Innochat Transcript – 19 August – Innovation Backwards?
August 24, 2010 by Andrew (Drew) · Leave a Comment
Sorry for the delay in getting the most recent innochat transcript posted. The challenge associated with connecting while on the road was greater than anticipated. Needless to say I didn’t expect to be looking at Uluru (aka. Ayers Rock) in the middle of Australia as I type this, but here I am.
Thanks for your patience. Attached is the transcript from the “Innovation Backwards?” chat, which was incredibly well positioned thanks to the great framing post from Caroline Di Diego and excellent moderation by Renee Hopkins.
A favorite tweet from this week’s post? This insight from Jose Briones:
The biggest issue is that in most cases picking winners from the ideation process really means picking favorites.
Innovation Herds: Me-too-ism & the dumbness of crowds
July 26, 2010 by Andrew (Drew) · 3 Comments
Great minds think alike, but fools seldom differ.
- English Proverb
In honor of the recent football (okay, soccer) World Cup—and congratulations to South Africa for pulling off a sterling tournament (Bafana Bafana!) and the Spaniards for their first tournament victory—it seems appropriate to consider the impact of the herd on innovation practices. Not just any herd, though; this is the herd that forms when two opposing packs of 5-year-olds play the glorious game: the herd of Pee Wee Soccer.
Sound and motion with little to show for it
For those of you who don’t have children or have not seen children this age playing soccer, you have missed what certainly is an experience. The rules of soccer seem immaterial. Yes, there is a ball in play. Yes, there are referees and linespeople. Yes, there are goals at each end of the usually shortened field and two equal-numbered teams of players. The basic framework is the same, but the way the game is played is quite…different.
The pervading game objective practiced by both teams is to quite literally “crowd the ball”: where the ball goes, that’s where all players attempt to go, except for those few who become distracted by a parent or sibling on the sideline, or by the color of the sky, or by something bright and shiny, or need to re-enact football hooliganism an so on. You get the picture. What forms is a tight pack around the ball, hiding it from the spectator’s view, and which moves as a herd up and down the field. Occasionally the ball will “escape,” only to be recaptured by one of the team members who, in their inability to run and dribble the ball simultaneously, will stall until the rest of the members from both teams re-form the herd.
No one here but us sheeple
The greatest difficulty is that men do not think enough of themselves, do not consider what it is that they are sacrificing when they follow in a herd, or when they cater for their establishment.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
What of this herd? And what does it have to say about the impact of the herd mentality on innovation? A short explanation can be found here.
Given our complex worlds with their voluminous sensory inputs, we are wired to adopt a series of mental shortcuts (termed heuristics) that enable us to process only the amount of data necessary, in as short a time as possible, to meet our immediate needs. Think of heuristics as experience-based models that help in problem-solving and discovery. They drive much of our daily behavior without us even recognizing it. The reason they are effective is that they relieve us from treating every circumstance as critically important, offering relief from having to think too hard. Is it really necessary to calculate the optimum parking space at the mall, taking into consideration timing, prevailing weather, shopping patterns, etc.? No? Right—open space, here I come!
By employing heuristics, we create a series of short cuts that enable us to focus on more complex issues, more holistically and systemically, as the need arises. Heuristics, however, reinforce situational thinking and action. In recent studies conducted at the University of Leeds in Great Britain, researchers discovered that it takes a minority of just 5 percent to influence a crowd’s direction—and that the other 95 percent follow without realizing it. If we hearken back to the heady days of the dot-com book in the early 2000s, we can see this pattern in the practices of developers, who threw together “me-too” websites; institutional investors, who threw money at anything with a website; and stock market investors, who piled their money into every “sure thing” they heard about from their hairdresser, dog walker, or cab driver. And that herd behavior ended well, didn’t it?
Wise crowds and the benefit of discomfort
The dissenter is every human being at those moments of his life when he resigns momentarily from the herd and thinks for himself.
