“Don’t be someone who asks “what happened?” — make things happen. Change your attitude, and you’ll find that things really can improve. The next year is full of opportunity, and it’s yours if you want it! ”
A few years ago, right around the approach of the New Year, I wrote a blog post that I called ‘10 Great Words.”
Since that time, this inspirational post has become one of the most heavily tracked pages on my Web site; it also happens to provide the structure for the closing of most of my keynotes on stage.
In a few other years, I’ve updated the concept with other lists of inspirational words, and the meaning behind them. It’s always been a good way for me to clarify to my readers, and to my audiences while on stage, what they should be thinking about if they truly want to embrace the future and be an innovator.
With that in mind, I’ve been thinking about the words that might inspire people as they go forward into 2012. I’ve obsessed over this for quite some weeks now. I just haven’t been able to hit the right note.
And then while at the gym yesterday, and right after an interview for a newspaper in Sarajevo, the words for 2012 hit me like a torrent. Here’s what I think you should be thinking about as we go into a new year :
optimism: 2012 promises to be a year of volatility – economic, political, social. I suspect it will be easy to lose sight of the future and maintain the focus that you really need to innovate and stay ahead of volatility. To do that, you need the right mindset — you need to be eternally optimistic! I am – I think that’s why I thrive in what I do. So make this your first step for 2012 — be grounded in optimism!
perceive: make sure you understand the trends that surround you and what they might mean, and how they can build your optimism. Take the time to perceive where we might be going in the future in terms of your career, industry, company or skill set, and think about what it means.
opportunity: to be optimistic with future trends, you must have a sense of how these trends will define your opportunity — the third key word. The world is full of opportunity — if you choose to find it.
attitude: add those three thoughts together, and you get to the fourth key word. Your success in 2012 will really come from the attitude that will carry you forward. Remember, some people see the future and are filled with fear. Others see the same future, and see nothing but hope!
focus: of course, to maintain your optimism, you need to filter out the noise. You will be continually slammed by raging headlines related to the economy and all the other things that might go wrong. Stay focused – don’t lose track of your optimism; don’t let noise cloud the opportunities; don’t let volatility reshape your attitude!
passion: do these things, and you are well set for the future. If this is the case, then you need to make sure that you develop a huge amount of passion for the opportunities that you see, and the activities and actions you intend to pursue.
embrace: so you are in the right frame of mind, see the opportunity, and are filtering out the noise, and are excited about the future. Great — now you can embrace the opportunities for innovation and the future trends that surround you. Establish a goal, set a plan, and make sure you embrace this plan!
experience: this means that as you begin to focus on innovation, you’ve got to make sure that you experience a lot of things that you haven’t tried to do before. That means that you must build up a lot of experience in areas where you lack previous involvement. Experience is a great word — the more you build up, the better you are positioned for the future. I call it experiential capital – explore that concept throughout this Web site.
rebound: of course, if you are going to try to do some things you haven’t done before, you are bound to fail at a few of them. That’s where the word rebound comes in — pick yourself up, don’t focus on the failure, and try again!
thrill. In my original 10 words, I closed off with the word “enjoy.” On stage, it’s often my last comment, as in “if you follow these 9 words, you get to the 10th most important of all, and that’s enjoy!” And that’s why for 2012, I still think the same thing holds true — if you adopt these 9 words, you’ll get to the 10th most important word of all — you’ll enjoy the thrill, as I do, of embracing the future and being innovative.
Remember – some people see a trend and see a threat. Other seem the same trend and see nothing but opportunity.
Here’s a clip that I had out on Youtube, but realized that I had never worked it into the blog. It’s a quick clip on the “innovation killers” — the attitudes and actions that some people posses that manage to stifle innovation within an organization.
I had a conference call with a client yesterday with respect to an upcoming leadership meeting; I’ll be helping the organization think about some of the barriers they have towards innovation, and what they need to do to overcome these challenges.
One of the worst enemies of innovation are the "innovation killers." Click the light bulb for a great list of the attitudes and phrases that can shut down innovative thinking in your organization.
As we were talking, I scribbled down a short list of some of the issues that I was identifying with them.
tradition. Some organizations are too caught up with the past, which causes them to lose sight of opportunities for the future.
culture. Often corporate culture can stifling, if not deadening. Some build up an organizational sclerosis which eventually clogs up their ability to try to do anything new.
organizational memory. It causes people to focus on the past instead of the future.
bureaucrats. Their job is simply to shut down ideas, get people to fill out forms, and reduce the everyday work experience to a series of mind-numbing tasks.
stock markets. They cause too many senior executives to spend their time thinking about short term hits that can keep the stock price up, rather than working on the big bets that can provide for transformative opportunities. No wonder so many organizations are going private!
job descriptions. They reduce the role of people to a narrowly defined set of activities and small goals. I’ve encountered few organizations where innovation success is actually enshrined into the job description, let alone the HR reward system.
mission statements. They can be a great thing to give everyone an overall sense of purpose. On the other hand, most organizations don’t update and refresh them, which means that in many cases, the mission statement has nothing to do with what the organization actually needs to be doing.
strategic planning. Some organizations get so caught up in the process of strategic planning that they never get beyond the planing statge. Where do you think the phrases “analysis paralysis” comes from — organizations who are busy analyzing things as part of their planning process!
lone wolves. They’re often folks who can lead innovation, since they can have the brilliant ideas that are the spark for greatness. On the other hand, they can become so blinded by their belief that they refuse to accept the ideas and insight of anyone else, forgetting that collaboration is often at the root of all great innovations.
That’s a short list of some of the enemies of innovation – there are lots more!
If you want to known why you need to speed up your organization, spend a bit more time staring at an iPhone — or for that matter, any Apple device that you might happen to have in your home or office.
Think about the fact that Apple now masters such a torrid pace of product development that 60% of its’ revenue comes from products that didn’t exist four years ago. Then ask yourself if your organization could do the same thing.
Many of the organizations who bring me in for a CEO level leadership meeting, board retreat or staff event want to focus on a message that revolves around the idea of ‘how can we innovate faster.’ They recognize that increasingly, they too are becoming like Apple, in a world in which they must continually reinvent their products and services to stay relevant to their customers, or simply to keep up with the pacesetters in their industry.
With that context in mind, watch this video from a recent keynote in which I talk about the how innovators align themselves for this world of fast-paced innovation by taking advantage of what I call the “big global idea machine.”
This is a great story, since it demonstrates how organizations are realizing that we are in a world of ever accelerating scientific velocity, driven by global collaboration, increasing speed with pure and accidental research, the impact of a global ‘tinkering’ culture, and other factors which are speeding up the discovery of new knowledge.
New knowledge drives new innovation — and its’ by learning to tap into new knowledge that you can accelerate your innovation cycles.
That’s where an increasing number of organizations have been engaging me — to help them understand how to speed up their knowledge ingestion capabilities. They know they have to do this because the shelf life of the product or service that they have in the marketplace is continuing to decrease at an often alarming rate. And in some industries, products are obsolete before they get to market. (Just ask HP with its’ new Tablet product, which was abandoned shortly after being brought to market!)
Think about that for a moment: we now find ourselves in a period of time in which innovation and change is occurring so quickly that the very concept of a product lifecycle is beginning to disappear. And just as product lifecycles collapse, so too does the half life of knowledge and the relevance of skills. It’s only by picking up the pace of reinventing that knowledge and skills that you can get ahead — and one of the ways to do that is through the “global idea machine.” Hence, people are focused on open innovation, global innovate idea sourcing, new forms of collaboration, and other methods to generate insight and knowledge faster — to speed up the process of R&D.
Whether I’m dealing with a company driven by rapid change in the medical, scientific, financial, mechanical or engineering knowledge, one thing is clear: the knowledge that a organization needs to succeed in the future is becoming infinitely more complex every minute, with a constant, relentless flood of that which is new. And from my perspective, the story of the Apple is becoming increasingly common — as every organization is driven by the same rates of change that are enveloping this global giant.
The bottom line is simple:
the ability of obtaining rapid, instant knowledge generation is becoming an urgent necessity in almost every field of endeavor;
the ability to quickly digest, understand and assess new knowledge is an increasingly important skill – one that not a lot of organizations have mastered;
the ability to reformulate our thinking, assumptions and capabilities to respond to the constant change being thrust upon our organization is of increasing importance
In a nutshell, I coined the phrase “just in time knowledge” over a decade ago to describe the nexus of these realities. In the world of hyper-change represented by the Apple iPhone, it’s clear that we are already there.
