How to be innovative - with the Six C's of Innovation

Over the years, I’ve come to realize that part of the fuel that fires my passion for my work is my intense curiosity. I’ve also come to realize that thinking differently has become critical to my success.

So it is with you; in a time in which business models, markets, customers, industries and clients are changing at an ever more furious pace, thinking differently about the world around you is a powerful and important personal trait to possess. You also need to ensure that you provide for a culture of creativity within your organization so that it can evolve at a pace that the future demands of it.

That’s why I’d suggest that you think abut instilling a culture of personal and corporate innovation by instill in yousrelf and your team, my “Six-C’s of Innovation.”

• curiosity
  
• creativity and rebellion
  
• collaboration
  
• change
  
• courage
  
• creating excitement every day!
  

Creative organizations fuel a culture of curiosity, and encourage their people to look for trends, signs of change and opportunities everywhere. They know that innovation can come from tension, and that tension can come from people who don't fit the traditional corporate mold. They establish a collaborative culture in which information sharing is expressly encouraged. They also know that success comes from embracing change, not shying away from it. Not only that, but they know that true, real, sustainable success can only come from doing things differently, and that this in and of itself requires courage, because change involves risk.

And last but not least, creative companies create excitement, every day! I don’t know how many surveys I have read which indicate that staff within many an organization are bored by their work. That’s not the way to provide for creativity – it is by doing things differently that you can instill a sense of passion and purpose in even the most routine jobs.

Jack Welch might have come up with Six Sigma - but I think in a world of rapid change that my Six-C's provide a better framework for going forward!

For innovative organizations, tomorrow is the new today

With all the organizations I've studied, I've long realized that innovation comes naturally to those organizations who are focused on the opportunities of tomorrow rather than the challenges of today. By building a culture that is relentlessly turned to that reality, they easily succeed in doing things differently. And in doing so, they're the true innovators -- they've been able to throw off the shackles of yesterday's problems in order to concentrate on what they could be doing to adjust to tomorrow.

There are several key elements to this successful innovation culture:

• a growth orientation: they've managed to instill a culture that has everyone thinking about what can be done, rather than what needs to be fixed. It's a culture in which people are thinking less about the problems that have occurred, and more about the cool strategies that could be pursued. They don't run "change-management workshops" : they have strategic sessions on "growing the business." It's not an easy task, but innovative organizations have managed to get their people away from "right now" to "our next step."
  
• the ability to cost-manage and grow at the same time: give me a company that is focused strictly on cost management, and I'll give you an innovation lackard. Innovative organizations know that cutting cost and operational excellence is but one part of the equation. They also ensure that at the same time they hack away at cost, they are actively working on growing their market, learning how to do things differently, discovering new ideas, and seeking opportunity.
  
• a translatable vision: every single innovative organization has, at the root, at least one, simple, concrete idea (or more) that defines their innovation scope. One industrial company I worked with defined it this way: "at this point, we know we don't have the depth to generate innovation ideas entirely internally -- so we will see innovation partners to help us drive growth in our sector." Once that was defined, the rest followed, because it became acceptable to admit that innovation could come from somewhere other than internally.
  
• time to market is critical: the organization relentlessly lives and breathes the mantra, "it's all about our ability to get the product/service to market on time." With that key goal, they manage to harness their energy towards a growth and ideas agenda.
  
• internal collaboration: the organization has gone beyond seminars about teamwork, to a culture in which ideas are instantly shared, debated, transferred, analyzed and recomposed. There is no more debate about the need to break down silos; they are gone. What remains is a desire to learn from each other, and build on common insight.
  
• a transition at the top, of managers to leaders: innovative organizations have transitioned the roles of management. They've moved away from such mind-numbing activities such as day-to-day oversight, implementing procedures, generating reports, and all the other routine. Instead, they're redefining the organization by pushing decision-making to the lowest capable level; they defining goals and outcomes that staff can pursue; they, are putting in place collaborative and market oriented feedback loops. In other words, they're thinking about all the things the organization should be doing to survive and thrive in a fast-paced market.
  
