Culture is the most sustainable driver of innovation
Innovation doesn’t occur just because you order it, or as the result of isolated projects. It requires much, much more: an innovation culture in which engaged, independent employees can come together and use innovative ways of working to break new ground. Culture is the most sustainable driver of innovation in a company. It’s not only the management’s vision and it’s not only the methods or processes-it’s a holistic system that needs to be deliberately designed and developed so that an innovation culture can be established.
After all, only those that support an innovation culture from within can build an environment where employees consciously design offers and experiences that bring commercial success.
Without a clear innovation goal, you risk losing focus through untargeted initiatives
The core of an innovation transformation is the company-wide innovation goal. Before you can design initiatives that will transform your organization, it’s essential to have clarity about what you want the culture change to achieve. That’s the only way to define targeted initiatives that have the most impact for your organization.
Once the innovation goal is set, you can design the cultural framework with appropriate support and incentives to achieve it.
Our Innovation Culture Compass sees the organization as a holistic system
An effective innovation culture harmoniously balances multiple elements. If one or more elements are underdeveloped or missing, the resulting innovation culture will be weak or entirely ineffective. We think of innovation culture as a system, and develop it accordingly. That’s why we’ve developed the Innovation Culture Compass.
Once the innovation goal is set, the cultural framework to support and incentivise it can be derived from the five topic drivers: “strategy & offering”, “process and skill”, “metrics and learnings”, “people & teamwork”, and “senses & environment”.
Every dimension in more detail
Process & Skill
How work gets done within the company. Methods, tools and processes that support and promote human-centred innovation.
Key-questions:
What’s your product development process like? Do you have an established process for innovation projects?
How quickly can you adapt your development processes to unforeseen circumstances?
Which customer-oriented methods-such as customer journeys or prototyping-are used at your company? What are your strengths, and where are the gaps?
People & Teamwork
The skills and interactions between employees in the organization. Types of training and collaboration that promote a particular culture.
Key-questions:
In your organisation, who and what drives innovation forward? How is the team embedded in the organisation?
What rituals and methods do you use to promote and improve teams’ collaboration? And what role does management play in this?
Which skills are already available, and which skills are needed to reach your innovation goal?
Strategy & Offering
Concrete offers in the market that serve as evidence of a successful customer-centred culture, and that make it possible for the company to take the next step towards business success.
Key-questions:
How well does the current project portfolio correspond to the innovation goal?
What’s the balance between innovation projects and core business?
How do you find new areas with potential for disruption? Is there a vision that gives you guidance for exploration?
Metrics & Learnings
KPIs that measure the culture and the results of value creation-as well as the handling of those results-so that you can learn from them every day.
Key-questions:
How-and relative to what-do you measure your customer orientation and innovative strength?
How do you track and assess the income/expenditure ratio for innovation projects-and how is success defined?
How well is employee and customer feedback integrated into your culture and measured continuously?
Senses & Environment
The physical environment that directly manifests company culture, influences behaviour and either promotes or prevents exchange, collaboration, and customer orientation.
Key-questions:
What’s the overall effect of your work environment on cross-department collaboration, group work and informal exchanges of ideas?
Do project teams have dedicated collaboration spaces that are allocated over a longer period of time?
What impression of innovation culture do people get from your work environment?
Transformation is a living organism
In a transformation there’s no start point and no finish line. It’s a continuous journey, a living organism that constantly evolves and is always in motion. The five thematic drivers shown in the Culture Compass are all essential to shaping culture. Furthermore, they are all interdependent, so a change in one area can have an enormous effect on something else.
The above questions will help you to reflect on how strongly the five topic drivers are practised in your organisation today. Such an actual analysis will help you to derive relevant cultural initiatives and to design a strategic and tactical roadmap to achieve the desired innovation goal.
Ready to start?
Do you want to kick-off your innovation culture journey together with us in a 1.5-day workshop? We are happy to bring our broad experience in.
