October 12, 2005
How Should We Repair the Innovation Disconnect?
Last week “NussbaumOnDesign” creator Bruce Nussbaum,
( http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/NussbaumOnDesign/) reported the results of a recent BCG Survey. The results reveal a frightening disconnect between CEOs and their lower-level managers and staff in regards to innovation.
One off-putting statistic was:
76% of CEOs believe their companies foster a culture of innovation, but 51% of lower level execs and employees disagree.
It is difficult to tell who is at fault for this discrepancy. When reading the information, it is easy to take the side of the employees. Many feel time, lack of funding or bureaucracy squelches their creative ideas. With this in mind, it is no surprise most employees do not think their companies foster a culture of innovation.
But are CEOs at fault? A CEO is rarely working in “the trenches” so to speak. They may not see how long it takes for an idea to go from brainstorm to customer. When an executive sees products on the shelf from his company that are new, creative, and hi-tech, he or she may consider a culture of innovation at work. CEOs can only stay so involved in the day-to-day workings of the company before he or she does a poor job leading the company as a whole.
But how can the two sides see eye to eye? Is it possible for employees to innovate efficiently without bureaucracy and infrastructure in place? What can executives do to help their managers and staff while still “minding the store” so to speak?
I propose that executives reach out to managers and staff more frequently to ascertain what can be done about the innovation environment at the company. In the same vein, staff members need to let managers and executives know what still needs work when fostering an innovative work environment. It should not take independent surveys to discover and correct this apparent disconnect. Only when everyone is working from the same information can changes in the corporate environment occur.
- Erin Canty [erin.canty@brainreactions]
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Managing Ideas, Innovation Techniques, Corporate Innovation |
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2 Responses to “How Should We Repair the Innovation Disconnect?”
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October 22nd, 2005 at 3:51 am
I think here are various reasons for this disconnect some are..
1) Difference in the definition of innovation
If you really dig then you may find the definition of innovation may Vary from a radical change in product service or system to just a change in color of product from black to red.
2) Multi level hierarchy in organization structure
There is disconnecting between the top level strategic changes and the operation that the employee do. Lack of transparency and communication of vision is the major disconnect. Usually this kind of disconnect is found in organization which has a multi level hierarchy in the organization
Whose fault?
Link between top management and Employees.
This involves group of people who are completely dedicated to the company. And are at constant struggle to stabilize and optimize the process in the organization.
This is the Level where any change, innovation, or idea is crushed because of the fear of instability. There are many ways to deal with this also. One of them is as you mentioned constant conversation between executive and managers.
YES it is possible for an employee to innovate without any bureaucracy or support; one way to do is go STEALTH. This often requires faith in his idea, daring, strong motivation and ability to face consequences. All this is fairly dependent on the work environment the employee gets. We all know about what 3M, had done about this.
January 5th, 2006 at 10:19 pm
If innovation truly was looked at from a long-term perspective, then more innovation could be produced by more companies. One of the key reasons why bureaucracy often stifles innovation is because of upper management’s desire to satisfy Wall Street with immediate financial returns for new products and services. More short-term focus usually means more people involved in the process to make sure new products and services are immediately profitable, thereby resulting in more bureaucracy. Therefore, if Product A, which is very innovative, takes a longer time to produce a financial impact for the company than Product B, which is less innovative but with a quicker financial return, then Product A might get shelved in favor of Product B even if B’s return is lower over the long-term. Less short-term financial pressure could produce less bureaucracy.