- Archibald MacLeish
Unless we take steps to separate ourselves from the crowd and seek to break our ingrained patterns of thinking, we will continue to be drawn to the herd. In James Surowiecki’s bestseller The Wisdom of the Crowds, he noted that there are highly functional types of groups that possess not a herd mentality, but an inherent wisdom. From his perspective, if four basic conditions are met, a crowd’s “collective intelligence” will produce better outcomes than a small group of experts. Surowiecki says that wisdom will prevail even if members of the crowd don’t know all the facts or choose, individually, to act irrationally. “Wise crowds” need 1) diversity of opinion; 2) independence of members from one another; 3) decentralization; and 4) a good method for aggregating opinions. In short, effective groups need guidelines (like heuristics), but ones that are focused on differentiation and not similarity. “Me-too” has to be retired so that “What if” might prevail.
Unfortunately, when wisdom meets the herd, the prevailing outcome is the dumbness of the crowds.
To reach beyond the herd, organizations must embrace difference and the discomfort that comes from not adopting the first, or easiest, answer to a presenting challenge. Clay Shirky, a professor in NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program, described in his book Here Comes Everybody the benefits of groups breaking out of the herd mentality and moving toward “collaborative production”:
Collaborative production, where people have to coordinate with one another to get anything done, is considerably harder than simple sharing, but the results can be more profound. New tools allow large groups to collaborate, by taking advantage of nonfinancial motivations and by allowing for wildly differing levels of coordination.
Shirky, pp. 109
Over time, even the Pee Wee Soccer team learns how to play the game. Each player discovers his or her own strengths, and a good coach will recognize those differences and create something greater than a mob out of them. Their efforts become grounded in collaborative production. In our organizations, innovation processes that support our thinking and don’t provide ready answers give us the opportunity to develop solutions that reach beyond the herd. We can choose to stretch past the simple and explore the complex so that our solutions are new and not “me-too.”
We herd sheep, we drive cattle, we lead people. Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way.
- General George S. Patton
Being in a herd is actually a matter of choice, one that must be made consciously in order for a range of alternatives to be revealed. In a competitive marketplace, would you rather be in the herd, where the view rarely changes, or out front? I thought so.
Innochat Transcript – 22 July – Tribal Leadership and Innovation
July 23, 2010 by Andrew (Drew) · 1 Comment
Due to the inability to gain access to my Ning account, I’m posting the transcript temporarily here. It will be moved to a new location shortly (as will the other transcripts.)
Thanks to Andrew Townley for moderating this great topic – truly sad to have missed out due to client commitments.
Presenting at the ODN – Long Island Annual Conference April 8
March 31, 2010 by Andrew (Drew) · Leave a Comment
The ODN Long Island Chapter is hosting its annual conference on April 8, 2010 at the Marriott Residence Inn, Plainview, NY . The focus is on building stronger, better organizations so that they can not only succeed but thrive as we work our way out of the Great Recession. More details here.
My topic is: Manufacturing Magic – The Hard Work of Creating an Innovation Culture
In the phrase, “we need to be more innovative”, lies a universe of misspent time, energy and political capital. As the popular media love affair with the notion of innovation continues, and leaders begin looking for answers to their businesses’ economic health beyond those actions necessary to survive the Great Recession, many organization development professionals are being tasked with making their organizations “more innovative.” Unfortunately, it seems that the concept of innovation has been coupled with that of creativity and unless we deliver something bright, shiny and magical, we’re going to disappoint.
Creating an innovation culture is not easy. As with change initiatives that have come (and gone) before, it is fraught with miss-comprehensions, false starts and dead ends. With the right effort applied to the appropriate leverage points in your organization, you might just be able to deliver the results you and your leadership seek.
This presentation, backed by current research in innovation best practices, will provide a rapid overview of the different entry points to begin creating an innovation culture. It will highlight key concerns, critical decisions, potential problems and the planning necessary to begin the process of making an innovation culture that fits your organization’s needs and wants. It will also address the business value to be obtained in terms that are clear and meaningful. While creating an innovation culture may be costly and hard work, the key question to ask is – what is the business impact and cost of lack of innovation?
