Lack of Top Talent Linked to Failure to Innovate

Friday, March 30, 2012

If there was ever a time when innovation was and is crucial to the success of organizations, it is during the worst economic times in the last half century. Certainly the times they are improving without question. However, Europe is continuing to struggle with debit, Asia’s economies are beginning to soften, and the US is still facing what may be considered long-term structural unemployment. What are needed are governmental and business leaders who are capable of innovative thought and vision. In other words, organizations must focus on acquiring new talent and they must retain the top talent they have or they will not be able to innovate to success.

Like so many other traits, is innovation learned or is it somehow engrained into leaders and top performers. Can innovation be spread across the cloud in some distributive process or is the purview of some vaulted few? What is innovation and will organizations know it when they see it? Are top performers universally innovative? Can everyone, anyone be innovative? From where does innovation come?

According to Steve Tobak writing for CBS Money Watch, innovation is about seeing things differently than how others might see them. He cites a number of household names as examples of innovation in how technology and services are delivered. So if one man sees a pile of trash, another would see recyclable resources. If one organization sees production waste, their competitor may see a new product. Take the smart phone, it was not always smart, but somewhere along the product development line someone decided that a phone had to be more than a phone. Someone saw something that was not just a phone but a browser, game console, recorder, camera, personal assistant, … etc.

A web search brings phrases up such as “seeing” things differently, “listening”, and “connecting” to create innovation. Creativity and innovation are linked in a dance where neither one leads nor follows. Innovation is married to change, while change may not bring innovation, innovation certainly brings about change. Innovation is both tied to the current state of the environment as well as standing on the shoulders others. Over 150 years of communications technology development began with the electric telegraph and Morse code in 1840. By the way, Morse code is a binary system of “dots” and “dashes” which dates back to 1828 and Harrison Dyar. That same binary system in the form of “0s” and “1s” is the backbone of today’s communications and computing technology.

Apple, Nokia, and Research in Motion did not invent the smart phone, but they did take fundamental communications and computing technology and “innovate” how it was used by the consumer.

Amazon was not the first price discounter, however it successfully innovated how consumers search for and purchase books and other products. Mark Zuckerberg did not invite social networking, he made it feasible, user friendly, and economically viable. Henry Ford did not build the first practical automobile, however he innovated how it was built and marketed.

Jim Stikeleather, Dell’s Chief Innovation Officer speaks to three points of innovation:

1. “Rapid Prototyping”
2. “See the total picture”
3. See “great ideas … no one has recognized”

Stikeleather concludes that “social media and crowdsourcing” are tools of innovation.