Exclusive Interview with Robyn Bolton

Innovation doesn’t happen without the right kind of leadership, it’s not all about the lightbulb moment or the idea that results. Innovation begins with an insight and it is effective leadership that helps pay off my definition of innovation:

“Innovation transforms the useful seeds of invention into widely adopted solutions valued above every existing alternative.” — Braden Kelley

It is no easy task to identify an insight worth investing in or to organize and lead a team to successfully pick the right idea out of a sea of possibilities, to develop it, to understand its potential advantages versus the alternatives it must displace, and to align the organization in the ways necessary to overcome any idea’s fatal flaw and shepherd it to successful launch and possibly even market development if the market for the solution does not already exist.

Innovation of course requires leadership, but do the same leadership principles apply to successfully leading innovation?

Today we will explore this question, along with many others surrounding culture, obstacles, process, strategy, and other aspects of innovation success with our special guest.

Unlocking Innovation for Leaders

I had the opportunity recently to interview Robyn Bolton, who works with senior executives at medium and large companies who are committed to using innovation to confidently and consistently drive revenue growth. She works with companies in various industries, including industrial goods, healthcare, consumer goods, and education under her consulting firm MileZero. She is also a professor at the Massachusetts College of Art & Design in the Master of Design Innovation program. Prior to founding MileZero, Robyn served as a Partner at Innosight, the innovation and growth strategy consulting firm co-founded by Harvard Professor Clayton Christensen, worked as a consultant and project leader for The Boston Consulting Group in both Boston and Copenhagen Denmark, and earned her MBA at Harvard Business School.

Below is the text of my interview with Robyn and a preview of the kinds of insights you’ll find in Unlocking Innovation: A Leader’s Guide for Turning Bold Ideas Into Tangible Results presented in a Q&A format:

1. Why do so many companies struggle to innovate?

Companies struggle because they think innovation is an idea problem. It’s not. It’s a leadership problem. What I mean by that is executives who excel at running the core business are often asked to innovate (create new things) while they operate (run the existing business). Naturally, these executives rely on the very instincts and behaviors that made them successful – making quick decisions based on data and experience, striving to rapidly eliminate risk, and repeatedly and consistently delivering results. The problem is that these behaviors doom innovation efforts. They demand detailed financial forecasts when no data exists, expect quick returns on long-term investments, and try to eliminate risk from an inherently uncertain process. Success requires leaders who recognize that innovation is the opposite of operations and are willing to do the opposite of what made them successful operators.

2. Why is it so hard for innovation labs to last more than a couple of years?

Innovation labs struggle because organizations treat them like startups but expect them to operate and produce results like the core business. Executives launch labs with promises of freedom and flexibility but quickly start demanding predictable results and quick returns. By the start of the second year, executives are anxious for tangible financial results, especially as economic pressures mount, core business results slip, or a new executive arrives questioning innovation investments. Without a plan to demonstrate measurable progress in Year 2, deliver tangible results in Year 3, and a leader willing to advocate for innovation and the organizational clout to stave off skeptics, labs are easy targets for cost-cutting.

3. What does it take to build a solid foundation for innovation?

A solid innovation foundation requires a holistic approach, what I call the ABCs: Architecture, Behavior, and Culture. Architecture includes the strategies, structures, and processes that guide how work gets done. Behavior – specifically leadership behavior – turns words into actions and demonstrates what the organization truly values and believes about innovation. Culture establishes, expands, and sustains an environment where creativity and experimentation can thrive. But behavior is the most critical element because without leaders modeling the right behaviors, the best architectures fail and cultures crumble.

4. What is it that makes innovation almost the opposite of operations?

Operations exist in what Rita McGrath describes as a high-knowledge, low-assumption environment where leaders can predict outcomes based on past experience. Innovation occurs in low-knowledge, high-assumption environments where no one knows what will work, and past experiences are more likely to be misleading than helpful. Operational excellence comes from eliminating variation and risk. Innovation requires embracing uncertainty and learning from failure. The mindsets and behaviors that make someone a great operator – decisiveness, risk elimination, decisions based on quantitative historical data – hinder innovation success.

