40 Reasons Why People Struggle with Innovation

As facilitators, we know that getting people to embrace innovation can be difficult. There are many obstacles that must work to clear.  This list identifies MANY of those obstacles.  You might use this list to identify the roadblocks that might come up with a team you are facilitating and develop specific processes that work through it.

 The following list of forty reasons why people struggle with innovation in their companies in daily practice was compiled by Gijs Van Wulfen based on responses to questions he posted to LinkedIn groups.

Are there others that you would add? Let’s continue the conversation!

A. Culture

• We are uncertain if we can be creative and come up with ideas.
• How do we change our existing habits?
• There are too little ideas because people don’t dare to think innovative any more.
• A lot of people are lazy, just copying others work.
• There is a substantial lack of curiosity among people in our company.
• How to get key people in our organization aware of the need for innovation?
• People don’t really believe that innovation is truly going to happen.
• We lack the ability to invoke change, the ability to change the mindset of we’ve always done it that way.
• We do not have the guts (mind power) to bring an idea.
• Our past innovations were not successful and have cost a lot of money. This blocks new initiatives.
• Our short-term mindset overrules the long-term mindset and vision to innovate.
• There is no vision where we want to go in the future as a company.

B. Uncertainty

• Ideas are too ambitious therefore we can’t imagine how they ever will be feasible.
• It’s very hard to imagine the future.
• We fear failure.
• Those in our company that don’t understand the idea or new product will attack and ridicules the newness of it.
• The critical thing at the front end in our company is the demonstration of the positive bottom-line impact of the new service or product.

C. Support

• The hardest part of beginning an innovation is trying to get the support for the idea of innovation.
• How do I share my ideas with others in the company efficient?
• How to create sponsorship for innovation at the top?
• How to communicate ideas to the right people?
• How do you convince each internal stakeholder they benefit from innovation?
• Negativity – “we tried it x numbers of ago, it does not work in our environment” – is the biggest stumbling block in our company.
• How do we get consensus on a solution from majority of the stakeholders?

D. Market Insights

• Often customers don’t even know themselves what they would want or benefit from.
• We struggle to get inside the head of the purchaser of the product or service.
• How to uncover the true customer need?

E. Process & Tools

• Our innovation process is not well organized.
• There are too many ideas from which it is hard to choose.
• We do not stick to the original idea. Instead we take often the easier way.
• How do we decide what is a good idea?
• How do you filter ideas and at what point in the process do you throw out ideas?
• Everyone is talking about innovation, but few know what to start doing differently to make it happen.
• How do we select of the right technology/platform?
• It is difficult to translate the results of user studies into the language of technology development.

G. Team

• How do we guide the new product development team so that their ideas are in line with the company’s strategy?
• We do not have the right people in the room for the opportunity.
• Ideas are stopped because we do not have resources related to the needed talent.
• It is challenging for us to get internal teams to think beyond what made our company successful thus far.

Of course this is not a scientific proven list. I see it more as ‘a cry for help’ from innovation practitioners in their daily work.

Happy Holidays!

Cindy

The Importance of Focus, Time Constrained Tasks and Energy Breaks

A good reminder by  HBR contributor Tony Schwartz about the importance of staying focused on one task at a time, allocating time within which to complete a task, and taking energy breaks.  As all facilitators know, longer days do not equal more productive sessions. Better planning is the only way to accomplish more in less time.

Four Destructive Myths Most Companies Still Live By

11:17 AM Tuesday November 1, 2011

Myth #1: Multitasking is critical in a world of infinite demand.

This myth is based on the assumption that human beings are capable of doing two cognitive tasks at the same time. We’re not. Instead, we learn to move rapidly between tasks. When we’re doing one, we’re actually not even aware of the other.

If you’re on a conference call, for example, and you turn your attention to an incoming email, you’re missing what’s happening on the call as long as you’re checking your email. Equally important, you’re incurring something called “switching time.” That’s the time it takes to shift from one cognitive activity to another.

On average, according to researcher David Meyer, switching time increases the amount of time it takes to finish the primary task you were working on by an average of 25 percent. In short, juggling activities is incredibly inefficient.