5 Innovation Traps in Organization Culture
December 19, 2009 by Andrew (Drew) · Leave a Comment
“Experience is the name every one gives to their mistakes.”
- Oscar Wilde
Organizations can be such powerful forces for change. Sometimes they can get in their own way and the value they could bring to life becomes trapped. A little experience of the ways in which an organization’s culture can trap innovation might help others avoid these same mistakes. Do you see yourself or your organization in these five traps?
1. Preparation is everything – Actually, it’s become the only thing. We’re not ready, yet. Or Ever.
The very notion of choosing which innovation to pursue cripples many an organization. One of the primary reasons for this behavior is the chronic lack of clear decision-making criteria against which any of the usually many options may be assessed. And without clear criteria, there is never enough data. Because without a decision making framework all data is open for consideration.
Brache and Bodley-Scott, in their book Implementation make it abundantly clear that the criteria for selecting any portfolio (be it strategic projects or innovation prospects) must be tied directly into your organization’s strategy. These criteria should express how the alternatives might, for example:
- implement the organization strategy,
- increase sales,
- establish or widen a competitive advantage,
- reduce costs, and,
- increase customer satisfaction and lifetime value.
In Good to Great, Collins took this concept even further. His Hedghog Concept said that it is not enough to simply select the priority of investment alternatives you actually need to choose between life and death. You must choose which innovation efforts get funding and live and which do not, and therefore die so as to not draw away from your best efforts.
Getting out of the trap of analysis paralysis means keeping clear parameters for performance and success top of mind. This results in clear objectives driving your decisions. It also is most profoundly demonstrated in the courage of a company like Kimberly Clark to completely transform it’s business from a paper product company to a consumer products company. You don’t make those kinds of choices without being very clear of your intent. Focus first.
2. When we looked there, the cupboard was bare – Not enough stuff – people, resources, systems, data
In the current economic climate everyone is doing more with less. Fewer human resources, fewer capital reserves, fewer supplies. Resource scarcity has become the operational order of the day. This pervasive sense of limitation influences the choices we make about when and how to innovate.
Where this philosophy becomes a trap is when it is synonymous with keeping the lights on. Keeping the lights on as a mindset is the business equivalent of survival mode. No investments are being made. Current expenses are being severely limited. The concept of adding new investments for the purposes of innovation are not only avoided at all costs, they might be completely foreign because resource hoarding is so ingrained.
Cost-cutting procedures are of paramount virtue in this context. The person who saves the penny is a hero. But this organization trap means that we may be being penny wise and dollar (or pound, or euro, or renminbi) foolish.
How do you address this trap? One of my earlier posts focused on the counterpoint to resource scarcity – making do with what you have. Innovation as practiced in many organization does exactly that; the subversive nature of innovation means that it can survive even in the most hostile environments. An organization such as 3M used time as the primary investment of it’s employees in order to break this cycle. They instructed employees to use a percentage of every work week and devote it to exploring new ideas. 3M’s innovation success subsequently relied on long-term, individually directed exploratory research projects rather than large, well-funded, corporate sponsored efforts.
The key is to make do with what you have.
“The greatest thing a man can do in this world is to make the most possible out of the stuff that has been given him. This is success, and there is no other.”
- Orison Swett Marden
3. Sound and fury signifying nothing – we act without thinking and we talk about it (a lot)
“Have you heard about Twitter? What about The Facebook? Or Digg? Or Yelp? Well we are a little like all of them, but with a viral marketing element based on Mafia Wars.”
Stop it. Now.
An idea magically appearing in someone’s head does not mean it must be given voice. Innovation in this organization is trapped like so much debris in a Bowerbird’s nest. It’s bright and shiny and we’re going to collect as much of as we possibly can. Because surely when we collect enough of it we’ll attract more eyeballs and something is bound to happen, right? Please…
To paraphrase a famous Texan this organization is “all hat – no cattle”. They can talk a good game about innovation and probably have a mountain of “innovation” initiatives underway but little to show for it. They lack a cohesive strategy that might link all their efforts. In the absence of critical thinking about what innovation means they are intent on latching on to the next big thing, because if they pick the right one they think they will win. Don’t follow fads.
