Integrating your business strategy

We have discussed knowing your end game, types of innovation and their importance in developing an innovation strategy, there is also the development of an environment/culture that will foster innovation. The development of a framework to support innovation includes:

• Integrating innovation into business objectives
• Taking a holistic approach to innovation
• Establishing strong channels of communication
• Developing an environment of trust

Integrate Innovation into business objectives

Global surveys have found that the top motivators for innovation are leaders who encourage and protect innovation and top executives who spend their time actively managing and driving innovation. Inhibition of innovation commonly occurs where executives pay lip service to innovation but do nothing about it.1

For an innovation strategy to be effective there needs to be an integration of innovation into senior leaders’ agenda. By developing performance metrics and targets for innovation senior management integrate innovation into their normal pattern of business. This routine also creates an environment where managers and floor staff are comfortable with innovating, thereby making better use of an existing talent for innovation.

Taking a Holistic approach to innovation

Innovation is not resigned to just product development but can be in process improvement, organizational structure, business model and marketing.

For example the innovative organisation 3M which is best known for household brands such as Post-it Note, Scotch Guard and Scotch Tape has developed an environment of innovation which permeates every function of the firm so that accidental discoveries are captured and applied. For example, the accidental discovery of a new adhesive that was applied innovatively to give us Post-it Notes. 3M embedded innovation within the organisation by encouraging technical staff to spend 15% of their time on projects of their own choosing or initiative.

Look to the overall organisation and to stakeholders such as suppliers and clients when developing your innovation strategy. Bring in different departments into the innovation process and create strong communication channels throughout the organisation and beyond as discussed below. Look at your skills and the skills of your staff. Can more effective teams be developed through combing right brain (imaginative) and left brain (logical) people together to create a team that can better achieve the company’s strategy. Pixar’s John Walker (Producer) and Brad Bird (Director) provide a creative tension that sharpens the resulting movies.3

Establishing strong channels of communication

An organisations’ formal and informal communication networks will determine its innovation effectiveness. Effective networks allow people with different kinds of knowledge and ways of tackling problems to cross-fertilise ideas. Since new ideas seem to spur more new ideas, networks generate a cycle of innovation2.

When developing your innovation strategy think about how you can create conditions that allow innovation to become part of daily discussions. This could be achieved through adjusting existing organisational networks so that they become more decentralised, adding innovation to the agenda item of leadership meetings so that innovation is regularly discussed and training and professional development programs to encourage the use of creativity tools and techniques.

Developing an environment of trust

A key part of innovation is the fostering of ideas and the development of an environment in which employees are encouraged to take risks and test their ideas. Think about how this can be achieved and built into your innovation strategy. It can be as simple as acknowledging employees ideas and encouraging them to pursue ideas that add value to the business.

1 Barsh J., Capozzi MM., Davidson J., Leadership and innovation, The McKinsey Quarterly, Number 1, 2008
2 Barsh J., Capozzi MM., Davidson J., Leadership and innovation, The McKinsey Quarterly, Number 1, 2008
3 Rigby D., Gruver K., Allen J., Innovation in Turbulent Times. Harvard Business Review, June 2009

Links to subsections of this topic

Developing an innovation strategy
Types of Innovation Strategy
Integrating your business strategy
Prototyping
Driving Innovation
Summary