Be A Fire Starter

In response to my recent post “What’s It Mean?”, Paul Williams submitted the following comment:

“Great post.  Your comment, "The innovation game is not for dabblers" is extremely to the point.  Many of the organizations that I work with, who struggle with innovation efforts that seem to start/stop, are typically the ones who seem to think that innovation is project-by-project based.

“It’s a discipline, with tools and process and metrics and goals and roadmaps.  In essence, to be successful, you have start with the first step, but also realize it is a long journey.”

Paul makes a great point.  As we have discussed here before, organizations move through a series of Innovation Maturity Model phases.  In the earlier stages, the organization acts in a very localized manner—picking and choosing where to apply good innovation disciplines.  A key distinction between organizations that get stuck in the Situational Innovation phase is the degree to which they understand that innovation is a core competency that must be developed.

In environments where this is not understood, the organization fails to move out of the opportunistic model of occasionally enhancing a project with structured innovation techniques.  In those environments where it is understood that properly supported innovation best practices help build the value of the company, the organization begins to move to a Repeatable Innovation phase of the maturity model.

So if you are an innovation practitioner within a company, the question you should be asking is, “Does my company understand the strategic value of implementing a sustainable innovation program?”  If the answer is yes, then you can have some confidence that the demonstrable successes of today’s opportunistic efforts will lead to a more comprehensive strategy for building value through innovation.  If the answer is no, then you need to become an innovation champion and find strategic endorsers who can help influence the corporate mind set. 

As Reggie Leach said: “Success is not the result of spontaneous combustion. You must set yourself on fire.”  Light the fire of innovation success in your organization.

Comments

[Paul R. Williams]

James:

Thanks for the "shout."

Your new post ties in very nicely with Jeffrey Phillips' new post about "low hanging fruit."

http://innovateonpurpose.blogspot.com/2007/09/low-hanging-fruit.html

Why do these organizations so frequently look for the easy way out?

Frustrating...