• at every level, a tactical to strategic transition: at the same time that the role of management has evolved, so too has the role of staff. As part of the shift to innovation, the organization has transitioned the roles of many staff so that they provide a more strategic role ("what do we need to do to meet this new challenge?") rather than routine tactical activities ("I need to get this reconciliation signed off!") They've done this by automating a lot of the routine, day to day processes that can choke off innovation. They're freeing staff up from the performance of the mundane, to the enhancement of opportunity.
  
• a partnership orientation: innovative organizations recognize that they can't do it all. They look to actively work with their complexity partners in order to be able to do innovative things at the pace that the speed of change demands of them. Partnership is a key word: "we might not be able to generate all the ideas, but we sure as heck are going to know how to find them and capitalize upon them."
  
• global skills access is a key success factor: big or small, you can only drive innovation if you can access the complex talent needed to take you forward. Innovative companies have mastered the article of just-in-time skills access; they can access and focus a unique set of skills for a unique purpose at a moments notice.
  

To a degree, it's all about what leadership decides to do. And when it comes to innovation, there are three types of leaders. Only one can provide for a focus on real innovation. I spoke about this in one keynote, when I defined the three types of organizations that exist today, which you can watch here.

Brand confusion in the global world

One fascinating aspect of the new world in which we find ourselves is that some companies have found that globalization has meant some very unique "brand management" challenges, as their brand or company names runs up against long-standing brand or companies from elsewhere in the world.

I've got the same interesting challenge, but from a very different perspective.

The "other Jim Carroll" is an extremely well known poet, Pulitzer Prize winner, author of the Basketball Diaries (which became a Hollywood movie, with Jim Carroll played by Leonardo DiCaprio of Titanic fame), and leader of the 80's punk group, The Jim Carroll Band (best known for the hit, "Those are People Who Died.")

There are many people on the Web who are looking for that Jim Carroll - he has an enormous global popularity, as seen by his Wikipedia entry.

I'm often told stories by people as to how they've found him when they are looking for me. Most often, this has been after a keynote somewhere or other; they've heard the name Jim Carroll and go off and do a Google search.

We both show up, of course.

When they do their search, end up finding him, and kind of wonder about the poet aspect.....that's why I've long had this page that links to the "other Jim Carroll," in order to ease the brand confusion.

It certainly makes for interesting conversations!

Business models and complexity partners

With the lifespan of knowledge collapsing, furious rates of scientific advance, and rapid new discoveries, no one company can do everything.

In this clip from a presentation to a cable conference, I'm talking about the new corporate model of the future -- one increasingly based on "complexity partnerships."

Managing Gen-Connect

Everyone is talking about Gen-Y.

I've come to call the next generation, Gen-Connect. Their attitudes towards careers, which is very unique, is caught in this video clip.

As I posted previously in this blog, "This next generation is completely different in terms of how they think. Kids today 15 and under coming into the workforce are not going to want to have a job, they're not going to want to have a career path, they’re not going to want to work for a company. They are the ultimate entrepreneurs. You're not going to be able to hire them. You're going to be able to contract them at best."

Their attitudes are part of what is driving 10 very unique attributes of 21st century skills, which was captured in a blog post here.

Accounting beyond accountability...

I'm off to Halifax, Nova Scotia today; tomorrow, I'll be the luncheon keynote speaker for an annual get together of Certified Management Accountants.

The overall conference theme is "accountability" : the profession is immersed in the throes of the Enron fallout, as companies wrestle with the new focus on corporate ethics and responsibility. Kurt Eichenwald, author of Conspiracy of Fools, a fabulous saga of the Enron story, is the opening speaker.

The entire conference is focused around the "accountability" theme. I take them in a different direction -- what do we do after we deal with the accountability issue? Accountability is critical, but I think what is even more important is that accounting professionals need to a new set of responsibilities in the high velocity economy.

I captured some of those requirements in my post on "The New Face of Manufacturing: Agility, Insight and Execution." If you extend the thinking there, you can see that the real strategic opportunity for accounting professionals is to provide, manage and actively be involved in the critical insight needed to take an organization forward.

