According to Gartner research, 91% of marketers are leading or involved in driving organization-wide innovation. Marketing leaders acknowledge the importance of innovation to the business and invest a significant portion of their overall budget in making and regulating innovation strategies. However, another research shows that only 20% of companies are ready and equipped to innovate. The probable reason is that business entities are unaware of the suitable techniques and ways to introduce innovative strategies.
This is where innovation consulting services come into the picture. Innovation consulting is a strategy of unlocking new methods of creating value for customers and growth opportunities for businesses. Innovation consultants are responsible for performing research, analyzing, and reviewing latest data and offer fresh perspectives on modern processes.
Fueled by new technologies and changing consumer tastes, they are accountable to introduce innovation culture in an organization. Though they use different approaches to cultivate this culture in an organization, these are not limited to huge budgets and multiple strategies. Start small and proceed to build more with time.
Understand Innovation Culture with an Example
Unilever (a multinational consumer goods company) announced an immersive AI program to help the company fine-tune the recruiting process. Under this, the candidates or the applicants need to complete a series of mental games to assess individuals’ traits instead of sending CVs and cover letters. The selected candidates must go through recorded interviews. These are further analyzed using machine learning algorithms.
This example well reflects the power of innovation. Innovation can be taken as the first step to building unbiased and enriched organizational culture. Innovation culture prioritizes developing ideas, strategies, and skills for both workers and executives which leads to continuous organizational change.
This blog will cover some of the effective ways to foster innovation in an organization.
5 Ways to Build an Innovation-Enhanced Culture in an Organization –
Appreciate Ideas as well as Mistakes
Asking for input and innovation from the employees is an optimum way to construct an innovation-enhanced environment. Prepare pitches for new projects and products with the employees. Create an internal system that allows employees to pitch on a regular basis.
Choose the best pitches and offer advice to the person who pitched the idea to help them move from concept to implementation. To add up, the global innovation center (a community of like-minded individuals with whom to share and test ideas for development solutions) can be a great pick.
There are times when employees will make mistakes but the best solution is to push them to perform new tasks by eliminating the fear of failure. Allowing your employees to make mistakes gives them the freedom to think freely and independently.
Technological Capabilities
Today’s innovation is primarily driven by technology, technological capabilities, and an interest in the most recent technological developments. Hence you can’t overlook these essential components of an innovation-focused culture, as they allow for both exploration and implementation. Exploration of new trends and technologies promotes innovation and makes eventual implementation easier, while employees get more satisfaction from working with the new tools if they were previously able to discover their features on their own.
Open Communication
Communication is the driving force behind an innovation culture because it is an important factor in successfully implementing innovative strategies. Individuals develop a sense of belonging when they can express their opinions and ideas, which leads to peak performance.
One cannot indulge in a good exchange of ideas if the respective communication processes and channels aren’t properly implemented and streamlined. There is a need of focusing on conducting effective brainstorming and ideation sessions to foster innovation. Both synchronous and asynchronous communication is essential, especially in the age of remote and hybrid work, where workforces are typically distributed across multiple workplaces.
Psychological safety
Psychological safety is all about the feeling of ease that people feel while working together. The focus is to promote simple communication among the employees, leading to a fluent exchange of ideas without hassle. It is crucial for healthy collaboration, especially for diverse cross-departmental teams. In fact, many employees are more reserved about speaking up in psychologically unsafe environments and situations, which would make them hesitant about sharing their ideas and potentially lead to invaluable input missing.
Introduce innovation training
Almost every company should incorporate innovation training into their workflow and operations. It does not only teach leaders (and teams) innovative ways of thinking and working that push individuals to think outside the box (and thus improve the bottom line and result in more satisfied customers), but also improves employee engagement and satisfaction.
Innovation training will help teams and organizations keep up with our world’s increasingly fast-paced environment while creating and sustaining a culture of innovation. Successful teams want to see their company meet market demands and evolve eventually.
Bringing innovative approach to business
Instead of simply shaping and creating an innovative culture, having an inspirational innovative purpose for your organization is the best way to foster a meaningful culture of innovation. Concentrate on having a genuine motive that people can relate to. One that goes beyond simply making money. It’s all too common for businesses to tell themselves they’re innovative by implementing a few new working practices without focusing on what they’re really trying to accomplish.
Adopting the five strategies outlined above will enable an organization to map, systematize, manage, measure, and improve innovation, resulting in a steady stream of innovations—and the occasional game changer.