“Life is a tale told by an idiot — full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
- William Shakespeare (Macbeth: Act 5, scenes 1–11)
4. Perfect is the enemy of good – not ready to release (okay, never ready to release)
This innovation trap is one studiously avoided by most plastic surgeons. It was this field that coined the phrase that, “the enemy of good is perfect.” In this one line they landed the fact that there really can be too much of a good thing. (No link provided for the sake of everyone’s sanity but if you really must know, feel free to Google “plastic surgery disasters” for a sample of the pursuit of perfection) [shudder].
Organizations struggling in this innovation trap are intently focused on refining and polishing their innovations before taking them to market. The internal decision making and approval processes lock the innovation into a perpetual state of design and development, in endless pursuit of a hope for perfection. And where are the customers in this process? Nowhere to be seen. Giving rise to explanation like, “We can’t show them this? If we do, they might not like it and might go to our competitor.”
What’s that sound?
That’s the sound of your customer base being leeched away due to inattention and inactivity. Just because you’re busy innovating doesn’t mean they’ll stick around. This one innovation trap has actually given rise to equally important innovation practices, open innovation and rapid prototyping. Both of which offer ways out of over-reaching for perfection innovation.
“A man’s errors are his portals of discovery.”
- James Joyce
5. It’s business as usual day after day – (Business as usual just grindin’ away) predictability means dinner at home each night
The final trap into which the desire for innovation may fall is that represented by the economics of scarcity. Many organizations sacrifice their need to innovate to their desire to perpetuate BAU (Business As Usual). Which is not to say that a philosophy that reinforces business continuity is a bad thing. Far from it.
That said, a workman-like focus on BAU may actually be a self-deception.
Business as usual is safe. It is a known quantity. It doesn’t demand the unthinkable, the unknowable, or the unbelievable. It means we can get our job done, meet our objectives, and deliver anticipated value. It means we can work nine to five, punch the clock, pay the bills, and make it: home for dinner / to the game / for drinks with friends. It demands little. And people rise to the limited expectations of BAU because to think of being any other way is…just…too…hard.
“A ship is safe in harbor, but that’s not what ships are for.”
- William Shedd
And this is perhaps the most appalling trap into which innovation can fall. This represents an organizational failure to embrace the excitement and passion of the creative pursuit of the new, the wild, the different. This trap is created within an organization that has lost its way. The vision has long since dried up. The mission is already accomplished. The path this organization treads is the path of the zombie - a single-minded focus on immediate, simple survival needs and little else.
Unfortunately, often the only hope for the trap in which this organization finds itself is brutal. It either requires new leadership or a stake to the heart. But what if all it requires is something as simple as showing up and making an effort. To not do so would be criminal.
“A great deal of talent is lost to the world for want of a little courage. Every day sends to their graves obscure men whose timidity prevented them from making a first effort.”
- Sydney Smith
Avoiding the five traps in organization culture means: finding focus; making do; avoiding fads; accepting the acceptable; and having a go. Simple admonishments for powerful gains.
Framing for Accountability in Innovation for Twitter #innochat December 17 at Noon EST (USA)
December 15, 2009 by Andrew (Drew) · 2 Comments
Accountability – the currency of social innovation
This post is to trigger dialogue on innovation in the moderated Twitter #innochat on Thursday, December 17 at Noon, EST (USA) – all interested parties are welcome to join in. Follow #innochat to join at that time.
“The ancient Romans had a tradition: whenever one of their engineers constructed an arch, as the capstone was hoisted into place, the engineer assumed accountability for his work in the most profound way possible: he stood under the arch.” – Michael Armstrong
In its most elemental form, accountability is the state of being accountable, liable, or answerable; the state of being held, or holding oneself, to account. Yet, accountability as a concept is relatively new.