The key message: accountability is important, but I think everyone understands that. We need to start preparing for the next step.

(Did I say "we"? I did. My secret, as a fellow who focuses on innovation and creativity, is that I'm actually a professional accountant (and still am) ... going back some 20+ years......)

Is your brand from the olden days?

"A brand today can go from hero to zero in a matter of months...."

As the news media gears up for the release of the Sony Playstation 3, one wonders whether they are capturing an increasingly important aspect of the story: has Sony managed to keep any of the brand luster that it once had, or is already irretrievably lost?

That's an important question in this world of instant obsolescence. I often tell the story on stage of how my sons -- now 11 and 13 -- perceive many of the things which were once a part of my life as being from the "olden days." We've actually come up with a pretty long list; just the other day, when looking at a Web site, my youngest asked me with all innocence, "what's a cassette player?"

Sony once had a really cool brand name, and the Walkman had deep, deep brand value. Yet Sony seemed to lose its innovative spirit, and started going wrong in a big way. It ended up destroying a good chunk of the brand value behind the Sony name -- when I think of Sony now, I think of a company that is slow, behind the times, ponderous.

Which begs the question : are you operating with enough agility and rapidity in order to ensure that your own brand doesn't become a "brand from the olden days?"

The rate at which the Sony brand lost its value is nothing short of stunning -- and was due to a series of well known missteps (among others):

• they failed to keep up with the rapid growth and demand for flat panel TV's and other hot new technologies: they failed with market agility.
  
• they decided that going to war with their customers (by slipping destructive software onto their music CD's) was more important than developing great technology that caught the next wave of consumer electronics.
  
• they dropped the ball on the necessity for continuous operational excellence , as evidenced by a disastrous recall of laptop batteries.
  

Are you making similar mistakes that is costing you brand image? You certainly are, if:

• Your brand looks tired, because it is tired
: Case in point -- many companies in the automobile industry missed out on the revolution in the passenger compartment, because they weren't watching what their customers were doing. They were busy releasing automobiles that were some five years behind the living rooms of their customers -- and that certainly brought the brand sheen off of some of the biggest auto companies.

• Customers see a lack of innovation: Consumers today are immersed in a global cloud of new ideas. They’re witnessing constant, relentless, awe-inspiring forms of innovation all around them, as they deal with a flood of new consumer technologies, packaging based product innovation, and ongoing advancements in retail environments, both offline and online. They’ve come to expect that the brands they deal with are at the leading edge, in design, functionality, message and purpose.
  
• Lousy, ineffective customer service: Guess what – when it comes to interaction with your customers, they measure you up against the world’s best. If you don’t add up, you are doing some significant damage to your brand equity right there. Customer support is no longer good enough -- fanatical support is better.
  
• You don't know that you customers know more about your brand than you do: Your customers today are immersed in the global innovation idea feedback loop. They busy sharing ideas on what's really cool, and they are even busier taking apart the folly of those who have been left behind. In doing so, they are rapidly reinventing products, services, brands and image. If you aren't listening, you are guaranteeing that you'll fall behind.
  
• A lack of purpose or urgency: I've studied many organizations who still don't have the key information they need for market agility. They don't have instant feedback mechanisms which tell them of rapid developments in specific markets. They don't know how to regroup quickly "when bad things happen." They still operate blind, as if it's 1990: their sales force goes into a customer meeting, oblivious as to what that customer has been thinking about them. They approach every day as if it were the same as yesterday; meanwhile, their market and their customers have run away from them!
  
• A lack of market and competitive intelligence: It's the information-age, get it? There's no shortage of information to be had. Yet I see companies who seem shocked when a competitor drops a 'bombshell' announcement -- only to realize that they were the only one who thought it was a bombshell. Everybody else knew what the competition was up to, because in this new hyper-connected world, everyone knows what everyone else is doing!
  
• A regular series of fumbling missteps: The saddest thing is that Sony has messed up in so many ways, that some customers now look at as if it has a "L" on its forehead. Today, small mistakes can be instantly compounded. Take the concept of compounded financial interest. Now realize that a small PR mistake, a lousy executive decision, or poor execution, can lead to the same type of instant, global brand devaluation -- that can compound on itself at an extremely high interest rate!
  

