Category Archives: Innovation

China Plans to Trump Innovation from Outer Space

First, let me say that this is not a political article, but instead an article about a potential innovation crisis looming just over the horizon thanks to brinkmanship between China and the United States.

Second, let me say this article is not about killer satellites being launched into orbit by the Trump administration or the People’s Republic of China.

Instead this article is about the psychology of a country being backed into a corner, the measures China is likely to take to fight back when they can’t match the United States dollar for dollar in a tariff fight, the current state of the rare earth metals market and its impact on the future of innovation.

Now, some of you might be asking yourself – What the heck are rare earth metals?

Well, as the name might suggest they are metals that are not often found in dense quantities on earth. Some hypothesize that some of the best rare earth metal finds have an extraterrestrial origin. So, some might say that rare earth metals are literally alien, brought to our planet not by little green men (and women) but by blazing hot meteors smashing into the earth. Rare earth metals are so valuable to collectors and to high tech manufacturers that there are groups of modern day Indiana Jones clones out there racing around the world to be the first to claim the next meteor strike before someone else does (see article) and the Chinese government made a conscious choice to invest in trying to corner the market.

Why?

Because rare earth metals are CRUCIAL to all of the technology that empowers the innovation economy.

There was a 60 Minutes segment from three years ago that CBS recently refreshed and re-aired now that it is again timely given the United States vs. China trade war but they have since moved it to Paramount+. It provides a great introduction to rare earth metals and the role they play in the innovation economy, but this Financial Times video does a good job as well:

(updated 60 minutes video available has been moved to Paramount+)

About the only substantial change in the video is that China’s dominance has dropped from 90% of global production to 80% of global production.

Here is a chart showing the production of rare earths in 2018 in the world (data source):

Rare Earth Data

As the chart shows, China has about 40% of the world’s rare earth metals, but is responsible for 75% of the world’s production of rare earth metals. The military machine of the United States relies on rare earth metals to operate, along with green energy, high technology, electric cars, you name it – nearly every innovation direction we’re trying to go in – relies on rare earth metals.

China has cut off countries from rare earth metals before, most notably Japan, and now they are threatening to do it again to the United States (one article highlighting the threat not just to the United States, but to Europe as well). China is also threatening to begin blacklisting individual technology companies not sympathetic to its cause in the battle of egos and stare down between these two economic superpowers. You have to imagine this would include being cut off from rare earth metals.

So, is the innovation train, this pace of unrelenting technological advance and change, about to come a grinding halt?

I guess we’re all about to find out…

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The Impact of Open Innovation on Corporate Innovation

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The Impact of Open Innovation on Corporate Innovation

GUEST POST from Art Inteligencia

Open innovation is becoming increasingly popular among corporations as a way to improve their innovation capabilities. Open innovation is a process where companies collaborate with external partners to develop new products, services, and processes. This type of collaboration is beneficial for companies as it allows them to leverage the resources, knowledge, and expertise of their external partners.

The impact of open innovation on corporate innovation can be divided into three categories: cost reduction, increased efficiency, and increased innovation.

Cost Reduction: Open innovation can help companies reduce their costs associated with research and development. By utilizing the resources of external partners, companies can reduce the costs associated with research and development, such as personnel and materials. In addition, companies can benefit from the cost savings associated with external partners by receiving discounts on products and services.

Increased Efficiency: Open innovation can help improve the efficiency of corporate innovation by providing access to new technology and ideas. Companies can benefit from external partners’ knowledge and expertise to develop innovative products and services. This can help speed up the process of innovation and reduce the time and resources spent on research and development.

Increased Innovation: Open innovation can also lead to increased innovation for companies. By collaborating with external partners, companies can benefit from the knowledge and expertise of different people from different industries. This can help companies develop new products and services that they may not have been able to create on their own.

In conclusion, the impact of open innovation on corporate innovation is significant. Open innovation can help reduce costs, increase efficiency, and lead to increased innovation. Therefore, open innovation is an important tool for companies to improve their innovation capabilities and stay competitive in the market.

Image credit: Designed by vectorjuice / Freepik

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Leveraging Technology to Drive Innovation

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Leveraging Technology to Drive Innovation

GUEST POST from Art Inteligencia

Today, technology is more advanced and intertwined with our lives than ever before. From communication to healthcare and transportation, technology has become a necessary part of our lives. But, its importance doesn’t stop there. Technology can also be leveraged to drive innovation within businesses and organizations.

Innovation is the lifeblood of any successful organization. It’s the driving force behind new products, services, and processes. By leveraging the latest technology, companies can create new ideas and solutions to stay ahead of the competition.

One way to drive innovation is through data-driven decision-making. By collecting, analyzing, and interpreting data, businesses can gain a better understanding of their customers and the market. This data can be used to inform strategic decisions, create new products and services, and identify opportunities for growth.