Just in time knowledge involves a form of continuous learning that is instant, fast, and urgent. Think about situations where a need for JIT-knowledge is evident:
Some estimates suggest that medical knowledge is now doubling every eight years. Rapid advances in new methodologies, technologies, treatments and methods of care evolve at a furious pace. In such a world, medical professionals can’t be expected to know everything there is to know within their particular field of endeavor. The new reality going forward for doctors, nurses and any other professional is that these professionals are increasingly forced to go out and obtain new knowledge, just at the time that they need it. The same holds true for pharmaceutical companies, medical device technology manufacturers, and anyone else remotely involved with health care.
Sales based organizations are quickly discovering that furious rates of hyper-innovation in their marketplace require a sales force that is extremely adaptable, agile, flexible — and quick to understand the potential of new markets. If a product has a life of about six months in the marketplace, an organization can’t afford to waste any time in preparing to assault the market. The result is that there is an ever increasing need for sales based organizations gain deep, rapid insight into the sales potential of a new product line, while discarding the knowledge and understanding they have of the old product line.
Mechanical engineers continue to see rapid developments in manufacturing methodologies, as well as a need to quickly master the art of managing ever more complex global supply chains. With increasing sophistication and agility in the manufacturing process, every engineer involved in process automation must have the ability to quickly gain insight and intelligence into leading edge issues associated with plant design, construction, automation, assembly, robotics, and all kinds of other complex topics.
The reality going forward? If an organization is to succeed in the future, it must be a master of the ability to succeed with just-in-time-knowledge.
Are you ready for the world of just-in-time knowledge? Here’s what you should do to answer the question:
Undertake a knowledge turnover assessment. The first thing you need to do is get an accurate picture of just how quickly the issue of just-in-time knowledge is becoming a critical success factor in your industry. How quickly does new knowledge expire? How quickly is new knowledge generated? And what does this suggest to you in terms of the knowledge replenishment role that you need to master?
Consider the risks and opportunities. What happens if your company doesn’t adapt to this fast paced new reality? What’s the downside? Now is a good time to frame the future in terms of bold contrasts, and in terms of the cost of inaction.
Envision the future. If your organization excels at just-in-time knowledge, what will they be doing in 2015? 2020? How will their role have changed? What might they be doing day to day on January 15, 2015, compared to what they are doing today? And what you will, as their knowledge mentor, have done to have helped them make the transition?
Educate your leadership and staff. I’d hazard a guess that few of your executive team are even thinking about the issue and challenges that come with just-in-time knowledge. If they aren’t aware that it is an issue, they likely aren’t aware that their future opportunity and success will come from mastering this critical new corporate capability. If they don’t know about the challenges that lie ahead, educate them now.
Prepare a road map and adjust your strategy. Attaining the objective of having an organization master just in time knowledge promises to be a long, complex and arduous task – but what an opportunity! Start to rethink everything you do in terms of your new just-in-time knowledge role – whether in your board meetings, strategy sessions, or leadership discussions, and you’ll find that everyone is thinking the same thing: we need to start working to prepare for it now.
Many people don’t know how to think big — how to envision bold news ideas. In this clip from Las Vegas, Jim talks on stage in Las Vegas at a major manufacturing conference, about he challenged an auto company to think bigger by thinking about Google as a potential competitor. He uses this as opportunity to talk about the impact of future trends — particularly 3D manufacturing — upon industry and manufacturing.
The world of manufacturing is in the midst of a huge trend — we will witness the emergence of 3D printing and an inevitable shift to “additive manufacturing” from subtractive manufacturing based on “cutting, drilling and bashing metal…”
A few days ago, the Smart Blog on Leadership wrote a blog post covering my recent keynote at the IMXchange manufacturing conference in Las Vegas. It drew quite a bit of attention on Twitter, particularly the vein having to do with my concept of what holds back a lot of innovation efforts.
Some of the Twitter retweets began to focus on the section in the post which concentrated on my idea that what holds back a lot of innovation is a culture of “aggressive indecision.”
This is a topic that I’ve been writing about and speaking about on stage for well over a decade — indeed, since the dot.com bust more than a decade ago!
I’ve actually got the video clip from the Las Vegas keynote available on this blog — watch it here — and you’ll see the comments that the SmartBlog on Leadership picked up on.
In addition, I thought it might be a good time to pull tout an article that I wrote way back in 2003 about aggressive indecision. It made sense back then — it seems to make even more sense today given increased economic volatility. There’s valuable lessons you might use to challenge yourself as to whether you or the organization you work for is suffering from this malady.
Paralyzed by indecision? Just do it; Fear of the unknown has made doing nothing the new reality in business. Here’s how to stop spinning your wheels 18 July 2003, The Globe and Mail
You’ve been providing clients with a project quote every quarter — and when you decide to finally press them to close the deal, they are shocked to learn that you’ve been doing it for 2½ years.
You have a new initiative based on a key business trend that is still on the list of “things to deal with” — long after the trend has gone supernova and disappeared.
You finally decide to upgrade some of your significant business systems — only to learn that you’ve waited so long that the software you plan on purchasing is already out of date.
Sound familiar? It should. It’s the new reality in business: aggressive indecision.
Corporations have lost their sense of direction. In the nineties, people had a sense of purpose, a desire to get things done. “Nobody knows where we’re going, but we’re making great time” could have been the catch phrase. Well, now no one knows where they are going, and they sure are taking their time getting there.
Quite simply, people have decided not to make decisions — and they like it. The result is a economy in which everyone seems to be stuck in a rut, unwilling and unable to move forward.
Why is this happening? In part, fear of the unknown. Executives are afraid to make decisions because the next unforeseen event might prove to have negative consequences. Combine this with the current focus on cost-cutting, a disastrous number of ill-advised decisions in the past decade during the investment bubble and increasing corporate scrutiny as a result of ethics scandals, and you’ve got a general reluctance with many executives to do anything new.
The fact is, our confidence in the future has been shattered. Corporate nervousness has become the watchword, with the result that everyone is taking the easy way out: Deal with uncertainty by doing nothing.
What should you do to deal with this new reality?
First, look for the warning signs: a business mindset that is adverse to any type of risk; an absence of any new product or marketing initiatives; or an organization that is stuck in a rut, wheels spinning, and no one has decided even to call a tow truck.
Second, realize that aggressive indecision means that you’ll likely have to respond to external pressures faster than ever before. That’s because while people have learned that they can hold off until the very last minute, they are also learning that they can still get things right. This leads to a business cycle that involves extended periods of frustrated waiting, followed by a blur of activity as organizations rush about to respond to the customers’ demands for instant action.
Third, be prepared to change your corporate culture and work processes. You can’t get mad at your clients for waiting for 2½ years and then making a decision with a demand that you be there tomorrow. Don’t let it lead to an expectation gap — when your customer lives with aggressive indecision and you are still geared up to perform and deliver at the slow and steady pace that might have been appropriate in the past.
Finally, make some decisions. Remember what it used to be like when you had the courage to do something? Let’s call it the decision adrenaline rush. It’s good — and it can be addictive.
Want to test it? Find the one big decision that you’ve been deferring the longest, and decide one way or the other. Right now. Didn’t that feel good? Try it again — immediately. See? Isn’t that an amazing feeling?
You might not have made the right decision, and something could go wrong — but at least you’ve decided to start moving forward, rather than spinning your wheels in the mud. Battle aggressive indecision and you’ll find that you’ll gain back control over the future.
If your company is in the indecision funk, there is hope:
Recognize the problem. Aggressive indecision can be an addictive vice, and like any other thing that isn’t good for you, the first step is recognizing the problem.
Accept that uncertainty will continue to rule our economy. Making decisions in a vacuum has become one of the most needed corporate skills. Sure, things could go wrong as soon as you do, but that’s the way the world works today. The important thing is that you are again working to define the future, before the focus on an uncertain future does you in.
Accept the inevitability of change. Back in the nineties, people believed that we would see a lot of change in the business world. But now, with all that has gone wrong, it has become far too easy for people to convince themselves that they won’t be challenged by new business models, competitors or innovation. That’s a dangerous attitude to carry around, and one that can also help to doom you to a state of inertia.
