The terms, structure and innovation may seem like an oxymoron. However, innovation does not just appear, sprouting out of the floors and walls of your office. Innovation may seem magical, but it is not magic. Magic is an illusion of nonsensical events or items materializing seemingly out of thin air. While innovation may seem to have the same beginnings, achieving innovative results is quite different.
A Culture of Daydreamers and Explorers
Almost everyone is familiar with the innovative culture of the 3M Corporation. This organization is specifically intentional in being innovative by providing their employees with the tools, time and talent they need to be innovation. 3M employees have the following items available to them to help conjure up innovative ideas.
- Employees receive 10 to 15 minutes each day to daydream or think of new products.
- Support is given to forums and think tanks for new ideas to be summoned from the depths of employee’s minds
- 3M scientists go out meeting customers face-to-face to understand any issues they might be experiencing
- The company bases bonuses on revenues from products that are less than 5 years old. Inventive employees can acquire seed month for their own new inventions from various business units throughout 3M
- Employees are allowed time off to bring their ideas to market and their jobs await them when they return.
Despite the fact that 3M already has over 5000 products, it is dedicated to innovation and that mindset has become a part of the company’s DNA.
Even if you are not a huge company the size of 3M, achieving innovation can take place with certain skill sets. These skills, like innovation, are not magical and you don’t have to be a Harry Houdini to have them appear in your skill set or a David Copperfield to master them. The book by Jeff Dyer, Hal Gergersen and Clayton M. Christensen entitled The Innovator’s DNA explains these skills.
- Questioning: In the 2014 Super Bowl, Russell Wilson, quarterback for the Seattle Seahawks said that his Dad always asked him the question, Why not you? Innovators always question the status quo. In addition, they are always conjuring up thoughts about what could be, and inventing ideas about ways to adopt what they already have in their bag of business tricks.
- Observation: Innovation is like magic in one sense and that is in the details. Magicians worth their salt never leave any detail out of their performance or the magic will simply not be there. True innovators observe every detail of their competition, the market, the economy and the buying trends and needs of their customers.
- Networking: Those who are less innovative often fail to network with peers, competitors or new acquaintances. An innovator has a vast and diverse network of contacts. Many of these contacts can turn into allies to pull the next innovative project out of the hat.
- Experimenting: People who are afraid to fail rarely experiment. Trying new things is one of the most magical ingredients in innovation. You might think of it as the gunpowder in the art of Poof! OK, sometimes the Poof! doesn’t happen. Failure never stops an innovator, it simply gives them, as Einstein said, ways it won’t work. Next!
If you feel all of this is still too woo woo for you, Peter Drucker once wrote an article entitled The Discipline of Innovation. In this article, the late Mr. Drucker suggests that being innovative requires hard, focused and purposeful work. Innovators use both the left and right brain and conduct analytics to determine both the opportunity for innovation as well as the end user. He further suggests that achieving the creation of innovations is typically in small steps rather than grandiose leaps. He goes on to say that, most innovations are not flashy, splashy like the magician’s flash paper, swishing capes or the spectacle of a hundred doves soaring into the air, but rather they are simple and focused.
So you see, innovation may seem magical, but the truth is, you don’t need a book of secret incantations to be innovative. You don’t need any magical fairy dust or a bag of mysterious tricks to conjure up an innovation. Your own skills, hard work and your ability to persist are all you need to create innovation. Now your excuses for not being innovative have disappeared in a puff of smoke.
Graphic Credit: Big Stock.com