Difficult as it is to focus in the face of the endless distractions we all now face, it’s far and away the most effective way to get work done. The worst thing you can do as a boss is to insist that your people constantly check their email.

Myth #2: A little bit of anxiety helps us perform better.

Think for a moment about how you feel when you’re performing at your best. What adjectives come to mind? Almost invariably they’re positive ones. Anxiety may be a source of energy, and even motivation, but it comes with significant costs.

The more anxious we feel, the less clearly and imaginatively we think, and the more reactive and impulsive we become. That’s not good for you, and it also has huge implications if you’re in a supervisory role.

As a boss, your energy has a disproportionate impact on those you lead, by virtue of your authority. Put bluntly, any time your behavior increases someone’s anxiety — or prompts any negative emotions, for that matter — they’re less likely to perform effectively.

The more positive your energy is, the more positive their energy is likely to be, and the better the likely outcome.

Myth #3: Creativity is genetically inherited, and it’s impossible to teach.

In a global economy characterized by unprecedented competitiveness and constant change, nearly every CEO hungers for ways to drive more innovation. Unfortunately, most CEOs don’t think of themselves as creative, and they share with the rest of us a deeply ingrained belief that creativity is mostly inborn and magical.

Ironically, researchers have developed a surprising degree of consensus about the stages of creativity and how to approach them. Our educational system and most company cultures favor reward the rational, analytic, deductive left hemisphere thinking. We pay scant attention to intentionally cultivating the more visual, intuitive, big picture capacities of the right hemisphere.

As it turns out, the creative process moves back and forth between left and right hemisphere dominance. Creativity is actually about using the whole brain more flexibly. This process unfolds in a far more systematic — and teachable — way than we ordinarily imagine. People can quickly learn to access the hemisphere of the brain that serves them best at each stage of the creative process — and to generate truly original ideas.

Myth #4: The best way to get more work done is to work longer hours.

No single myth is more destructive to employers and employees than this one. The reason is that we’re not designed to operate like computers — at high speeds, continuously, for long periods of time.

Instead, human beings are designed to pulse intermittently between spending and renewing energy. Great performers — and enlightened leaders — recognize that it’s not the number of hours people work that determines the value they create, but rather the energy they bring to whatever hours they work.

Rather than systematically burning down our reservoir of energy as the day wears on, as most of us do, intermittent renewal makes it possible to keep our energy steady all day long. Strategically alternating periods of intense focus with intermittent renewal, at least every 90 minutes, makes it possible to get more done, in less time, more sustainably.

Want to test the assumption? Choose the most challenging task on your agenda before you go to sleep each night over the next week. Set aside 60 to 90 minutes at the start of the following day to focus on the activity you’ve chosen.

Choose a designated start and stop time, and do your best to allow no interruptions. (It helps to turn off your email.) Succeed and it will almost surely be your most productive period of the day. When you’re done, reward yourself by taking a true renewal break.

Tony Schwartz is the president and CEO of The Energy Project and the author of Be Excellent at Anything. Become a fan of The Energy Project on Facebook and connect with Tony at Twitter.com/TonySchwartz and Twitter.com/Energy_Project.

http://blogs.hbr.org/schwartz/2011/11/four-destructive-myths-most-co.html

Brainstorming: Finding the Next Big Idea

Finding the Next Big Idea — IGNiTE Presentation

Feel free to download the attached presentation (pdf format) for essential facilitator tools and techniques.

The key to successful facilitation is providing structure and process tools to help groups think through issues, brainstorm solutions and evaluate  alternatives. I’ve attached a presentation I created called “Brainstorming: Finding the Next Big Idea.”  I hope you will find a useful tool or technique in here that you can apply to your work as a formal or informal facilitator.

Cindy Diamond,  Principal, Strategist & Facilitator

IGNiTE - Fueling Creativity and Innovation

Try These Focus Groups with an Insightful Twist!

Debate-style focus groups are a great way to learn more about consumer preferences. This style of focus groups amps up the disparities between product supporters and detractors or heavy users and light/non-users by putting them in the same room and asking them to debate your product’s merit vs. other options!