The term only came into wider usage a little more than two hundred years ago with the advent of the Industrial Revolution. The later part of the 18th century began a marked shift in large sectors of Great Britain’s previously manual labor–based economy towards machine-based manufacturing. With this shift production, which previously had been personal, was now delegated not to one but several people in environments owned by others. The concept of accountability was literally tied to the formal process of physically accounting for labor and output. Answering the questions of: who contributed what and how?
What does accountability mean in the present context of innovation?
Accountability within innovation must navigate two primary challenges. The first is that as innovation
is the introduction of something new the manner for measuring its performance may not be readily apparent. Without clear performance measures there may be limits to what someone may be held to account.
The second is the way in which organizations increasingly develop innovation through teams of people, both internal and external to an organization, that cross that organization’s formal lines of responsibility and authority. Unless there are replacement methods for linking individual and group performance to innovation outcomes accountability may also fall by the wayside.
In light of this, here are three questions for consideration to kick off the #innochat:
1. What does it mean to hold people to account for innovation?
2. What systems or processes need to be considered to support accountability?
3. What does the practice of accountability look like in your organization?
For a more detailed exploration of some of the facets of individual and mutual accountability and organization design in their support the following articles provide some additional (read: detailed) food for thought:
Organizing for Innovation in the 21st Century. By Deborah Dougherty – Professor, Management and Global Business Dept, Rutgers Business School.
Teams versus individual accountability: solving multitask problems through job design. By Kenneth S. Corts
Eyes on the Prize – In a CoIN a flexible approach to changing conditions means more wins
December 7, 2009 by Andrew (Drew) · Leave a Comment
In his fascinating research on collaborative innovation Peter Gloor, a Research Scientist at MIT’s Sloan School for Management Center for Collective Intelligence, identified a model he termed CoIN for, Collaborative Innovation Networks. He first named this model in the popular press in his book, Swarm Creativity: Competitive Advantage through Collaborative Innovation Networks. His stated goal was to make CoIN’s the widespread model for organized innovation. A CoIN is a team of self-motivated people linked virtually that shares a collective vision, enabled by technology to collaborate in achieving a common mission (a specific innovation) by sharing ideas, information, and work.
Now for those business leaders sold on the concept, their primary concern may be that with limited resources they now feel that they must invest in creating CoIN’s across their organizations to create or sustain a competitive. This is not the case.
CoIN’s already exist across most organizations. What needs to take place is their rapid identification and ongoing nourishment. In order to achieve this we need to prime the organization to be receptive to fluid teams focused on delivering a specific value. The way these teams are buoyed is through shared context – they need to share a vision, mission, purpose that draws them together and they needs an organization that fosters the identification of those things and supports their pursuit.
Organizations improving their culture of innovation when utilizing CoINs create virtuous cycles of success. The shared victories of the teams over problems become their own reward. This environment of collaboration focused on innovation creates a collective efficiency that is self-perpetuating.
“When a company is growing and profitable, we tend to infer that it has a brilliant strategy, a visionary CEO, motivated people, and a vibrant culture. When performance falters, we’re quick to say the strategy was misguided, the CEO became arrogant, the people were complacent, and the culture stodgy.” – from The Halo Effect
One of the inherent pitfalls of CoINs (when they are working) is the the impact of the Halo Effect if they are not occasionally disrupted. The Halo Effect, based on the work of Phil Rosenzweig, highlights the fallacy of so much of the research of day which emphasizes the repetition of “best practices” and our tendency to make specific evaluations of performance based on an elemental impression. If a CoIN falls into a pattern of attempting to repeat it’s success it may make choices about it’s approach to innovation that are not based on the shifting business context.
The Halo Effect highlights the fact that performance is relative, not absolute. Based on this understanding it follows that the way in which companies succeed is when they make choices and do things differently than rivals. In essence it moves from a world geared toward management by via benchmarks and best practices to one which is governed by making choices under conditions of uncertainty. And this is where CoINs come into their own – they create a fluid platform for innovation that can respond effectively to changing conditions.