Watch trends and react appropriately. Now is not the time to let your radar down. Fact is, while you might be suffering from active inaction, your competitors might not, with the result that you are almost guaranteeing yourself some sort of surprise in the future.
Redefine goals, establish priorities and set targets. Companies mired in the mud of aggressive indecision are often directionless, drifting. They’ve lost sight of the need to constantly innovate and establish new directions, with the result that most staff don’t feel any compelling sense of urgency for change. Fix that in a hurry.
Re-examine your business strategy. For the past several years, organizations have primarily focused on cost-cutting, and yet taking the knife to operations can only go so far. Restate where you plan to go in the next several years, and communicate that vision and direction to your staff.
If your clients or colleagues are suffering, you can:
Share the risk. If it is the uncertainty that is killing many a business deal, see what you can do to minimize the fear.
Be clear about the potential downside. If they aren’t making a decision, then why not be more open about any potential problems? If there are risks in the deal, be up front about them.
Clearly define the benefits. In an economy in which accountants rule the future, with every expenditure under the microscope, you’ve got to outline the benefits and return on investment clearly.
Scare them into action. If they are stalling, then put into perspective how their peers, competition or others in a similar position are moving ahead. People hate to be left behind, and if you can provide information on how others are charging ahead it might spur some momentum.
Be prepared to move on. Sadly, some people have become so bogged down with aggressive indecision that it might be time to cut your losses. If an existing client seems unlikely to do anything, then maybe you’d do better spending your time opening doors to new clients.
Don’t give up. Continuing aggressive indecision within your client or customer base can drive you to distraction. A continuously negative message can dissuade you. In times like these, you must constantly battle the negative energy that aggressive indecision can place within you.
The natural human inclination when faced with something that is uncomfortable is to turn away from it — lingering uncertainty is the root cause of our aggressive indecision. But we can’t afford to do this any longer — our careers, our companies and our future depend upon our ability to cope with a world of constant change. We’d better get used to it and take the time to learn the skills — and the attitude — that will help us to thrive in this era of uncertainty.
More information:
Watch: The recent Las Vegas keynote clip that inspired the CPI post
See the original newspaper article on aggressive indecision (cool picture) (PDF)
The “10 Great Words” page on my Web site is one of the most consistently visited and shared pages on my entire site.
I think that people find the words to be powerful and inspirational, and help to set a good mindset for innovative thinking.
Words are very powerful motivators. I was dealing with a client situation this morning revolving around an upcoming keynote, and during the conference call, jotted down a number of additional words which I think can be powerful motivators.
Words which provide simple insight and motivation are great.
Here’s 10 more to get you thinking about fast change:
Adapt: Change is happening faster than ever before. Accept that, adapt to it, and go with the flow. It makes everything a lot easier.
Flex : In times of rapid change, agility is a critical skill. Develop flexibility in attitude, skills and capability in order to thrive.
Experience: There’s a lot you don’t know. Enhance your knowledge and experience by doing all the things you’ve never done before.
Create: Stop managing things, and create things instead. Focus on doing things that make a difference, rather than trying to make a difference with what you’ve done before.
Focus: You can’t master all the knowledge there is to know, nor can you do everything you want to do. Do what you do well, and figure out new ways of doing the rest.
Partner: Deal with rapid change and complexity by seeking partners who can help you accomplish what needs to be done.
Shift: Far too many people view the future with fear rather than thinking about opportunity. Shift your focus, and you’ll discover opportunities for growth.
Imagine: Innovators don’t make a difference by redoing the status quo — they accomplish great things by being different. And they don’t constrain their difference with traditional thinking: they simply think differently.
Start: You’ve probably been holding off on doing the one thing you always wanted to try to do. Drop the stop now, and begin doing it. Innovators succeed through momentum, and momentum comes from doing.
Enthusiasm: People who approach things with passion and purpose live a compelling life. Find your spark, and light it!
"If Carroll had his way, the phrase “You can’t do that because we’ve always done it this way” would be grounds for immediate dismissal".
The following article was just published in July in AkzoNoble’s ”A” Magazine, featuring some of my thoughts on innovation in organizations.The organization is the largest global paints and coatings company and is a leading producer of specialty chemicals.
The article is a good read as to how I think and work.
It was distributed in print form to several hundred thousand readers in their global client base.
You can grab the PDF of the article by clicking on the magazine cover on the right.
WHAT’S YOUR VISION OF THE FUTURE by Jim Wake
If routine rules your working life, you could be stifling any chance of growing and improving your business. Worse still, if you fail to encourage creative thinking, you could well be doomed to failure.
Innovation is not what you think it is, says Jim Carroll, a selfdescribed “futurist” who makes a living advising companies on how they can reinvent themselves to compete effectively in a fast-changing world. “When it comes to the word innovation,” he explains, “a lot of people hear that word and they think it isn’t something that applies to them. I call it the ‘Steve Jobs effect.’ People hear the word and they think: ‘That’s about the design of cool products and only cool people get to do that. I manage purchasing, so how could I be responsible for innovation?’”
But what Carroll tells them – in ways designed to get them to laugh at themselves and squirm in uncomfortable self-recognition – is that innovation is both more mundane and more achievabe than dreaming up the next breakthrough consumer product, writing brilliant computer code, or developing new methods for microsurgery. “I step back and reframe the question,” he continues. “To me, innovation is three things that apply to everyone in the organization. Whether they are the head of purchasing or product development, or the CEO or the Vice-President of sales, it’s about challenging yourself with three questions. What can I do to run this business better? What can I do to grow this business? And what can I do to transform this business?”
To Carroll, it’s a lot more about awareness than it is about genius. “Running the business? Innovation offers all kinds of opportunities to take costs out of the business. With computerized technologies to streamline processes, for example. It’s just unlimited potential. Growing the business is all about how we get into new markets, new product development, how we generate revenue where revenue hasn’t existed before. Transforming the business is about restructuring ourselves. How we collaborate better, how we reshape the way we’re doing R&D, how we do things differently as an organization.
“A lot of people still think that innovation is some deep mysterious thing,” he goes on. “To me, the link is that there’s a whole bunch of obvious trends which are going to impact an organization, whether they’re demographic, social, political, business trends, whatever. Innovation is simply responding to and keeping up with those trends. Some of it is drop-dead obvious: in Western society, we have a looming boom of baby boomers who are going to become older and sicker and require more care, so that just impacts a whole variety of different industries. With technology, there’s a whole bunch of fascinating trends underway where a lot of everyday devices around us are going to gain intelligence, are going to be linked to the internet, so that’s an obvious trend. And in terms of politics, what’s playing out in Egypt – where there’s a transition of power from one generation that is unplugged, unconnected, to a different generation that is plugged in and connected. Those are the kinds of obvious trends I’m talking about.”
But of course, what is obvious to Carroll – who acknowledges that research is an important part of what he does – may not be so obvious to the person who is focused on meeting deadlines and paying the bills. Still, he is convinced that management can nurture an environment which encourages creative thinking and the willingness to take risks that is pretty much a prerequisite for innovation. “I call it tone at the top. It is something that is CEO-led. He or she has to set the tone for a culture which allows for continual change and adaptation and innovation, in order to keep up with the very fast-paced change around us. If you don’t set that tone at the top, then you really are doomed to failure. I see a lot of organizations try to make innovation something special. They form a little innovation team and go off in a little room and study innovation. But that just doesn’t work. It’s a culture throughout the organization where the leadership is saying to everyone that you’ve got to challenge yourself on those three questions, and we will judge you during the annual review process and in your remuneration and in your job description.”
One example he points to is Google, which provides “innovation time off” – a provision allowing engineers to devote up to 20 percent of their time on projects not directly related to their job descriptions or responsibilities. “It’s important,” says Carroll, “that organizations establish a whole series of projects that are very focused on innovative outcomes, in addition to having everyone responsible for day-to-day innovation.” He also suggests that routine is one of the biggest threats to innovation. “I think it’s very easy for an organization to go into autopilot. If you can do something to shake up their complacency – whether it’s the rebel coming on board or doing something to cause some chaos – that’s a good thing because people need to wake up to how quickly their world is changing around them.” In his talks – he gives dozens every year to audiences as diverse as Texas bankers, California cattle farmers, national park management professionals and the US Professional Golfers’ Association – he can almost be aggressive in trying to combat complacency.
