opinions on what's to be achieved in an innovation programme is almost always the first sign that nothing much is going to be achieved, no matter how much effort and money is expended.

The most successful innovation teams usually agree a definition that permits them to examine new things with very broad scope, but which avoids being excessively threatening to existing operations. In my own programmes, this is a definition that's worked:

Innovation is "anything that wouldn't have been achieved through ordinary business-as-usual processes".

Note this doesn't prescribe either the scale or volume of innovation that is undertaken. Innovators are free to do anything at all that is not already being done. But it does make it clear to everyone that if they already have something working, the innovators won't interfere.

The definition is a good balance between having the flexibility to pursue new things, and making sure that powerful stakeholders won't feel they have to shut down the innovation programme before it gets off the ground.

About the Author:

Getting better at innovation provides huge differentiation. James A Gardner's free book has many resources you need to make a great start with your innovation effort.
 
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