Technology can also be used to increase efficiency and streamline processes. Automation tools can enable businesses to perform repetitive tasks faster, freeing up employees to focus on more important tasks. Artificial intelligence can be used to automate mundane tasks, such as customer service, freeing up resources to focus on more important tasks. Additionally, cloud computing can be used to store and share data securely and quickly, allowing teams to collaborate more effectively and quickly.

Organizations can also use technology to develop new products and services. With the right tools, businesses can quickly develop prototypes and test them in the market. This allows companies to get customer feedback early in the process, enabling them to make adjustments before officially launching the product.

Finally, businesses can leverage technology to improve customer engagement and loyalty. By using digital marketing tools, such as social media, businesses can reach their customers more effectively and build relationships with them. Additionally, businesses can use customer feedback platforms to collect and analyze customer feedback and use it to improve customer experience.

In conclusion, technology can be leveraged to drive innovation within businesses and organizations. By collecting and analyzing data, automating mundane tasks, developing new products and services, and improving customer engagement, businesses can stay ahead of the competition and create new products and services. Leveraging technology can be the difference between success and failure in today’s competitive market.

Image credit: Pexels

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Innovation at Scale: How to Make Change Stick

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Innovation at Scale: How to Make Change Stick

GUEST POST from Art Inteligencia

Innovation is the key to staying ahead in a competitive market, but making transformative change can be a challenge. Whether it’s a new product or process that needs to be implemented, or a shift in the way an organization does business, the impact of innovation must be felt throughout the organization in order to be successful. This is especially true when the change needs to be implemented at scale.

Organizations can focus on a few key strategies to ensure that adoption of innovation at scale is successful. First, ensure that the organization is well-prepared for the innovation. This includes having the right technology, infrastructure, and training in place to support the change. By investing in the proper resources upfront, the organization is more likely to be successful in implementing the change.

Second, create a culture of innovation. Encourage employees to think outside the box and take risks. This doesn’t mean that all ideas should be given a green light, but it’s important to ensure that employees feel comfortable bringing their ideas forward and that those ideas are given a fair chance to be explored.

Third, ensure that there is clear and effective communication about the innovation. Make sure that everyone in the organization is aware of what the innovation is and how it will affect them. Provide training and resources to support the change, and make sure to solicit feedback from employees to make sure the change is understood and accepted.

Finally, create systems and processes that make it easier to implement the change. This can include automating certain tasks, streamlining existing processes, and providing tools and resources to make the change easier to adopt.

Braden Kelley, author of Charting Change, offers five key findings to help organizations make change stick at scale:

1. Understand the Nature of Change – The first step to making change stick is to understand the nature of change itself. Kelley emphasizes the importance of recognizing that change is a process, not a single event. By recognizing the complexity of change, organizations can better plan for the process and make sure that new initiatives are implemented successfully.

2. Establish a Change Culture – Establishing a culture of change is essential for making change stick. Kelley recommends that organizations create an environment where change is seen as an opportunity rather than a threat, and where employees are encouraged to take risks and experiment.

3. Make Change Visible – To ensure that change takes hold, Kelley advises organizations to make the process of change visible. This could include creating a visual representation of the desired end-state, or using storytelling to communicate the importance of the change.

4. Embrace Adaptive Change – According to Kelley, organizations should be open to making changes along the way and learning from mistakes. By embracing adaptive change, organizations can adjust and adapt as they learn more about their customers, their industry, and the environment.

5. Celebrate Successes – Finally, Kelley suggests that organizations celebrate their successes. Celebrating successes helps to reinforce the desired behavior and can help to motivate employees to continue to innovate.

By following these five key findings and leveraging the tools in the Change Planning Toolkit from the Human-Centered Change methodology, organizations can make sure that their new initiatives are implemented successfully and that change sticks. By understanding the nature of change, establishing a change culture, making change visible, embracing adaptive change, and celebrating successes, organizations can make sure that their innovations are implemented at scale and that change sticks.

Bottom Line: Innovation at scale is a challenge, but it is possible. By taking the right steps to ensure the organization is well-prepared for the change, creating a culture of innovation, and providing clear and effective communication and systems, organizations can make sure that their initiatives for change stick.

Image credit: Pexels

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How to Integrate Design Thinking into Your Organization

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How to Integrate Design Thinking into Your Organization

GUEST POST from Art Inteligencia

Design thinking is a powerful and innovative approach to problem solving that has become essential in many industries. It is a process of creative problem solving that starts with understanding the user’s needs and then working with them to come up with creative solutions. Design thinking has been adopted by many organizations and can be used to develop innovative and user-friendly products, services, and experiences. The following article will explore how to integrate design thinking into your organization and the five benefits that it can bring.