Debate style focus groups require two groups of consumers to come in at the same time. The process begins with a brief discussion with each group in separate rooms with a moderator  (i.e. heavy users in one room and non-users in the 2nd room). The moderators work with each of the groups to form the basis of their debate arguments. The groups are then brought together in one room to debate the topic at hand (for example, “Apple makes the best laptop computers for business professionals” may be the topic debated). One group will agree and the other disagree. The arguments that come out provide a deeper understanding of the category benefits,  how your product performs in that category, key product and category drivers, consumer perceptions and attitudes about your product and others in the category, etc. The moderators’ role during the debate is to keep the discussion genuine, probe on key issues and encourage group participation.  At the conclusion of the debate, the groups return to their separate rooms to debrief with their respective moderators on what was most convincing from the other side and which of their arguments they felt held up and which did not.

Debate-style focus groups provide a new level of insight and understanding you are unlikely to get from traditional focus groups. It’s also highly engaging and entertaining for the people observing in the back room!

IGNiTE your team with new consumer insights!

Cindy Diamond, President

IGNiTE, facilitating creativity and innovation

Creativity and the Spaces We Work In

We all know the impact that the space we work in has on our productivity and creativity. As facilitators and participants in group process, we feel great when we have light, air and space to move around. It helps us think more creatively and keep our energy high. Now, there’s scientific research that backs this up. This interesting article in the Wall Street Journal confirms what we know intuitively — the space we work in strongly impacts the job we do and even our physical health!

Here’s to great creative spaces!

Cindy Diamond

Building a Thinking Room

Wall Street Journal, Saturday April 30th by Jonah Lehrer

For thousands of years, people have talked about architecture in terms of aesthetics. Whether discussing the symmetry of the Parthenon or the cladding on the latest Manhattan skyscraper, they focus first on how the buildings look, on their particular surfaces and style.

Today, it turns out, the real cutting edge of architecture has to do with the psychology of buildings, not just their appearance. Recently, scientists have begun to focus on how architecture and design can influence our moods, thoughts and health. They’ve discovered that everything—from the quality of a view to the height of a ceiling, from the wall color to the furniture—shapes how we think.

Recently, for example, researchers at Ohio State University and the National Institute of Mental Health tracked 60 white-collar workers at a government facility in the central U.S. Some had been randomly assigned to an old office building, with low ceilings and loud air-conditioners. The rest got to work in a recently renovated space filled with skylights and open cubicles.

Millenium Images

For the next 17 months, the scientists tracked various metrics of emotional well-being, such as heart-rate variability and levels of stress hormone. They discovered that people working in the older building were significantly more stressed, even when they weren’t at work. The scientists said the effect was big enough to be a potential risk factor for heart disease.

But spaces can also help us to become more creative and attentive. In 2009, psychologists at the University of British Columbia studied how the color of a background—say, the shade of an interior wall—affects performance on a variety of mental tasks. They tested 600 subjects when surrounded by red, blue or neutral colors—in both real and virtual environments.

The differences were striking. Test-takers in the red environments, were much better at skills that required accuracy and attention to detail, such as catching spelling mistakes or keeping random numbers in short-term memory.

Though people in the blue group performed worse on short-term memory tasks, they did far better on tasks requiring some imagination, such as coming up with creative uses for a brick or designing a children’s toy. In fact, subjects in the blue environment generated twice as many “creative outputs” as subjects in the red one.

Why? According to the scientists, the color blue automatically triggers associations with openness and sky, while red makes us think of danger and stop signs. (Such associations are culturally mediated, of course; Chinese, for instance, tend to associate red with prosperity and good luck.)

It’s not just color. A similar effect seems to hold for any light, airy space. In 2006, Joan Meyers-Levy, a marketing professor at the University of Minnesota’s school of management, studied the relationship between ceiling height and thinking style. She demonstrated that, when people are in a high-ceilinged room, they’re significantly better at seeing the connections between seemingly unrelated subjects. In one experiment, undergraduates came up with nearly 25% more connections between different sports, such as chess and basketball, when sitting in a loft-like space than in a room with an 8-foot ceiling. Instead of focusing on particulars, they were better able to zoom out and see what various things had in common.

