Successful companies look to innovation as a source of competitive advantage and growth. They especially do this when being disrupted. As companies innovate, they focus on developing approaches to accelerate consumer needs identification, through derivatives of Design Thinking and/or Jobs To Be Done methodologies, and idea development. But this is only part of the innovation equation for getting ideas to market and into the hands of consumers.
We’ve made a critical observation based on our experience with F1000 companies: team dynamics and organizational conditions are often overlooked or undervalued factors in increasing innovation success rates. When neglected, the unintended consequence can be innovation sabotage.
Over Index Innovation Efforts on Idea Development
In the world of startups, VCs routinely invest in teams as much, if not more, than ideas. Some even say they will invest in an A-team with a B-idea, before they would invest in a B-team with an A-idea. Investors recognize the importance of team dynamics to fuel idea development. The combination of hard-skills obtained through experience or formal training, and the soft-skills like passion, conviction, curiosity, and collaboration are a powerful formula for navigating the ambiguity and inevitable setbacks they will encounter in the innovation process.
Unfortunately, many BigCos over index their innovation efforts on idea development. They neglect team selection. Their program staffing strategy is often based on functional formulas and capacity, rather than passion and skill specific to the challenge. The unintended consequence of this formula-derived, capacity-driven approach to staffing is that it often perpetuates functional bias. Also, individuals feel overly compelled to defend work versus advance it objectively.
Individuals with good intention, but a lack of clarity to their roles, will consciously or subconsciously interject personal agendas, bias, and questions into the program schedule in an effort to find meaning, validate their position, and ensure project metrics align with role specific rewards. Even the best intentions, when misplaced, can create swirl. Misplaced questions, bias, and siloed reward systems can be innovation killers, often sending the most promising ideas into a vortex of team conflict and data collection with minimal measurable progress. This is often where Burn Rate or rather Burn-out sets in.
They underestimate the importance of organizational conditions
Another common pitfall companies will make as they build their innovation capability is to underestimate the importance of creating conditions in the organization structure for innovative work to thrive. They make the mistake of thinking previously successful organizational structures, decision making processes, and reward systems will be effective at supporting the innovation their businesses require in the near and distant future. Eric Ries writes about these conditions and the need for change in detail, in his book The StartUp Way.
The Garage Group has helped dozens of Fortune 1000 companies adopt and apply entrepreneurial capabilities. They’ve done it at a c-suite and division level.
We recently partnered with a A F500 Retail Company that was losing market relevancy. We gathered their multi-brand Senior Executive team together to align on what would need to be true to move the consumer to the center of their decision making. In partnership with The Garage Group, they embarked on a development program to build their listening and observation skills, and importantly, their mindsets in looking at the consumer need, through the consumer lens rather than through their own. They then cascaded this new approach and mindset through their teams, and equipped them with the skills and tools needed to truly enable what has become a breakthrough shift in their business.
Evidence tells us that sustained success requires the adoption of new mindsets and behaviors, which are nurtured through organizational structures and processes, and enabled by leadership. The details for how these elements come together, will be largely informed by existing systems, and the BigCo’s ambitions.
The Garage Group has found the following tactics to be simple but impactful in avoiding Innovation Sabotage.
If this article was helpful, or if you found success in leveraging one of the tactics listed, let us know. We’d love to hear your story, and help you on your journey.