What this demands of leadership and innovation teams is a much more rigorous approach to reward-seeking and risk-mitigating behavior. The Halo Effect shifts our thinking about performance from one that looks for a formula for success, toward one that sees the world in terms of probabilities and possibilities. Innovation leadership is about making choices, under uncertainty, that have the best chance to raise the probabilities of success, while never imagining that success can be predictably achieved. Even good decisions may lead to unfavorable outcomes, but that doesn’t mean the decision was wrong. It simply provides an opportunity for the innovation team to make a new decision and find a new path to success.
Mix Business With Design Thinking – from Fast Company
November 11, 2009 by Andrew (Drew) · Leave a Comment
We’ve all heard the news that the traditional MBA framework is broken, but adding courses on business ethics and financial crises won’t solve the problem. And although Harvard, Wharton, Kellogg, and the rest are all considering bringing new ways of thinking into their hallowed halls, a relatively small school in Canada is actually transforming the meaning of an MBA right before our eyes. The Rotman School of Management, helmed by Roger Martin, proposes a radical idea: to develop business leaders who are well-grounded in multiple disciplines.
The complete Dev Patnaik article may be found here.
Innovation Trapped – Rethinking the flow of ideas to market
November 10, 2009 by Andrew (Drew) · Leave a Comment
I think we do need to move very swiftly in creating value for consumers and reacting to the economics.
- Brian Becker
On BusinessWeek’s website recently (November 9, 2009), Vivek Wadhwa posted a ViewPoint column focused on the implication of globally outsourced innovation. While what he reviewed was not necessarily earth-shattering in its revelations it did highlight a series of long-held but little discussed ways for the USA (or any country) to position itself in the new exchange of research and development ideas.
Wadhwa catalogued the inherent risks in the present shifting innovation landscape: over 50% of US companies have developed outsourced innovation initiatives; US inflexibility in partnering with offshore resources is negatively impacting domestic innovation performance; cost may have been the initial driver for embracing outsourced solutions, but tapping global talent is the new fundamental necessity; and, the support roles previously outsourced have been superseded by much more complex jobs involving complex thinking, research, and solution design. If the most complex jobs are moving off-shore, what remains of the innovation-driven US economy?
In response he offered four approaches to help the US retain its innovation edge:
-
1. Increase the global awareness of American workers as they will be looking off-shore for ideas to apply at home in new and interesting ways, to drive the US economy domestically and globally,
2. Mid-tier companies cannot afford to outsource so better policies need to be developed to make it easier for them to use technology and provide them tax breaks for research,
3. Outsourcing is inherently disruptive so we must upgrade our investment in workforce training and development and make these items more of a corporate priority (as well as a national one akin to Singapore’s approach, perhaps?), and,
4. As early-stage ventures create the highest percentage of value per capita during the lifespan of companies, we need to harness this innovation treasure by building mechanisms to break the innovation logjam at the source, inside the research institutions and organizations where good ideas too often die.
Of the four areas for action defined, it is perhaps the last one which can provide the most immediate positive impact to both the innovation standing of the USA and to the need to generate new jobs to replace those lost in the current economic turmoil – or “Great Recession” as I heard it so glowingly defined recently. It is not a question of, “does America need to try harder on the innovation front?” Far from it. What needs to occur is a fundamental rethinking of the way current innovations, often set aside due to missteps and poor advocacy, so that they can receive a full and frank assessment for market potential.
A case in point. I was recently attending a fundraiser for the 80th anniversary of the non-profit nursery school for which I serve on the Board of Trustees. In the middle of meeting-and-greeting I began a conversation with John, the Alumni Relations and Development Director for a local high school, about the nursery school which in turn led to a discussion of my role on the Board and my work away from the Board (in the “real” world). After explaining my consulting approach, which is focused on helping people bring their ideas to market as fast as possible, John said, “that’s interesting…”
(If ever there was an opening!)