“Here’s what I’ve learned,” he says during one of his videos from a keynote speech. “In every single organization there are people who wake up every single day. The very first thought that comes to their mind is ‘what am I going to do today to kill new ideas?’” It’s a comment which provokes nervous laughter, but that’s because everyone in the audience recognizes a kernel of truth there. “You know that they’re out there because they come into their meetings and you’re presenting new concepts and new ways of doing things, and they’ve got all these little code words that they use to shut ideas down.”
If Carroll had his way, the phrase “You can’t do that because we’ve always done it this way” would be grounds for immediate dismissal. “Never mind that the world is going to change, that the world is going to go over there really, really fast, and we’re still here and we have to get over there with the rest of the world,” he says mockingly. “There are people out there who’ve adopted the attitude of ‘you can’t do that; we’ve always done it this way – it won’t work!’ You come up with a really good idea, you put it out there, you seek some reaction and there is a naysayer at the table who immediately says: ‘It won’t work’; or ‘Dumbest idea I ever heard, it’s too risky, we’re not an organization that takes risk.’” He lets the thought hang there for an instant and then points out the obvious: “The only way to get ahead is to take risks.” As if he himself has suddenly been appointed CEO, he then starts issuing orders to the audience: “Each of you from this point on agrees that you will never use, or permit to be used in one of your meetings, that phrase ‘you can’t do this because we’ve always done it this way’. You’re going to completely ban that phrase ‘it won’t work, dumbest idea I ever heard’. You’re going to banish the type of thinking that tries to hold us back from doing new things.”
He encourages his audience to conduct a simple test the next time they are sitting in a meeting – keep score of the “innovation killing” phrases that come up: a point for every time they hear “it won’t work”, “you can’t do that”, “I don’t know how”, and several others demonstrating fear of trying. Five bonus points for “The boss won’t go for it” and ten for “Why should I care?” Your company is already in trouble – innovation-adverse, in his words – if you score more than five, “innovation dead” if you score more than ten, and you might as well either close up shop or give him a call if you score more than 15.
At the other end of the spectrum are the behaviors, practices and corporate cultures that generate new ideas – ideas flow freely throughout the organization, subversion is considered a virtue, creative champions are present throughout the company, people understand that innovation is not just about
technology, but about doing things differently and better, and that failure is an inevitable – and acceptable – part of the innovation process. “Hire people you don’t like,” he urges, and “forget everything you know”. In this changing world, he claims, we don’t need MBAs so much as we need “MBIs” – Masters of Business Imagination. “The phrase Master of Business Administration is about running the business. That’s great, but what are you going to do to grow and transform the business? We [spend] more time thinking about how our markets are changing, how we might build new relationships with our customers, thinking about how we might go in and disrupt other business models and how we might ingest technology faster to do awesome things within our industry. We should just have a lot more people with a lot more imagination on our team.”
Carroll wasn’t always a change guru – he spent 12 years as an accountant. But somewhere along the way, he realized that technology was moving much faster than the business world, and that there was a business opportunity convincing the corporate world that it needed to change to accommodate new technologies and trends, or get left behind. He points out that Apple generates 60 percent of its revenue from products that didn’t even exist four years ago, and that the only thing that is certain is
that everything will be different before you know it. Half of what students learn in their first year in college is obsolete by the time they graduate. “Having been at this for 15 years,” he says, “I think that the necessity for organizations to get on board with this type of thinking is becoming more critical, because business is changing faster, customers are changing faster and technology is changing faster. My key word is velocity. The need to do a lot of radical things is speeding up because everything out there is speeding up.”
Here’s a video clip from my opening keynote for the 94th Annual General Meeting of the PGA of America, in which I talk about the necessity of “thinking big, starting small, and scaling fast,” and of the importance of the concept of experiential capital as a foundation for innovation.
I’ve written and spoken about the concept of experiential capital quite a bit through the years – I think in a fast paced economy its one of the most important innovation strategies that we can undertake.
Experiential Capital. In a world in which Apple generates 60% of its revenue from products that didn’t exist four years ago, it’s critically important that an organization constantly enhance the skill, capabilities and insight of their people. They do this by constantly working on projects that might have an uncertain return and payback – but which will provide in-depth experience and insight into change. It’s by understanding change that opportunity is defined, and that’s what experiential capital happens to be. In the future, it will be one of the most important assets you can possess.
I also write about the idea in my book Ready, Set, Done: How to Innovate When Faster is the New Fast, where I made this observation:
“Innovation comes from risk, and risk comes from experience. The most important asset today isn’t found on your balance sheet – it is found in the accumulated wisdom from the many risks that you’ve taken. The more experiential capital you have, the more you’ll succeed.”
I close with the observation: “Investing in experiential capital is one of the most important things you can do.”
When people ask me about the “secrets” of innovative organizations, this is one of the key attributes I outline. They realize they are immersed in a world of fast-paced ideas — and they take on many different projects, some of which are doomed to fail, in order to build the overall experience of the organization.
Which begs the question: how many experiential oriented projects do you have underway that involves new technological platforms, social network and branding or marketing projects; business model innovation or any other number of ideas?
One day I'm with senior officers of the US Air Force speaking about innovation. The next day, I'm speaking at a cosmetics/beauty industry conference! What do these two groups have in common?
Here’s an adaptation of my May CAMagazine article, which was titled “From Bombs to Beauty” in the print edition.
——-
March was an interesting month for me. One day I was in Dayton, Ohio, opening the annual leadership meeting for the US Air Force Research Laboratory.
In the room were senior military officers, scientists and researchers who control virtually all the research spending for the entire air force.
The next day I was in West Palm Beach, Fla., as the closing speaker for the Personal Care Products Council, with senior executives from the cosmetics, toiletries and other personal-care products industry.
Talk about going from one extreme to another. But it certainly provides insight into one of the key trends sweeping the corporate and scientific world today. There’s a belief that if we think broader — observe what is occurring in other industries, for example — we might see more opportunities to change what we do and how we do it, rather than continue to think in narrow terms.
So what’s my role? As someone who sees the world in extremely broad terms rather than through a narrow industry lens, I can provide many organizations with different points on view. This is a critical and important skill - I often find myself immersed in a wide variety of complex circumstances in a vast range of industries, and have learned to quickly develop the capability to observe key issues within those industries, assess different strategies and come up with solutions to complex problems.
So it is with the corporate and government world today. People find themselves in a place where change is occurring at a blinding pace. New ideas, business models, industries and products are launched faster than ever. And it’s by learning how to observe and understand change from a variety of perspectives that organizations can get ahead.
Consider the world of defence spending, where there is a great deal of budgetary pressure to continue to move forward but to do so with new spending restraints. Organizations ask themselves questions such as, what can we learn from other organizations outside the defence industry that have scientists and engineers? How are they generating innovation ideas? How are they responding to similar pressures? Sometimes the concept of customer-oriented innovation plays a role. Maybe, goes the thinking, we’ll find one customer using a product in a unique way that no one else is thinking about, and we could take that idea to the rest of our customer base.
Then there is the issue of innovation within the consumer products sector — such as cosmetics and beauty products. Today, customers are more vocal with opinions; fashion tends to evolve faster; new ideas go from the runway to the shelf much faster. In this case, we’ve got an industry looking around to see where the next marketing, branding, product or customer-support ideas might come from. And they’re influenced by other industries — there’s a marriage of technology, healthcare and beauty for example. Imagine a new piece of jewellery in the not-too-distant future that doubles as a medical monitoring device.
In both cases, we’ve got groups of people who, five years earlier, might have based their progress on how things looked inside their organization or industry. Today, they’ve realized they’ve got to look wider; not narrowly, but from a very broad perspective. That’s why concepts such as customer innovation, open innovation and other new models for idea generation are becoming so important.
And that’s why, in the space of just two days, I can find myself delivering two keynotes on very much the same innovation theme to two very, very different groups.
A few weeks ago, I was the opening keynote speaker for the 2011 Multi-Unit Franchising Conference held at The Venetian in Las Vegas.
The audience were owners and operators of multiple franchise operations, primarily from the restaurant / food sector, but also from other franchise operations in auto, pet care, home supplies and other retail product lines.
An audience of close to 1,000 listens to Jim Carroll's keynote on fast paced consumer, retail and restaurant industry trends in Las Vegas
My keynote topic was built on the theme “”Where Do We Go From Here? Why Innovators Will Rule in the Post-Recession Economy – And How You Can Join Them!”