Integrating design thinking into your organization is a great way to foster a culture of creativity and innovation. Here are some tips on how to do it:

1. Begin by introducing design thinking to your team

Start by introducing the concepts of design thinking and user-centered design to your team. Explain the basics of the approach and how it can be applied to different projects. Show them examples of successful applications and allow them to ask questions. This will give them a better understanding of the process and help them to see the value of incorporating design thinking into their work.

2. Create a space for experimentation and collaboration

Design thinking relies on collaboration and experimentation to come up with innovative solutions. Create a collaborative environment in your organization that encourages employees to explore different ideas and approaches. Make sure everyone has access to the necessary tools, such as design software or prototyping materials. Provide ample time for your team to explore and experiment with new ideas.

3. Foster a culture of innovation

Encourage your team to think outside the box and come up with creative solutions. Reward employees for coming up with innovative ideas and encourage them to take risks. Provide resources and support to help them find new ways to solve problems.

4. Revisit and revise

Design thinking is an iterative process. Revisit your designs and products on a regular basis and make changes as needed. Listen to feedback from users and incorporate their insights into your design process. This will help you create better products and services that meet user needs.

Five Benefits of Integrating Design Thinking into Your Organization

Integrating design thinking into your organization can help you create better products and services and improve your overall operations. By introducing the concept to your team, creating a space for experimentation and collaboration, fostering a culture of innovation, and revisiting and revising your designs regularly, you can start to reap the benefits of design thinking in your organization.

1. Improves Problem Solving: Design thinking is an effective way to solve complex problems and come up with innovative solutions. By looking at problems from a user’s perspective, you can identify the underlying issues and develop solutions that are tailored to the specific needs of the user. This approach helps organizations to create better products, services, and experiences that meet the needs of their customers and stakeholders.

2. Increases Collaboration: Design thinking encourages collaboration among employees, customers, and other stakeholders. Working together allows for a greater exchange of ideas and a better understanding of the user’s needs. This can lead to more creative and effective solutions.

3. Fosters Creative Thinking: Design thinking encourages creative thinking and out-of-the-box solutions. By looking at problems from different angles, it is easier to come up with creative solutions that are tailored to the user’s needs.

4. Enhances User Experience: Design thinking helps to ensure that products, services, and experiences are designed with the user in mind. By understanding the user’s needs and creating solutions that are tailored to the user, it is possible to create a more engaging and satisfying user experience.

5. Improves Efficiency: Design thinking can help to streamline processes and make them more efficient. By understanding the user’s needs and creating solutions that are tailored to the user, it is possible to make processes more efficient and reduce waste.

Integrating design thinking into your organization can bring many benefits, but it is important to ensure that it is implemented correctly. It is also important to ensure that employees are trained in the process and that it is used consistently throughout the organization. By doing this, you can ensure that you are able to reap the rewards of design thinking and create better products, services, and experiences for your users.

Image credit: Pexels

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Innovation, Change and Transformation in London – Part One

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Innovation, Change and Transformation in London - Part One

I’m off to London tomorrow for my London Business School class reunion. And, while I’m looking forward to reuniting with my LBS classmates, I’m also looking forward to connecting in person with some of the smartest innovation, change and transformation professionals, academics and entrepreneurs on the planet.

But I need your help…

I’m trying to organize a meetup of London innovation, change, and transformation professionals on Friday afternoon, 3 May 2019 in central London, but I’m still looking for someone to provide a space to facilitate this cross-pollination of ideas.

If you would like to host me and a dozen or so amazing innovation, change and transformation professionals, academics and entrepreneurs to empower some great conversations and information sharing, please contact me.

I will be returning to London in June/July, but more about that later. Stay tuned!

UPDATE: I was able to secure a room at the Oracle office in Central London near Moorgate for Friday afternoon from 1pm-4pm. Please contact me if you’re interested in attending as I’m finalizing the attendee list and I have a maximum capacity for 25 people. I’ll send final details by email once the attendee list is finalized.

UPDATE: We had a great turnout at this innovation, change and transformation meetup at the Oracle office in Central London. It was a great opportunity to meet some great Innovation Excellence contributors in person, to make a lot of great connections between people and to share information and inspiration. For those of you unable to make it, sorry, but you really missed out! Maybe next time…

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The Innovation Value of Cross-Pollination

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Internal Mobility as Retention Strategy

The Innovation Value of Cross-Pollination

GUEST POST from Chateau G Pato
LAST UPDATED: January 10, 2026 at 11:16AM

In the current landscape of the global economy, the most valuable currency isn’t capital — it’s human potential. We are witnessing a fundamental shift in the employer-employee social contract. For decades, the “career ladder” was the dominant metaphor for progress. You started at the bottom, climbed vertically within a single functional silo, and retired at the top. But in an era defined by rapid technological disruption and shifting human expectations, that ladder has become a liability. It is rigid, fragile, and increasingly disconnected from how innovation actually happens.