Although we’re only starting to grasp how the insides of buildings influence the insides of the mind, it’s possible to begin prescribing different kinds of spaces for different tasks. If we’re performing a job that requires accuracy and focus (say, copy editing a manuscript), we should seek out confined spaces with a red color scheme. But for tasks that require a little bit of creativity, we seem to benefit from high ceilings, lots of windows and bright blue walls that match the sky.

One day, we might be able to firmly ground the forms of architecture in their mental functions.

Aligning your work with your values

I recently had the pleasure of attending a workshop by Dr. John Demartini. The topic was on Fulfilling Your Destiny. Dr. Demartini spoke about the importance of knowing what you truly value most and aligning what you do with those values. When you are living a life aligned with your values you feel fulfilled, when you are not it may create  frustration, anxiety and/or depression.

I have seen this so many times in the work place. People are anxious about their jobs, can hardly get out of bed in the morning to get to work and dread Monday mornings. These are clear signs from your body & mind that you are in a job that is not aligned with your highest values.

This also applies to any type of relationship. If each person supports the other persons highest values most of the time and provides some challenge to those values some of the time the relationship will flourish and grow. When those things are out of balance, the relationship will be stressed.

This can be applied very effectively in the workplace. If you want something from someone else and you approach them with only your values in mind, they may resist. But if you can make your request in terms of how their highest values will be served, you will both be satisfied.

Now, for the facilitation angle: when facilitating teams it’s important to understand the values of that team and the individuals that comprise the team. That way, the facilitator can more effectively moderate the conversation and help participants present their needs, wants and ideas in a way that serves the values of his or her team members. That’s the real meaning of seeing something from someone else’s point of view!

Learn more about John Demartini and his work at www.drdemartini.com

Cindy Diamond

President, IGNiTE

Permission to be Innovative

What's really difficult about innovation is giving people permission to be innovative!

More than time and space to innovate, organizations need to give people room for failure. Better yet, reward people for taking a risk and failing.  Too often we are charged with innovation and then punished for failing to deliver the forecast.  Real innovation success is often preceded by failures (yes, often more than one).  If you want to break through and truly discover new territory, you must have permission to take risks; risk taking means there is a chance for failure.

 

Blue Ocean Strategy Process for Innovation

Blue Ocean Strategy offers a unique approach to thinking about innovation. The basic premise is that you seek out territory for innovation that is not in a crowded competitive space (called a “red ocean”).  The  Blue Ocean Innovation strategy can take months to complete if it’s conducted as it was intended to be — as a blueprint for a new operating model. However, I have had great success in creating Blue Ocean Strategy style workshops for innovation on a smaller scale.

The Blue Ocean Strategy tools of mapping the competitive space and seeking out white space are good tools for many different types of innovation projects — particularly new product development. I have successfully used these tools to facilitate structured workshops which help brand teams come up with new products and new ways to market those products. The key to these workshops is in getting the clients to focus on areas the competition has ignored. This strategy is similar to the one discussed  years ago by Michael Porter when he said if everyone else is going in one direction, you might be better off going the other direction.

The tools I have found most useful in facilitating smaller scale Blue Ocean type projects are: 1) Creating the “as-is” strategy map; 2) Six Paths analysis; 3) Identifying non-customer commonalities — The 3 tiers of non-customers and 4) 4) Four Actions framework and the “to-be” strategy canvases. Use of these tools, together with some simple fieldwork conducted by team members between the 2 workshop days, can yield some very surprising, interesting and fertile results!

Posted by Cindy Diamond

CEO, IGNiTE. . . fueling innovation and creativity

Sinnovation: The 10 Deadly Sins of Innovation

BusinessWeek ran an article last week on the 7 deadly sins of innovation.  Let me know which ones you face most often and how you deal with it! Here’s a summary of the article:

Sinnovation – BusinessWeek

October 21, 2009 (2:38 PM) by GMM

The seven deadly sins of the innovator—and how you can stop yourself from committing them

Just for fun, let’s take a look at seven of the most common and deadly sins of the innovator. We’ve seen all of these cause failures of Biblical proportions.