What did I take a look at? A wide variety of the fast-paced trends impacting the retail / restaurant sector today. I broke my talk down into 3 key trends, what I might call:
Consumer velocity
Mobile madness
Intelligent infrastructure
1. What We Know: Consumer behaviour shifts faster today than ever before
“The average consumer scans 12 feet of shelf space per second.” That’s a stat I’ve long used to emphasize that the attention span of the typical shopper of today is shorter than ever before — and retailers need to innovate to ensure they can keep the attention of today’s consumer.
It’s not just keeping up with fleeting attention spans — it’s about adapting to the fast pace of how quickly consumer choice changes. Consider what is happening with the rapid emergence of revenue in the late night business segment – it was up 12% in 4th quarter 2010, compared to 2-3% for other parts of the day. That’s why major chains have been focusing on new “happy hour” offerings — and so their success increasingly comes from how quickly they can scale and adapt to fast moving trends.
We’ve seen plenty of fast innovation from various organizations in the sector to respond to quick consumer change. Morton’s capitalized on the new consumer sensitivity towards value when it jumped on the trend that involves the “casualization of fine dining” with its’ $6 mini-cheeseburger.
Other fast trends drive the industry. The Sydney Morning Herald ran a great article in April of 2011, noting that “… the world of cooking and restaurants is becoming more like an arm of show business …..” with the result that “everyone wants to see the chef.” That’s why we are seeing many restaurants from fine-dining to fast casual moving the kitchen to the “front of the house,” or in other cases, a lot of TV display technology that provide for video links from tables to the kitchen. The evolution that is occurring is that the chef is becoming the star, and more and more of the staff are becoming ‘performers.’ Innovators in appropriate sectors would see the opportunities and jump on this trend.
Whatever the case may be, the consumer of today changes quickly, and innovators check their speed and agility in being able to respond to this reality.
2. What We Know: Technology – especially mobile – has become the key influencer of today’s consumer decision making.
Simply put, the velocity of mobile adoption, local search and product promotion is evolving at a pace that is beyond furious.
Consider the growth rates underlying today’s technology. It took two years for Apple to sell two million iPhones. It took 2 months for them to sell 2 million iPads! It took 1 month to sell 1 million iPhone 4’s!
The impact of such trends is an explosive rate of growth of wireless Internet usage. Mobile represented but 0.2% of all Web traffic in 2009. That grew to 8% by 2010, and is expected to hit 16% of all traffic this year.
Some suggest that mobile searches now exceed the number of computer based searches. What is also well known is that most mobile searches are for “local content.” Not only that, but Google has found that when someone gets a smartphone, the number of searches they make increases 50 times!
What is clear is that people are using their mobile devices to find nearby – stores, retailers, restaurants and just about everything else. Combine this with the emergence of new promotion opportunities (through apps and other tools) and you’ve got a revolution in the making in terms of local product promotion. That’s why the success of many retailers / restaurants will come from their success with location-sensitive coupon technology.
Bottom line? Innovation is: rethinking in-store uplift in terms of new methods of interaction!
3. What We Know: We will have far more opportunity for operational innovation through the rapid emergence of new technology, infrastructure and other trends
Consider how quickly near-field payment technology is going to steamroller the retail / restaurant sector. Simply put, over the next few years, the credit cards in our wallet will disappear as our iPhones, Blackberries and Android phones become the credit card infrastructure of the future. This is a HUGE trend — it provides countless opportunities for innovation, disruptive business model change, new competitors, and all kinds of other fun opportunities.
The trend has enormous velocity – we can expect $113 billion in transactions by 2016, with 3.5 billion transactions – and with this comes new opportunities for loyalty and contact followup. From an innovation perspective, the sector will have to ensure they can ingest the new infrastructure quickly enough, and keep on top of the industry change that it will cause to ensure that challenges are turned into opportunity.
There are all kinds of other areas of fast change that present opportunity. Consider the issue fo ‘green buildings’ and sustainability. The West Australian newspaper recently noted that “with the rapid increase in knowledge, skills and availability of materials, costs have fallen. The industry now understands how to build green and building a 5-star Green Star building is now generally cost neutral.”
Some franchisees are taking this to heart, with aggressive plans involving eco-friendly buildings. Chick-fil-A has a LEED initiative in building a test model restaurant that has water usage down by 40% through rainwater collection; an electricity reduction of 14% through the use of skylights & energy efficient appliances; 20% of the building content is from recycled material; and 30% more fresh air than regular buildings. While the structure is 15% more expensive to build, they expect a fairly quick payback — and will manage to get a branding image to their customer base that they don’t just talk sustainability – they do it!
From this perspective, innovation is keeping ahead of and planning for hyper-innovation with IT, energy, environmental and other infrastructure trends that impact facilities or the nature of the customer interaction.
Innovators get ahead by focusing on bold ideas, and exploring the concept of 'experiential capital' - Jim Carroll
I also emphasized that innovators aren’t afraid to make bold moves. Every franchise and retail organization today is looking for opportunities for cross-promotion, cross-selling and product placement. So consider this observation from the Dallas Morning News in March 2011 in an article titled: Funeral home adds little sip of heaven: Starbucks Coffee.
“At McKinney’s Turrentine Jackson Morrow Funeral Home, it’s now possible to pay your respects to the dead or plan your own funeral with a venti Caramel Macchiato in hand”
Craziness, or smart niche-marketing? I think it’s innovation!
So what do you do? My message to the folks in Las Vegas was to get involved and explore these fascinating new worlds that surround you!
Many of them might hold themselves back from Facebook advertising, because the concept might simply seem overwhelming for a small to medium sized mulit-unit franchise operation. Yet, today Facebook now accounts for 1 of 3 every online ads. And we are seeing the rapid emergence of new online ‘aggregators’ that are focused on helping small business take advantage of that fact. These organizations — such as Blinq — manage the buying of thousands of individualized ads, based on age, location, interests.
They should simply try the world of mobile promotion. Buffalo Wild Wings gave it a shot for one recent NFL based initiative, and indicated that they tripled the return on their investment.
Think differently in terms of new ways of reaching the consumer. Pizza Pizza, a Canadian chain, recently released a new iPhone App that allows online ordering. Nothing new or special about that – such apps are becoming a dime a dozen, and are quickly becoming de rigueur. What is cool is that the chain has revealed that it is working to link the app payment system to university meal card plan, in recognition of the fact that many students in the target market might not have credit cards (or “credit worthy” cards.)
Bottom line? One of my key closing messages was that innovators focus on the concept of “experiential capital” -there’s a lot going on, and to figure out, we should just get out and do it! Try new ideas, explore new initiatives, undertake new projects. One of the only ways to get ahead is to work quickly to build up your experience in all the new opportunities that surround you.
My recent post about using a live text message poll while speaking to a group of high school students drew a fair bit of attention as an example of the novel use of a social networking tool.
This isn’t the first time I’ve been using this type of tool on stage — I’ve been doing this for close to four years, and it always provides for an amazing amount of interaction with the audience.
Here I am opening the 94th Annual General Meeting of the Professional Golfers Association of America, immediately diving into a poll with the audience in order to gauge their thoughts on when we would see an economic recovery. While running the poll, I challenge the PGA to think about the impact of mobile technology out on the golf course!
Is your organization getting a tad stale? Try rejuvenating staff by prescribing a dose of newfound creativity – through some innovation oxygen!
When my good friend Scott Kress summited Mount Everest two years ago, he used a little bit of oxygen for the final push. Many climbers do — sometimes you need the extra energy to accomplish something massive! (Scott’s also a speaker, and has a great stage story to tell! When he summited the highest peak in Europe last year, he ended in a hi-jacked Russian plane!)
My good friend Scott Kress at the Summit of Everest in 2009!
So it is with innovation — sometimes you need some help to accomplish great things. Here are some thoughts on how you can kick up your innovation efforts a bit more. Most importantly, the idea is that you can generate a little innovation oxygen by investing in some experiential capital!
What’s the use of innovation oxygen?
It is no secret that we are in an economy that has become far more hurried, complex and uncertain. Things are changing at a furious pace out there – from the products we are selling, to the markets we are selling to, to the attitudes of the customers that we are dealing with. Not to mention challenges with business models, marketing, branding, customer service, new forms of competition — and well, just about everything else!
