We’ve all heard it, the innovation phrases that make us squirm in our seats. They usually sound something like this:
We’ve got to seriously shake things up
We need a game-changing, out of the box, disruptive idea now
It’s time to make a sharp right turn
Believe me, I’m all about making waves and shaking things up. In fact it’s the only way to get noticed in this crazy cluttered world.
But, what I don’t agree with is how you get there. The so called experts out there talk about getting your people to bring game-changing ideas to their next meeting or rattle the cages of status quo. They talk about creating “change agents” out of everyone.
It’s the notion that in one twenty-four hour day you are going to take a leap over the edge when you’ve never even stood on it with your toes dangling over. That sudden jolt is how innovation dies in most organizations.
I’m sure you’ve been there before. Leadership, maybe that’s you, sets the tone that innovation is a value, and a mandate. You want big things from your team. Your team gets excited and then goes back to work. They bang their heads against the brick wall trying to do something so bold that you will fall out of your executive chair. A few weeks go by, then a month, maybe even a year, and it seems that you aren’t much further than where you were at the start.
As I stated, I believe in being disruptive, but I don’t agree with the sudden jolt most of us try to do in an effort to achieve that. The challenge is that no one buys into it and hence, it doesn’t work.
I would like you to consider a different approach, one that may seem smaller but will actually get you there faster, and with more buy-in. I call it “leveraging the power of Compounding Innovation.” We know the value of compounding interest in money where one buck turns into two, two turns into four, four turns into eight, eight to sixteen, and before you know it, you are at one million.
Innovation works in the same way. If your team adds just 2% more innovation to everything they do everyday, the power of compounding will take you from incremental to high-impact before you know it, and with less pain. You’ll go from 2% more innovative to 4%, then to 8%, then 16%, next 32% and then you are well to 100%.
You ask your team just 3 more provocative questions in the team meeting, getting them to think differently about the challenge at hand. Kenneth makes the extra effort to connect with someone outside of his core team for input on his big initiative, improving the idea and getting buy-in from the people that have to implement down the road. Barbara sees a challenge and on the spot thinks of a creative solution that prevented future problems.
Tiny moments of innovation don’t just add up, they tap the power of compounding innovation. That not only gets you to that blue skies, disrupt the marketplace business, it gets you a lasting behavior shift from your team. And that lasting behavior shift means you aren’t just ahead of the curve, you are creating it.
The power of Compounding Innovation means your team has turned innovation from a point-in-time exercise to a mindset. They’ll create a winning culture of innovation that is able to turn change from a frustrating outside force to an inside asset that gains you the competitive edge.
On LaunchStreet, the online program to ignite innovators and foster a culture of innovation so you can outmaneuver the marketplace and outperform the competition, we see how our bite-size innovation tools turn into lasting impact for people, teams and organizations. Everyday people grab one tool for their next meeting, one idea on how to think differently about their work, one interview that sparks an aha moment.
I encourage you to walk away from the idea that innovation has to be this shocking shift. Instead treat innovation like money that builds over time.
Tap the power of Compounding Innovation.