John then recounted an innovation lost story of his own. It seems he was asked to provide support to a pair of university professors who had developed a serious piece of heads-up display technology. It was truly mobile and ground-breaking. The professors were evidently excited by their breakthrough and eager to present it to possible venture capitalists. John, in working with them closely recognized that the professors needed some additional preparation. They simply were not ready for “prime time.” He tried to address his greatest fear, that they would not present their concept in the best light, by spending extensive time with the professors in advance of the impending demonstration. The professors tolerated his involvement, but kept insisting that their ideas would speak for themselves.
On the day of the presentation, John reinforced the fact that the demonstration needed to go off without a hitch. The display equipment, all very beta, was a little unwieldy. The professors, eager to show off their creative genius, asked the venture capitalist to try it on as it was very impressive when you were immersed in the data display. For the wearer the experience was like a 20 foot video screen was floating before you. Or, at least that was what was meant to happen. No sooner was the headgear clamped to the head of the venture capitalist than the arm holding the small display snapped at its base and the arm swung down driving the display into his shocked and open mouth, chipping a tooth.
In an instant he went from interested party to injured party.
Needless to say, no money was to be offered that day, or any day as word got around about what had transpired. The professors couldn’t understand why no one was willing to take a chance. John, in frustration, walked away from the deal. His parting comment to me, “if we can’t help our best and brightest bring their sharpest ideas to market we’ll all suffer in the long-term.”
So, here’s the challenge, how can we help unlock those innovations, many already fully formed, so that they can flow to the market? No matter where they are, in the heads of our scientists and researchers, or in the work of our offshore partners, how can we capitalize on them as swiftly as possible. I’ll look for your ideas in the comments and will offer my own in future posts.
Space & Place – Using the physical to influence the psychological
November 2, 2009 by Andrew (Drew) · Leave a Comment
One of the great challenges in galvanizing a team to achieve new levels of creativity and innovation lies in the intersection between the tangible and the intangible. Missing from the thinking in the realm of innovation and product development is the way in which space not only influences, but directly informs, the quality and productivity of innovation and product development teams. So often the space in which people reside is an afterthought or, if it is considered at all, it reflects organizational hierarchies or norms of behavior defined by functional expertise. In many cases it fosters a silo-based mentality that destroys collaborative solution-seeking activities. Space and place directly prime us to be innovative, or not…
The smell of mystery…and successful innovation
One of the classic uses of space as a way to buoy innovation occurred at the aerospace and defense contractor Lockheed (now Lockheed Martin) with the formation of their Skunk Works®. It was the height of World War II and Lockheed had been asked to work on a new jet fighter. Given the project to develop Clarence L. “ Kelly” Johnson hand-picked engineers and manufacturing people and housed them in a windowless office with hand-me-down furniture in Burbank, California. Each new team member was cautioned that design and production of the new jet fighter was to be carried out in strict secrecy. No one was to discuss the project with anyone outside the four walls of the facility. The physical space essentially became a clubhouse of sorts (not the first time an innovation team would find that moniker applied.)
The Greeks get bent out of shape
Yet, the manipulation of space in order to evoke a mood, feeling or even inspire is nothing new. For as long as humans have altered the landscape with structures we have used that alteration to influence and change behavior. Sometimes this is conducted overtly. Sometimes and perhaps more commonly this is executed covertly. Take the Parthenon for instance. This Ancient Greek structure sitting above the city of Athens was the crowning architectural element of Grecian society at one point (perhaps even today). It inspired awe with its massive perfection. The only problem is that it wasn’t perfect – at least not in any straight-lined geometrical sense. The Parthenon’s architects and builders understood that if they did not employ entasis, a process for curving straight lines into convex in order to give them the appearance they are straight (yes, really), their crowning achievement would appear to be collapsing in on itself. Not such a stellar way to inspire the masses, right? They understood that if their audience was to see perfection the building must not be “perfect”.