Faster is the new fast!
In such an environment, a constant, relentless focus on innovative ideas might be the key to helping deal with rapid change. And through innovation, you may discover new opportunities.
This is the perfect time for every organization to put in place what I call “innovation oxygen.” This involves establishing a culture where everyone is actively encouraged to test a new idea.
In other words, everyone needs to inhale.
Oxygen. Innovation oxygen. Breathe it in deeply!
How do you do this? Several ways!
Banish complacency
Start out by banishing forever one of the worst phrases ever to be used in the corporate setting: “We’ve always done it that way.” Let go of the past. Things are different today, and will be far more different tomorrow. Constant, relentless change with markets, products, technology, customer behaviors and attitudes is the new reality.
Trying to go forward by doing what you’ve done in the past, results in being blind about potential opportunity. Don’t let complacency drive your agenda.
Put an alternative culture in place – one that encourages the use of the phrase, “Why not try doing it this way?” If you did things in a certain way in the past and it isn’t working as well as it used to, then do something completely different. See if it works.
Learn from it if it doesn’t, and move on to something new again. Try ten different approaches, and maybe you’ll find one that is effective. Throw out the other 9, and give yourself marks for innovation.
Take risks, reward failure
Of course, you can’t do this if your corporate mindset is one that discourages risk-taking. I’d suggest that to get into innovation mode, you should put yourself back in the mindset that existed before the current economic downturn.
Back then, it seemed that almost anything was possible, and everyone was willing to go out on a limb to try something new.
That’s no longer the case today. The challenges with the economy have had a huge impact on our willingness to try new ways of doing things.
Indeed, it’s fair to say that the climate towards risk taking and innovation has become very negative. After all, who would dare to stick out their neck today when they’re terrified of losing their job? Everyone is hunkering down, in survival mode.
Such an attitude will certainly help to kill an organization before the recovery even begins!
Bring back the courage to innovate.
Otherwise, current attitudes will settle in like a wet sponge, smothering any chance for innovation. Explore new ways of dealing with customers, particularly around social networking. Continue to examine methods of building sustainable customer relationships and loyalty. Return to experimenting with leading edge technology that might help to encourage new methods of building or enhancing brand image.
Whatever the case may be, keep trying out new approaches to do business, and reward those staff members who are willing to experiment and try new ideas.
Deal with the reality of aggressive indecision
Anyone involved in business has come to realize that over the last several years, it has become more and more difficult to close a deal. Massive indecision has come to be the rule, not the exception. And you can expect that to be a long-term reality, so adjust your plans accordingly.
The fact is, people have decided not to make decisions – and they like it! This has taught them something – they can hold off on deciding until the very last minute. The impact is rather challenging. It means is a business cycle that increasingly relies on long lead times, with sudden and instant short-term decision horizons.
Are you in sales? Here’s the new reality — you will find that your prospects will keep putting you off, and then one day will call, breathless and in a rush! There’s a decision to be made tomorrow morning, you are told. They need a revised proposal by 9am, and they need you to attend the meeting.
Oh, and you’ve got to be able to address multiple different product scenarios that haven’t been talked about before!
Can you respond to such a situation? Do you have a culture that would let you instantly jump in and reconfigure a deal? Can you pull together the information that would be necessary to support your presentation?
In retrospect, the need to be in an innovative frame of mind becomes obvious – critical, in fact. This new world can present a big shift in the approach that needs to be taken by your team.
Executives must constantly probe and learn how to deal with a business environment in which aggressive indecision is driving the decision making process.
Encourage frivolous education and promote offbeat time
To get into a frame of mind of acting fast, everyone needs to be able to learn a lot, very quickly. One way of doing that is by encouraging people to “waste” time. That’s right – I really recommend that as a business strategy.
How can people understand the high velocity change in markets, business models, competitive challenges, the emergence of new means of marketing and branding, and all kinds of other issues, if they are restricted to formal education programs? How can they learn about the new products that they need to sell when those products are coming to market so quickly? How can they learn new methods of dealing with a customer by taking an in-house course that was developed over a year ago, when the market was completely different from today?
That’s where frivolous education comes in, as a complement to traditional, formal corporate education programs.
Why not establish some “playtime” with your sales force, with the purpose being to try out a multitude of new technologies: encourage browsing through industry magazines, surfing the Web for market research, etc… Such activities may help bring understanding to how the customer is changing. So in fact, what may appear to be “wasting time,” really is not so.
Set your sales force out to do frivolous activities with a goal in mind – to measure customer service, examine competitive activities, take a look at new products, or simply come up with some innovative, new ideas that might help them sell more. Maybe you’ll get some unique insight that doesn’t come from your traditional educational programs!
Destroy organizational sclerosis
It’s been said before, but needs to be said again – hierarchy is the enemy of innovation. Everyone knows that the biggest challenge in many organizations are uncommunicative departments, and a culture that doesn’t promote openness. To improve the ability of an organization to innovate, communication barriers need to be broken down.
It seemed that when new technologies appeared on the scene in the 1990′s, that there were vast new opportunities to destroy “organizational sclerosis.”
And yet now, this culture of open communication is slowly being destroyed, as companies come to discourage frivolous employee communications. Jokes are frowned upon, and political correctness has become stifling.
This indictment of open communication impairs the very ability of the organization to encourage a culture of knowledge exchange, often critical for understanding how markets and customers are changing.
We need to continue to encourage employees to communicate as much as possible, however frivolous. Do this, and you’ll find that the culture of innovation opens up too.
Invest in experiential capital
In a world in which business models, methods of customer interaction, and other fundamentals are changing overnight, it’s critically important that an organization constantly enhance the skill, capabilities and insight of their people.
They do this by constantly working on projects that might have an uncertain return and payback — but which will provide in-depth experience and insight into change.
It’s by understanding change that opportunity is defined, and that’s what experiential capital happens to be. In the future, it is one of the most important assets that you can possess.
Invest in experiential capital, and that’s where you’ll find your innovation oxygen.
Often, one of the best ways to discover ideas for doing things differently — of fuelling your innovation engine — can come from studying other organizations or industries that are excelling at dealing with fast market, business model, competitive and technological change. There are many organizations out there who aren’t innovative and are stuck in a rut; there are others who are extremely innovative, at the same time that there are a lot of laggards.
Seek ideas for innovation by studying those who excel at dealing with fast-paced change
One of the best ways to discover new and creative innovation ideas is by studying those who are moving forward at a really fast pace. They might be within your own industry; quite often, they will be in a completely different industry.
Organizations or industries that are subject to extremely high velocity are often the most innovative. They are busy working with the challenges that exist, and are being as creative as possible to deal with those challenges in order to turn them into opportunity.
Regardless of who and where they are, they share several things in common: they’re busy experimenting, adapting, evolving and changing. They’re working hard to make sure that the essential concepts of high-velocity innovation – run the business better, grow the business, transform the business – have become an essential part of their lifeblood.
If you can spot these organizations, you can learn from them, and become inspired by them. They can be a wonderful source of creative ideas!
So how do you find them? By looking for the telltale signs of companies or industries who are faced with all the challenges that the high-velocity economy can throw at them. Given the challenges, the organization or industry will tend to have people who are more innovative, realistic, practical, and open to new ways of thinking. They are likely to be more forward oriented and creative. They will be working to rapidly adapt to changing circumstances, and will be collectively seeking complex solutions to unique problems.
Several signs can provide you with insight as to whether the company is dealing with extreme velocity and is therefore a real innovator. Look for these characteristics:
They are significantly impacted by faster science. The fundamentals of the science within the industry are evolving at a furious pace as a result of the infinite idea loop. It is evident that the discovery of new knowledge within the industry is occurring at a faster pace than within other industries. Hint: look to genomics companies. Furious rates of scientific change here!
More competition. Business models are changing quickly, with a lot of new competition appearing on the scene as the industry begins to blur and change.
A faster degree of product/service innovation. The industry is widely known for being innovative, with a constant stream of new products or services coming to market.
More operational innovation. There is a lot of fundamental change within the industry in terms of business models, marketing methodologies, customer relationships and other unique changes. Organizations or industries that are subject to extremely high velocity – that is, significant amounts of fundamental change occurring at a rapid pace – are often the most innovative.