A brand today can go from hero to zero in a matter of months. How do you avoid such a fate?

• Recognize that brand longevity is now a critical issue
  
• Ensure your sales, marketing, development and customer support team are relentlessly focused on the currency of the brand
  
• Make sure that continuous brand innovation is part of your corporate mantra
  
• When confronted with the new and challenging customer, learn from them rather than running away
  
• Be incessantly focused on the likely innovations that will come to impact your brand
  
• Learn to think five to six product lifecycles in advance -- and plan to do them all within six months.
  
• Make forward oriented intelligence a critical aspect of what you do.
  

The impact of globalization

At the Swiss Innovation Forum in Zurich, I took a look at the real impact of globalization -- the new consumer, market commoditization, rapid emergence of new business models, shortened product lifecycles.....

The bottom line? "We need to shake ourselves out of any complacency that we can continue doing tomorrow what we did today."

That's why innovation is critical : organizations today are in a situation in which everything around them is fluid, constantly changing and evolving. Permanence has been torn asunder.

It is only by focusing on continual, rapid change that an organization can adapt to today's new global realities.

The innovation killers

At the Swiss Innovation Forum in Zurich, I took a look at the attitudes, ideas and cultures which always manage to stifle -- and kill -- any hope for innovation within an organization.

Key point? "Organizations fail, because their have failure engrained in their corporate culture!"

This clip is based on an article I wrote a few years ago about the innovation killers. I often tell a joke on stage that it sometimes seems that there are groups of people who wake up every morning and ask themselves, "what I am going to do today to kill off new ideas?"

Take a look at the list of innovation killer phrases. Take it into your next meeting, and start to take score of how often these phrases are used. That will give you a sense as to whether you are slowly dying from organizational sclerosis, or if you do have a corporate culture that permits innovation to thrive.

The new face of manufacturing : agility, insight and execution...

Yesterday I gave the opening keynote for the annual manufacturers meeting of the Hearth, Patio and Barbecue Association. Most of the folks in attendance were CEO's and senior management with a wide variety of companies, and they were keen for insight into what they should be doing beyond knowing that the world is flat.

There was quite a bit of information to share with them. In the last few years, I have hosted a dozen or more sessions on behalf of the global computer giant SAP. I've interviewed the CFOs and CIO's of a wide range of major manufacturing companies such as Purdue Pharma, Hunt Oil, J Crew, Fossil Watches, Lennox Furnaces, Endo Pharmaceuticals, Adaptec and more. I've studied and analyzed what it is that these companies are doing to ensure that they can thrive in a world of rapidly changing markets.

Several key themes have emerged.

• Concentrate on rapid replenishment: smart supply chains are the bare minimum for today's manufacturers. What you really need to do is build an information-partnership with your suppliers and customers, ensuring that you stay lean and mean at the same time that you meet very tight delivery expectations. It's not about building-to-inventory -- it's about building to demand and build-to-order.
  
• Meet the raised bar of expectations : The new math is easy: that purchasing manager you are dealing with is often dealing with the best and the brightest companies on the planet. They will expect and demand the same level of service from you. The bar of expectations is pretty high, and it gets higher every day. At the very least, you've got to be able to provide instant, 110% service with everything you do -- support, order status, bid prices, dispute resolution. If you don't, you are increasingly out of the game. Today's customer has options, and they won't hang around waiting for you to fix your problems.
  
• Focus on planning agility: Gone are the days of sitting back and figuring out how to crank out a production run of 700,000 items. Markets and demand are changing so rapidly that you might need to retool, rework and redo your production capabilities, so that you can respond to something new that is going to happen next week. That's why you've got to ensure that you make agility -- the ability to change your own goalposts -- the cornerstone of your manufacturing capability.
  
