Innovation Initiatives In Large Organizations Follow An Eerily Similar Pattern

If you have worked at a large organization, you may have lived through something called an “innovation initiative”.  A major effort aimed at building an organization’s innovation capabilities.  

These initiatives take on many forms but the pattern they follow is eerily similar.  

They Start With A Bang

The group CEO or some senior leader decides to launch a major innovation initiative.  

New innovation labs, innovation teams, and product squads start popping up.  A Chief Innovation Officer is hired. 

Big product ideas are openly discussed. Budgets are approved.

Senior leaders constantly talk about the importance of innovation.  Promises are made about big organizational changes.  There is new energy in the organization. 

Everyone is encouraged to come up with new ideas.

And End In A Whimper

But after a year or two, things start to bog down.

Teams start to notice that nothing has changed. The big product bets never materialized. Many ended up in costly failures. No new innovative products are being proposed.

Budgets are slashed. Resources are being reallocated.

Fewer and fewer people talk about innovation.  The organization continues to work the way they used to work.  None of the promises ever came to fruition.  

And the previous energy has turned into “this too shall pass” skepticism.

So What Happened? Why Do So Many Initiatives Fail?

 It comes down to the following 5 reasons.

1. Trying To Do Too much – Innovation is a big topic and comes in all shapes and sizes.  It is easy to get lost in the wilderness
2. Myopic View Of Innovation – Limiting innovation to idea generation
3. Not Building Innovation Skills – Hoping that product teams will pick this stuff up
4. Lack Of Proper Leadership Support – All talk and no action. The fastest way to kill innovation
5. Being Impatient – Wanting innovation to happen NOW!!

Let’s Dig Deeper Into Each One Of These Reasons And (Most Importantly) Share With You How You Can Avoid Them

Reason #1: Trying To Do Too Much

Recently, a leading telecom operator shared with us their product innovation portfolio. It included a wide variety of projects – from building new businesses, developing new products, extending product line, to designing new experiences, upgrading technology, to process re-engineering.

On the surface, each one of these projects sounded like a good problem to solve. But, on closer inspection, each project required a different innovation capability.

Building a new business requires different skills than designing a world-class digital experience.

By trying to do too much, you end up doing too little. Forcing you to spread your resources too thin, getting lost, and not delivering.

A Better Approach:  Focus On Building One Type Of Innovation Capability At A Time

A better approach is to focus on one capability. Build it. And only after you have mastered the basics, move on to the next.

For example, a leading automotive organization focused on reinventing digital experiences first. New product introduction second. And new businesses (moonshot) third.

Doing so delivered the following three benefits.

First, it provided clarity. It tells your team what type of innovation you would like to and like not to pursue. Thus avoiding the “trying to do everything” innovation trap.

Second, it sets a north star. By saying that you are targeting user experience innovation. You are reinforcing your product priorities and desired outcomes.

Third, it increases the chances of your success. By pooling all your resources in one area…you have a better chance of delivering results.

Reason #2:  Focusing On Idea Generation Only

Too often, leaders take a myopic view of innovation. They believe that innovation is about coming up with the big idea.

So they end up investing in the latest brainstorming fad. Hoping that once the idea is generated, their normal product development process would take care of the rest.

Unfortunately, in most cases nothing happens afterward.

Organizational inertia kicks in. Either the team does not know how to proceed next, or the idea is too risky, or plain forgotten.

The end result, lots of wasted energy creating ideas but no real impact.

A Better Approach: Put In Place A Holistic Innovation Process

Google, Amazon, Facebook, Starbucks are successful at innovation because they don’t stop at the idea. They take a more holistic approach. So should you.

At a minimum, you need to establish an end to end innovation process that includes,

1. Searching: Uncover customer problems that are worth solving
2. Ideating: Generate lots of ideas and solutions
3. Experimenting: Try out new solutions to discover out what works the best. Cheaper and faster.
4. Building Small: Build the least amount of product possible (minimum viable product), and
5. Measuring Impact: If you don’t measure, how do you know if your idea worked

Defining a holistic innovation process is one thing. Getting products teams to adopt is another.

Reason #3:  Not Investing In Building Innovation Skills

A few months ago, we were invited to a new product kick-off meeting at a large regional health care provider.

During the meeting, the product executives emphasized the importance of innovation. And set expectations that the product teams need to embrace new ways of working.

However, after talking to the product team we realized no one knew how to work differently. Yes, they all understood the concepts. But putting it into practice was a whole new ball game.

A Better Approach:  Help Teams Adopt (Training Is Not Enough) Modern Innovation Practices 

Organizations that are serious about innovation,need to help their product teams adopt these practices.

How do you do that? Two parts.

Part one, upskill teams through repetition.

If you want to change your habits, you need to repeat the new habit a few times before it becomes ingrained. The same philosophy applies to teams.

To do that consider putting your team through a three-tier program that will,

1. Teach Them What To Do: A 1 – 2 day training course that builds the right mindset and knowledge foundation.
2. Show Them How To Do It: A multiweek regiment where teams learn innovation skills by getting their hands dirty.
3. Do It With Them: Embed SMEs into teams to help guide them on the day-to-day work.

We built a similar program with a large bank a few years ago. And the team continues to use these techniques even today.

As for part two – provide the proper leadership support. For teams to thrive, they need permission, help, and guidance from their leaders. This brings me to my next reason.

Reason #4: Lack Of Proper Leadership Support (All Talk No Action)

In the healthcare example above, it wasn’t just that the team did not know what to do. It was the leaders as well.

Yes, they could talk the talk. And while they all had the best of intentions when it came to action, few actually knew what to do.

For innovation to work, leaders need to match their words with action. Otherwise, teams will immediately revert to their old habits.

A Better Approach:  Upskill Your Leaders, This Is New To Them As Well

Leaders need to be upskilled too. In addition to being versatile in modern innovation practices, leaders must also,

1. Create The Right Conditions: Provide the team with time, physical space, training, coaching, and proper support.
2. Mobilize Cross Functional Teams: Break down silos, create true cross functional teams, and manage them across the product development lifecycle.
3. Manage Contradictions: Innovation is full of trade offs. Managers need to find the right balance between short and long term priorities. For example, experiment but know when to stop, disciplined approach but not being bureaucratic, set strong performance standards yet tolerate failure, etc.

If you want your change to succeed you need to make sure your leaders are capable of supporting it.

Reason #5:  Big Bang Approach

Every once in a while, we get clients who are so eager to innovate that they want it all right away. They want teams trained in 3 months, the first big idea launched in 6 months, and a new operating model in 12 months.

Unfortunately, building innovation capabilities does not work that way. At a minimum, the journey takes at one product development cycle (12 – 18 months in a large organization).

Most likely two to three product development cycles, depending on organization complexity.

A Better Approach:  Start Small, Learn, Pivot, And Then Scale 

There is unfortunately no substitute for time. Building capability is a multi year endeavor.

However, you can choose how to use your time more effectively.

Instead of a big bang approach, consider the following journey,

1. Pilot: Pilot the program with 2 – 3 product teams. Keep the blast radius small and show early wins
2. Learn: Based on what you learn, adjust and pivot the program as needed
3. Scale: Once the program shows promise, continue to expand till you reach critical mass
4. Codify: Change operating model to lock in the changes

I always tell my clients, operating model changes should always be last not first.

Innovation initiatives are inherently risky.  After all, you are trying to change the DNA of your product team.  It’s not an easy task.

By applying the better approaches outlined above, you will not only increase the chances of your success but also dramatically reduce risks and increase flexibility as you roll out the program. 

Good Luck!!

And if you have encountered other hurdles within your organization, please add them to the comment below.