Shorter product lifecycles. Products are coming to market faster than previously, or faster than within other industries, due to the previous four trends.
Rising tides require fast change. Customer expectations are changing quickly in terms of the products or services being offered, because of the furious rates of innovation that are occurring. In addition, there’s heightened customer service due to hyper-competition; people know that they must absolutely excel in service levels.
A significant creativity capability. The organization or industry is dominated by creative thinkers; a workforce and management team that is fully focused on doing things differently, in order to respond to the reality of change that engulfs them. Those who kill ideas aren’t the dominant force; those who suggest how things could be done differently are at the forefront of action within the organization.
A partnership orientation. The organization or industry is constantly seeking outside expertise in order to help it go forward; it is willing to make use of complexity partners, nomadic workers, skills banks and other partners in order to grab on to ever more important change capabilities. They know they can’t do it all, and so they are willing to do what it takes to get access to what they need to get it done.
They’re plugged in. The organization or industry is linked into and is feeding off of the ideas from within the infinite idea loop. They are constantly scanning and sifting through the constantly evolving collective insight of the global discussion that is taking place; they are always eager to spot how innovation is occurring outside of their organization, and are busy interpreting what is being said in order that they can use this insight for their own purposes.
Organizations or industries that are subject to extremely high velocity – that is, significant amounts of fundamental change occurring at a rapid pace – are often the most innovative. They are busy working with the challenges that exist, and are being as creative as possible to deal with those challenges in order to turn them into opportunity.
You want to find these organizations, study them, and learn from them – since that will be one of the best ways to create your own innovation oxygen.
A clip from my keynote for the PGA, challenging the audience to think about innovation in a different way. Innovation isn’t just about the invention of new products and services — it’s also about focusing as a leader on how to “run the business better, grow the business, and transform the business!”
As you can see, I ran a live interactive text message poll in the room — we had responses from 200+ people in a matter of two minutes. I was then able to use the nature of the response through the rest of the talk. For this group, innovation is really about ‘growing and transforming the business’.
"We really don't understand it all, and so we aren't going to do anything!"
A few years ago, when I was the closing speaker for the Swiss Innovation Forum in Zurich, I made the observation that many ”organizations fail, because their have failure engrained in their corporate culture!”
Do you?
It can be difficult to try to be innovative in many organizations. Many people with an innovation-oriented mindset often find their enthusiasm stymied when they approach senior management with an initiative. And when their effort is turned back, it can extremely frustrating!
One of the most typical situations today in which we are seeing innovation-dead-in-its-tracks involves the many initiatives that people are pursuing with social networks and/or mobile applications. They know that we live in transformative times in which major changes are occurring with branding, production promotion, customer relationships and just about everything else!
So they set off to build a sophisticated customer-oriented Facebook initiative; they roll out a prototype mobile iPhone app; or they simply get a very basic Twitter feed happening that includes a stream of useful news updates that customers might actually appreciate.
Enthusiastic as heck, they take their project to the senior management team — and its’ rejected, with a litany of reasons as to why the organization just isn’t ready to deal with their new ideas right now.
Any number of reasons can be given; each and every one of them is indicative of the fact that a sort of organizational sclerosis has set in, that clogs up the ability of the organization to deal with anything new. Consider the attitudes that you might encounter if you are trying to get something happening:
we don’t understand it, so we don’t think we need to do it
it’s too easy to not confront the tough issues
we are too busy fighting fires right now!
we don’t have the skill sets to deal with this. That’s a weak excuse
we haven’t thought about this in our strategic planning process
we have really spent a lot of time thinking about what comes next
we don’t have a budget for that!
what we’ve been doing all along is perfectly ok, isn’t it?
there’s so much going on, and we don’t know where it might fit in terms of priorities!
it’s too far ahead of its time!
Of course, it’s easy to take this wall of negativity and step back from the project and curb your enthusiasm — and give up! Here’s a clip from my keynote in Zurich in which I talk about the challenges you might face.
But real innovators don’t give up! They work to address the organizational sclerosis that might be in place. What you should do is confront these excuses head on: there are a variety of different reactions depending on the different excuses that are used:
if they don’t understand it, educate them! This might involve building a better business case for the initiative; bringing them up to date on the key business drviers and trends that require some bold steps and dramatic change.
help them that those who tackle the tough issues usually win. This is a good time to put into perspective the concept of accelerating change. You need to make sure that the leadership team understands that everything around us today is changing faster than ever before, and will continue to do so: business models, methods of customer interaction, new forms of competition. Business today is all about continually confronting a flood of tough issues; we should be bulking up our capabilities to deal with a world of incessant change.
if the organization is always in fire-fighting mode, change the agenda. Maybe they won’t be fighting as as many fires over the long term if they have a clear view of the future, and have a strategy that aligns to that future. So rather than asking, “whoah, where’d that come from,” they’re asking “ok, what comes next, and what do we need to do about it?“
skill sets don’t give us the capability: That’s a weak excuse: if there are shortfalls in certain key skills to deal with current business realities, deal with it and fix it fast. Ensure that you work with HR to undertake a skills inventory with respect to the area you are trying to innovate within, and work to plug the holes.
if it’s not part of the strategic planning process, make it part of it. Every organizations has multiple processes in which issues and activities rise to the top because they’ve been idenitified as fitting within the overall strategic plan. If yours isn’t part of the plan, work to get it there; and again, this comes through education, a clear business case, as well as internal discussions with those who are involved with and shape the strategic planning process.
get people thinking about what comes next: Does the organization have a regular series of forward looking leadership meetings? Does it take the time to assess the trends which might impact it on a 1, 2, 5 and 10 year basis? Is it busy looking at we have really spent a lot of time thinking about what comes next
we don’t have a budget for that! Following the process of getting the initiative into the strategic plan will help to lead to the next step: getting the project properly approved and funded within the overall budget process for the organization. There’s a process for budgeting — and you have to be intimately involved in and respect the process.
make it clear that it isn’t ok to keep doing the same thing that has been done in the past. You’ve got to clearly articulate the new threats the organizations faces and the opportunities that it can pursue as a result of ongoing change.
there’s so much going on, and we don’t know where it might fit in terms of priorities! This is a tricky one, because in this type of situation, its pretty well certain that there is some weak management in place who doesn’t know how to set a clear action plan that the team must follow. Best bet is to address the other issues on the list, and work to put in place a clear business and strategic plan for your initiative, with sound business reasoning as to why it needs to be done.
it’s too far ahead of its time! Frame the future to the organization this way: do we want to always be fast followers, or do we truly want to be market leaders?
In Zurich,I noted on stage that “we develop corporate cultures that stifle — that kill our ability to try to do anything new…..” That’s what you’ve got to work to avoid — it’s not easy to do — but absolutely necessary!
A quick little video from a keynote in which I outline what organizations often do — with good intentions that go horribly wrong.
Think about what happens — suddenly, a message is established that only ‘special people’ on the ‘special team’ are responsible for innovation.
Here’s what I wrote in What I Learned From Frogs in Texas — which, by the way, you can now buy for your Kindle from Amazon or for your iPhone/IPad on iTunes.
Three Simple Ideas
The essence of innovation is really quite simple. It is all about coming up with new ideas that help you to run the business better, grow the business and transform the business. But it isn’t just about idea generation—innovative companies excel at implementing these ideas and making them work.
Let’s examine each of these areas.
Run the Business Better
There is plenty of opportunity in every organization for operational innovation; that is, doing what you can to “run the business better.” This type of innovation involves a continuous effort to change, improve and redefine business processes, whether they involve customer service, HR practices, logistics and shipping methodologies, purchasing processes or just about anything else.
Never think there isn’t huge room for improvement—most organizations are inherently inefficient, with outdated or illogical processes in place. There is countless potential for improving the way organizations work, and plenty of opportunities for innovative thinking with respect to the way things are done.
Add it up and look at the benefits from doing things smarter or more effectively and there can be a huge return.
Grow the Business
Second, make sure you understand the opportunities from “growing the business,” or what might also be called “revenue-focused innovation.”
Most often, new revenue comes from new products and the ability to enter a new marketplace. Yet that isn’t the only way to enhance revenue. Think about business model innovation, for example: new business ideas involving expansion in existing markets or new ways of reaching the customer that weren’t previously possible (or that no one had thought of before).