• Go maximum on flexibility: Here's your new production mantra: volatility is the new normal. The last five years have taught us that unpredictability now comes at us in regular waves. If you are a food manufacturer and can't instantly respond to sudden, new food traceability requirements, you'll be faced with whopping, new, unmanageable excess costs. If you can't provide detailed new logistics information to respond to some sudden new security concern, you don't have the right flexibility. Today's manufacturers live with the new unknown, and plan for it.
  
• Transition single source labor to multi-source skills: Old line manufacturers have different workers that do different stuff. The new guys have transitioned themselves with an investment in training and attitude so that their production team members can take on multiple different projects and assignments. It's not about single-sourced skills -- it's about ingrained capabilities to instantly shift skills and resources to meet sudden new demands.
  
• Have deep insight into rapidity: With the collapse of product lifecycles and wildly fluctuating consumer / customer attitudes, you've got to stay on top of how quickly demand might change. All of the manufacturers I've studied with have ensured that they have the systems and technology that provide them deep, deep insight into how quickly their markets are changing. This includes CEO's and executive management who can access real time, high-level snapshots of all kinds of key operating metrics. Sales force and marketing and production teams who know exactly what is going on in the marketplace, minute by minute by minute, and plan accordingly.
  
• Concentrate on commonality of business / manufacturing processes: Most manufacturing companies of any scope and scale have had multiple, independently operated plants and facilities, with countless numbers of different production control, manufacturing, planning, logistics and supply chain systems. Anyone with any degree of smarts today has ripped out the junk, and has gone to one, single, comprehensive system to do it all. Time should not be spent on trying to make different bits of code work -- time needs to be spent in focusing on the competitive challenges in the marketplace!
  
• Implement flexible, just in time processes: What will your customers be buying six months from now? What new products might come out that will blow away your market position? If you don't know, you should -- and you should have the capability to quickly revamp, refocus and redo your business and manufacturing processes on an on-demand basis. The companies I've studied have pursued two key goals: ensuring that they can quickly redirect their manufacturing process, and in addition, having an IT staff that can quickly roll out sophisticated new business applications at the drop of a hat. Hand in hand, these two factors allow the organization to respond to the rapidity of market change that is a reality today.
  
• Develop better bid or service costing: Forget flying by the seat of your pants when you are putting out a bid on a contract. With margins so tight and with everyone becoming religious on cost management, that's a surefire way of ensuring that you'll lose money. Smart manufacturers have put in place the intelligent information backbones that let them bid and cost with a precision that matches the quality of their manufacturing process.
  
• Work to become the “supplier of choice: Your key goal today? You want to make it as easy as possible for your customers -- whether they are wholesalers, retailers, distributors, end users or other manufacturers -- to do business with you. Think of instilling "electronic glue" in your relationship -- it's all about partnering with them and putting in place business processes that makes it so easy for them to do business with you, that they will be unlikely to take their business elsewhere.
  
• Be relentless on operational excellence: Globalization means that being great is no longer enough -- you have to be even greater. That's why pursuing and achieving absolutely pure excellence within every aspect of the manufacturing operation is critical -- you've got to go beyond greatness, to excellence, in order to compete in the massively global, increasingly flat, ever more rapid, customer-empowered marketplace that is today. It's only by aiming for the highest that you can begin to hope to do what needs to be done.
  

All of the CFO's and CIO's and senior management teams at the companies I've studied have concentrated their efforts on three key words: agility, insight and execution. Pretty cool stuff!

What's your future-attitude?

There are two types of people in the world -- those who view the future with fear, worry and concern -- and the rest of the people who look at the future as an opportunity.

The latter group are the innovators; the former group will do everything they can do dismiss the idea of doing anything differently. (They use the "innovation killer phrases" which I often use on stage.....)

I just grabbed a quick video clip from a talk I did for the Cedar Rapids, Iowa Chamber of Commerce earlier this fall (which drew a standing room only crowd of 800 people), in which I'm talking about the attitudes of farmers towards the future. I spent a bit of time talking about the 10 Big Trends for Agriculture, and put into perspective that we really need to focus on the opportunity of the upside.

It might be worth a watch, because it really puts these two camps into perspective. Take a look at it here