The creatives run amok
Even when we attempt to directly address space as a fundamental support to innovation practices we can misstep. Chiat\Day (now TBWA\Chiat\Day) was at the vanguard of the advertising business in the 1990’s – they were the creators of such classic campaigns as, Apple’s “1984” and “Think Different” and the $30 million Reebok campaign, which centered on the rivalry between decathletes Dan O’Brien and Dave Johnson. The founder, Jay Chiat, wanted to unleash creativity in his Venice Beach office (strangely enough, also in California – apparently a hotbed of physical space-related innovation). Key to doing that was Project Chrysalis, a think tank designed to propel the agency away from its current restraints of time and space.
Chrysalis developed the blueprint for the industry’s first “virtual” office, a fully portable, organic workplace that broke with traditional concepts of office use and featured state-of-the-art communications technology. His vision for a virtual office was realized in 1994 as a “clubhouse” (see – back again!) designed by leading architect Frank Gehry to unleash creativity – agency staff were given only portable equipment, cellphones (aka. “bricks”), laptops and the edict to work wherever they wanted as the mood struck them. The intent being to “free” them from the confines of the physical space. Instead of reveling in their new-found un-tethered freedom the staff took to arriving early, commandeering space, and fighting pitched battles over the limited space available. With no personal space to anchor them, everything became a clamor to claim the personal and for some, way too hard. Needless to say the experiment was scrapped.
Today the TBWA\Chiat\Day facility takes a different approach. It is a miniature town with a mix of both “public” and “private spaces” with places to gather and bump-into each other. It even has a Central Park. The opportunity for the “water-cooler” conversation on a wider scale is writ-large across the organization. It is much more conducive to collaboration and creativity, because it is both unlike any office space you might experience, but so familiar in that it draws on very real archetypes. Main Street and the village square are both represented.
The cutting edge of physical systems
One of the most interesting developments in use of physical space to foster and promote specific behaviors and feelings is a marriage of the work of Maturana and Varela, two Chilean biologists, who coined the term “autopoeisis” in 1972, and the work of noted architect Christopher Alexander in the development of what he termed, a “pattern language” in a book he co-wrote with Sara Ishikawa and Murray Silverstein of the Center for Environmental Structure of Berkeley, California, with writing credits also to Max Jacobson, Ingrid Fiksdahl-King and Shlomo Angel for describing physical space requirements to meet specific needs. The marriage of these concepts is coming to fruition in the work of a graduate student at MIT by the name of Neri Oxman. She has created a body of work around the concept of materialecology:
“…an interdisciplinary research initiative that undertakes design research in the intersection between architecture, engineering, computation, and ecology. As such, this initiative is concerned with material organization and performance across all scales of design thought and practice. As such, it seeks to promote and define a design research agenda which is ecological in nature, in ideology and in material practice; it aims at embracing the evolving elements of change in both (and indeed related) social constructs and environmental descriptions of the ever changing built environment. materialecology undertakes research in advanced digital applications for architectural practice and pursuits – their contribution to a design paradigm promoting generative design processes.”
In this one area of practice, the implications of an holistic approach to the design and creation of space through a multi-disciplinary approach offers not only a framework for supporting innovation, but a frame of reference for what innovation could and should be in vibrant innovation cultures: open, immersive, divergent, exploratory, collaborative, generative, envelope-pushing, and synergistic.
Key questions anyone seeking to foster an innovation culture through the manipulation of physical space should ask themselves are:
Only after consideration of these questions then, and only then, should we step into the breach and begin our work.
Twitter: DrewCM
- Last few days in Australia before returning to the USA. Great trip.
- Greetings from Uluru / Ayers Rock! Where it is raining but the views and surroundings are spectacular. (And the internet access is spotty!)
- Better late than never: #innochat Transcript – 19 August – Innovation Backwards? With thanks to @CASUDI & @Renee_Hopkins http://ht.ly/2tOe3
- For those looking for #innochat transcript this weekend - it is coming - just a little slowly due to the time difference! (mine, that is)
- Thanks for #FF and RTs @innovatorsmix @MeghanMBiro @Jabaldaia @CreativeSage @FHInnovation @Renee_Hopkins @Gwen_Ishmael and #innochat gang