Revenue enhancement can also come from changing the nature of existing products, such as adding a service component to a product that can bring in additional revenue. It might involve enhancing the perceived image of a product so it is more valuable to the customer, resulting in the customer being willing to pay more for it.
The key is, don’t think about “growing the business” and revenue enhancement as simply coming from new products or new markets; there are plenty of other methods for innovative thinking that can lead to revenue enhancement.
Transform the Business
Last but not least, always keep in mind the concept of “transformational innovation.”
Transformational innovation involves taking a look at the way the organization is structured, and thinking how it might be able to work smarter, more efficiently and with better results by changing the skills makeup of the organization. It involves constant, probing questions that continually assess the organization and its skills, such as:
Do we have the people we need in the right places/positions?
Do we have the right people with the right skills available at the right time?
If we are suddenly faced with rapid market change, do we know how to access specialized skills and talent we might need?
With the global connectivity that has emerged over the last few decades, there is plenty of opportunity to do today what couldn’t have been done even five years ago, in terms of how an organization accesses the skills, resources, talents and capabilities that it needs to get the job done..
Organizational transformation also recognizes the concept of “partnership” as a key corporate structure for the future. In a world of mammoth complexity and constant change, organizations must focus on their core competencies and partner with others to accomplish the things they cannot or should not do. In essence, they must recognize that the path to the future is to concentrate on what they do well and on what is critical to their central mission, and to seek partners to help out with everything else.
It was a busy September, with keynotes and leadership events for the likes of PPG, the Utah League of Cities and Towns, St. Joseph’s Health Center, Transcontinental Media, the Ohio League of Bankers, the Illinois League of Financial Institutions, the Minnesota Hospital Association CEO Summit, Allied Solutions and many other events.
A common theme for many of the keynotes I’ve given for senior executive events at these groups has been the focus on ‘what do world class innovators do that others don’t do?” In that context, there are several key themes I’ve been relentless on:
fast beats big: we have never lived in a period of time that has involved such rapid change with business models, competitive landscapes, product and service innovation, challenging consumers, a new political dynamic, and countless other new realities. World class innovators are those who move fast, get things done, and keep getting things done.
bold beats old: all around you right now, there are countless numbers of people and organizations who are out to mess up your business model. They’re making bold steps, aggressive moves, and big decisions. This is not a time for timidity; it’s a time for BIG ideas and the pursuit of the offbeat
velocity trumps strategy: careful strategic planning can be a critical step in adapting to the future, but in some areas, things are happening so fast that you can’t take the time to strategize: you just need to jump in and go. That’s experiential capital it’s one of the most important investments that you need to be making now. Understand what it is, and why you need to be investing in it NOW.
flexibility beats structure: successful innovators have mastered the ability to form fast teams: they know their that their ability to quickly scale resources to tackle fast emerging opportunities or challenges are the only way that they can win in the future. They avoid the organizational sclerosis that bogs too many organizations down
disruptors destroy laggards: step into any industry, and there are people who are busy messing about the fundamental business models which have long existed. Start your own disruption before you find yourself disrupted
connectivity is the new loyalty: with the forthcoming dominance of mobile technology in everyday lives, everything you know about customer relationships is dead. Right now, it’s all about exploring and building new relationships throughout the mobile data cloud in which the customer lives. If you don’t get that, your brand is dead.
location is the new intelligence: withconnectivity comes location, which results in new applications, business models, methods of customer interaction, and just about everything. If you don’t have a location strategy for your business, you really don’t understand how quickly your world is changing around you
For more on this thinking, check out the ‘innovation’ tag on my blog.
Over the last fifteen years as a futurist and innovation expert, I’ve spoken to a tremendous number of agricultural groups. This has often included large groups of farmers, attending an event where I’ve been asked to speak at a community economic development event.
These talks have long involved a lot of research into key agricultural trends. And one thing I’ve come to appreciate is that farmers can be some of the most innovative people on the planet. Here’s a video clip from a keynote to a US Military conference in Dallas — yes, the military — and I’m describing to them the unique innovation insight that can be learned from farmers.
"An outstanding presentation for an industry and association that falls on its traditions so often. We learned that our tradition should not be something that holds us back, but rather the launching pad for innovation for the future. Thanks Jim for your thought provoking presentation!"
- 94th PGA of America Annual General Meeting
"We were extremely pleased with Jim’s presentation... the content was bang-on and would hopefully prompt people to think about the rapidity of change going on in our world!. Jim’s storytelling approach really helps to get his points across! He did a great job!"
- Walt Disney Company
"We thought Jim was amazing - just the positive message we wanted to leave folks with.
- T. Rowe Price
"Jim Carroll recently presented at Lockheed Martin’s Executive HR Leadership conference. His content was very provocative, fascinating, and relevant. I’ve embedded a couple of his nuggets into my operating model
- Lockheed Martin
"Many thanks for your presentation, “7 Things You Need to Do Right Now: Aligning the Fast Future to Your Current Strategy” It couldn't have been more energy filled and dynamic to start the conference out on the right foot. It was exactly what the audience wanted and needed to hear. The feedback from all attendees was excellent."
- VIBE Conference 2010, Las Vegas
"Bringing Jim into our MLC Sales Conference in Sydney through a fibre optic line was truly incredible. The key note session Jim delivered was on the money, he exceeded my expectations."
- MLC National Australia Bank
"Jim is one of the best speakers we had. He had excellent information that our attendees could take home and incorporate it into their plans immediately. He also incorporated our messages into his presentation that helped localize the information for our group. Highly recommended!"
- Illinois Bureau of Tourism.
"After seeing Jim speak at another conference, I was so motivated by his presentation, I invited Jim to speak at a conference for my organization. Another home run! Powerful, articulate, thought provoking and energetic! Jim's delivery on the importance of staying abreast of rapidly changing trends truly can assist in changing the way we do business!"
- US Navy, Air Force, Marine Child Youth Program Conference
"... your talk hit just the right note.....I did have several people ask me if they could get a copy of your presentation as well as many who noted that the programming was fantastic and gave them a lot to think about."
-Consumer Electronics Association 2010 CEO Summit
"Thank you for an outstanding opening keynote for the 10th Anniversary Opportunities Conference: you received a 100% approval rating which has only been achieved 2 other times in our 10 year history!"
-Opportunities 2009 Conference Organizer
“We were extremely pleased with Jim’s presentation….. the content was great and would hopefully prompt people to think about the rapidity of change going on in our world!”
You were superb! As we make changes your message could not have come at a better time. This group likes tradition but unfortunately that often gets in the way of moving forward. Thank you again for reminding us that our greater responsibility is to the future!"
- US National Recreation and Parks Association
“I have been working with Jim for the past four years, and, without question, he is one of the most dynamic speakers and professional partners I’ve ever come across. Our audiences (internal and external) love him, and he works wonderfully with our customers. ….I’m willing to bet your first experience will lead to many, many more, as it has with SAP. I wish you the best with him….book him before someone else does!”
- SAP
Great presentation by Jim! Key words and explanations were enlightening and relevant to us all!
- International Society of Medical Publication Professionals
Healthcare in 2021? What will we be doing in 10 years time? Well, according to Jim Carroll, keynote speaker for the opening session, definitely not what we're doing today! He presented an invigorating view of what our healthcare systems could be looking like and it's up to us to decide how we get there. We'll be accepting his challenge to take three scary ideas away and think about how we can make them work, rather than the reasons why they won't. The poll4 system was fun and it was definitely the first time we'd been asked to turn our phones on during a presentation!
- International Society of Medical Publication Professionals
Sample of recent and upcoming speaking engagements
PGA - Professional Golf Association
94th Annual General Meeting Boston, Massachusetts
Terrapin Conference Group
2011 World Pharma Innovation Congress London, England
Computer Science Corporation
2011 CSC Executive Exchange St Andrews, Scotland
Private Event, July 2011
2011 Global Health Care Trends Munich, Germany
T. Rowe Price
2011 Investment Symposium Baltimore, Maryland
International Dairy, Deli & Bakery Association
2012 Global Global Conference New Orleans, Louisiana
Talent Management Magazine
2012 International Talent Management Conference New Orleans, Louisiana
James Madison University
2012 - Special Event for MBA Students Harrisonburg, Virginia
Since that time, this inspirational post has become one of the most heavily tracked pages on my Web site; it also happens to provide the structure for the closing of most of my keynotes on stage.