5. What would your advice be to an innovation professional on how to prevent innovation zombie projects from emerging?

Zombies exist because managers are reluctant to kill projects because that may mean that they were wrong. Instead, they put the projects on pause or delay work until the next round of funding. The key to preventing zombie projects is recognizing and communicating that the decision to start wasn’t wrong. It was based on the information available at the time. New information is now available, resulting in a different understanding of the situation and, therefore, a different decision. This learning process becomes infinitely easier when you have a (relatively) objective and (completely) transparent decision-making tool outlining clear criteria for what makes an innovation attractive and worth pursuing – what I call an “innovation playground.” This framework defines what’s “in play” (attractive), “in bounds” (worth discussing), and “out of bounds” (not worth pursuing) across multiple dimensions like strategic fit, customer benefit, and required capabilities. Of course, this tool is only as useful as the people who use it, so leaders need the courage to make and stick to hard decisions about stopping projects that don’t meet the criteria.

6. Which is more important for innovation success? Leadership, strategy or culture?

Leadership behavior is the foundation for everything else. I’ve worked with companies that have brilliant strategies or are famous for their innovation cultures but are unable to get results from their innovation investments because their leaders don’t demonstrate the right behaviors – embracing uncertainty, making decisions with incomplete information, treating failure as learning. That’s why the “B” in the ABCs of Innovation (Behavior) comes first. Executives must recognize that their instincts and behaviors need to change before they can become successful innovation leaders.

7. Is there any such thing as a perfect innovation process? If not, what are the key components for any innovation process?

There is no perfect process. Innovation isn’t baking, where following a precise recipe guarantees success. However, there are essential components that every innovation process needs: diagnosing the real problem to solve, designing multiple potential solutions, developing and testing assumptions, de-risking through experimentation, and delivering value. The order of these steps matters, but everything else – the specific activities, tools, metrics, and timelines – can and should be adapted to your organization’s needs and culture.

8. What makes one innovation culture more successful than another?

Successful innovation cultures share three characteristics: First, they’re authentic to the organization rather than copied from another company. Second, they recognize that operators and innovators are equally important and valuable to the organization and work hard to strike the right balance between protecting innovation teams and connecting them to the core business. Third, and most importantly, they’re actively demonstrated through leadership behaviors, not just written on posters or mentioned in town halls.

9. Innovation labs/teams/groups often have a different culture from the rest of the organization. Is it possible to spread the culture out of the lab and infect the rest of the organization? How?

Yes, but it requires patience and intentionality. Start by sharing stories that make innovation relatable and relevant to everyone. If you can’t answer “What’s In It for Me” for each person in the organization, you can’t expect them to change their focus or behavior. When people express interest, invite them into your team’s traditions and events. Don’t force participation – remember that not everyone wants to or needs to be an innovator. Most importantly, teach and support those who are interested in innovation while celebrating the operators who keep the core business running. Culture spreads through pull, not push.

10. One of the most dangerous moments for any promising innovation project is the transfer of out of the lab and into an operational unit of the main organization to scale it. How can organizations do better at scaling up innovation experiments into equal members of the organization’s solution catalog?

The valley of death is real! The key to crossing it is to view it as a relay rather than just chucking something across the chasm. Historically, executives have been afraid of distracting core business teams with uncertain projects so they wait until launch to involve the people who will ultimately own the innovation. While this still occurs, I’m starting to see companies over-correct and bring operators into the process at the very start, including them in activities and decisions when the team is still operating in a highly ambiguous and uncertain space. Success requires meeting in the middle. When innovation teams know more than they don’t know, that’s when collaboration between innovation and operational teams starts. From that point through launch, innovators and operators should work hand-in-hand to understand and navigate uncertainty while adapting their plans, processes and metrics to ensure market success without losing the critical insights that sparked the innovation. Most importantly, Senior leaders must stay engaged, understanding and supporting the additional time and resources needed during the transition period.

11. Anything you wish I’d asked?

I wish you’d asked, “What does innovation leadership success really look like?” Because while revenue and survival rates are measures of success, I believe that the real measure is the lives you change. Given that only 0.002% of incubated ideas generate meaningful revenue, and 90% of innovation labs shut down within three years, there’s no guarantee that your work will become a wild, world-changing success. That doesn’t mean that you failed. For me and so many of the successful leaders with whom I’ve worked, success is also giving someone the courage to challenge the status quo because they see you doing it. It’s inspiring someone to take risks when you break the rules thoughtfully and responsibly. If you’ve helped even one person discover their potential as an innovator or creative problem-solver, you’ve succeeded.

Conclusion

Thank you for the great conversation Robyn!

I hope everyone has enjoyed this peek into the mind of the woman behind the insightful new title Unlocking Innovation: A Leader’s Guide for Turning Bold Ideas Into Tangible Results!

Image credits: MileZero (Robyn Bolton)

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