1. Lust. Innovating in a space you have no business being in. Trying to innovate outside your operational expertise or brand footprint creates incredible inertia internally. It also causes unhealthy confusion externally. “Wait,” the customer says. “My longtime supplier of plastic molding injection equipment is now making iPhone (AAPL) accessories? What gives?”

2. Gluttony. Trying to create too many initiatives with too few resources. Innovation takes emotional and financial capital and focus. Instead of making a number of small bets, focus your team and resources on one or two initiatives that have the greatest probability of hitting it big.

3. Greed. Taking short-term profits at the expense of long-term growth. The stock market demands a high rate of return, which naturally results in safe bets like line extensions — leaving you at risk of being blown out of the water by an industry-changing idea. The solution? Create two teams. Put one in charge of evolution and the other in charge of revolution. You’ll get both short- and long-term growth.

4. Sloth. Taking short cuts. Too many otherwise brilliant leaders have made the mistake of thinking that speed and short cuts are the only way to successfully innovate. While we agree that being overly cautious — “Let’s test the idea for the 83rd time” — is also potentially fatal, there is a happy medium. Think big, quantify, qualify, refine, and launch. This should take no more than 12 months.

5. Wrath. Being so focused on your competition that you miss the same opportunities your rivals are missing. You can’t read the label when you are sitting inside the jar. Don’t get kicked to the curb by someone outside your industry who is rightly focused on the consumer (and not either one of you).

6. Envy. In the context of innovation, envy means launching a “me too” product instead of finding a space you can own. So when your sales team comes to you and demands that you launch a product to compete with the “hot” new offering they just saw from the competitor, don’t take the bait.

7. Pride. You won’t give up on your favorite idea — even when the numbers prove you’re wrong. When it comes to your ideas, you must take a long, hard look at the data. Unless the data are overwhelmingly in favor of your idea, drop it and work on the one the team secretly knows is better.

Religion tells us the seven deadly sins are fatal to spiritual progress. We will let you debate that thought with the theologian of your choice. But we can tell you they are definitely fatal if you want to innovate successfully.

Read the full “Sinnovation” article in BusinessWeek

Happy Innovating!

Cindy Diamond

CEO, IGNiTE . . . fueling creativity and innovation

Facilitating Brand Strategy Workshops: Begin with Insights, Ideology, Intention

Insights. Ideology. Intention. These are three crucial components of a successful brand strategy. Set yourself up for success by making sure all of these components are part of your next brand strategy workshop.

Insights: What is that penetrating, discerning understanding about consumer motivations that will unlock opportunity for this brand?  If you don’t know the answer to this question, you need to seek it out prior to having your brand strategy discussions.  Identifying and understanding the key consumer insight that motivates your primary target audience  will ensure that you create a relevant brand promise. Without an insight, your promise is simply a guess as to what will motivate your audience to purchase your brand.

Ideology: Your company’s or division’s core ideology describes why you exist (core purpose), how you operate (core values) and what you are striving for (long-term goal and envisioned future).  Core ideology directly impacts your brand strategy. If your brand does not reflect your core ideology your company will be perceived as disconnected from the brand and in conflict with it (think of companies that don’t deliver on their brand promises . . . for example, some airlines & some cable companies). In fact, you may be percieved as trying to defraud your consumer. If not that severe, you will likely disenfranchise them.  With a clearly delineated and embodied core ideology, your brand strategy will reflect your purpose and values and help you to reach your goal.

Intention:  With your insights and ideology in place, you are ready to begin your work on the brand strategy. This work must be conducted with clarity and intention.  Getting to clarity and intention requires sacrifice. Your team must be aware from the beginning that a strong brand strategy is the best choice between many options — it’s essential to make choices to maintain focus and clarity. Remember that clear focus on your primary target audience will help you create a brand strategy that hits the bulls-eye and is meaningful and relevant.  Without sacrifice and intention your strategy will become diluted and will likely not be meaningful to anyone!

Your brand strategy influences and, in some cases, directs your communications strategy, product strategy and customer experience strategy.  A well thought out brand strategy that ties into your target audience insights and builds on your core ideology will be enduring, relevant and motivating both internally and externally!

Cindy Diamond — President, Chief Strategist and Facilitator

IGNiTE . . . fueling creativity and innovation