To survive and thrive today, organizations must replace the ladder with the Career Lattice. This human-centered approach to organizational design prioritizes internal mobility not just as an HR checkbox for retention, but as a primary engine for innovation. When we facilitate the movement of talent across traditional boundaries, we trigger a process I call “Organizational Cross-Pollination.”

The Retention Crisis is a Growth Crisis

Why do people leave? Exit interviews often cite compensation, but deeper inquiry reveals a more pervasive cause: stagnation. High-performing individuals are biologically and psychologically wired for growth. When an employee feels they have mastered their domain and sees no path to diversify their skills without leaving the company, they begin to look elsewhere. Retention is not about holding someone in place; it is about providing enough internal space for them to move.

Internal mobility acts as a pressure-release valve for talent. By allowing a software engineer to spend six months with the customer success team, or a marketing strategist to pivot into product development, the organization provides the “newness” and challenge that high-potential employees crave. This human-centric flexibility creates a culture where the organization is seen as a platform for a lifetime of different careers, rather than a single, static destination.

“Innovation is the byproduct of human curiosity meeting organizational opportunity. When we restrict mobility to protect functional silos, we stifle the very curiosity that sustains our competitive advantage. A truly innovative culture is one where the ‘Not Invented Here’ syndrome is cured by people who have actually been ‘There’.” — Braden Kelley

Unlocking the Innovation Value of Cross-Pollination

Beyond retention, the strategic value of internal mobility lies in the breaking of silos. Silos are where innovation goes to die. They create “echo chambers” where teams solve the same problems using the same tired methodologies. Cross-pollination — the movement of people, ideas, and “tacit knowledge” from one department to another — introduces the constructive friction necessary for breakthrough thinking.

An employee moving from Department A to Department B brings with them a unique set of lenses. They see inefficiencies that long-tenured members of the team have become blind to. They recognize patterns that exist across the organization and can connect dots that were previously invisible. This is the Innovation Premium of internal mobility.

Case Study 1: The Global Tech Giant’s Talent Marketplace

A major enterprise software provider faced a significant “brain drain” as mid-level managers sought roles at smaller, more agile startups. The leadership realized that while they had thousands of open roles, their internal hiring process was more bureaucratic than their external one. They implemented an AI-driven Internal Talent Marketplace.

This system allowed employees to see not just full-time roles, but “micro-projects” across the company. A data scientist in the Finance department could spend 10% of their time helping the Sustainability team model carbon footprints. The Result: The company saw a 25% increase in retention for participating employees. More importantly, the Sustainability team launched a new product feature based on a financial modeling technique the data scientist brought from their home department — a feature that became a primary market differentiator within one year.

Case Study 2: The Industrial Manufacturer’s Digital Bridge

A century-old manufacturing firm was struggling to integrate IoT (Internet of Things) sensors into its heavy machinery. Their software developers were brilliant at code but didn’t understand the physical stresses of a factory floor. Conversely, their mechanical engineers knew the machines but feared the digital shift.

The firm launched a “Cross-Pollination Fellowship,” moving mechanical engineers into the software UI/UX teams for 12 months. The Result: The software became significantly more intuitive for actual operators because the designers now possessed deep “domain empathy.” This internal move saved the company an estimated 18 months in development time and resulted in three new patents that combined physical mechanical insights with predictive software algorithms.

The Barrier: Overcoming Talent Hoarding

The biggest obstacle to internal mobility is not technology or lack of interest; it is talent hoarding. Middle managers are often incentivized solely on the output of their specific team. When a star performer wants to move to a different department, the manager views it as a loss rather than an organizational win. To fix this, we must change the incentive structure.

Leaders must be measured on their “Talent Export Rate.” We should celebrate managers who develop employees so effectively that they are recruited by other parts of the business. This requires a human-centered change in mindset: seeing the organization as a single ecosystem where the flow of talent is the lifeblood of the whole, not the property of the part.

A Call to Action for Innovation Leaders

If you are an innovation leader, your job is not just to manage ideas; it is to manage the environment where ideas are born. Internal mobility is the most underutilized tool in your kit. By championing a culture where people can move freely, you are building a resilient, adaptive, and deeply human organization. The next great idea for your company is already inside your building — it just might be sitting in the wrong department.

Frequently Asked Questions

How does internal mobility directly improve the ROI of an innovation program?

Internal mobility improves ROI by reducing “time-to-competency” and “acquisition costs.” When an internal employee moves to a new role, they already understand the organizational culture and network. Furthermore, the cross-pollination of their previous knowledge into a new area often leads to faster problem-solving and unique intellectual property that external hires would take months to develop.

What are “micro-projects” and how do they support retention?

Micro-projects are short-term, part-time assignments that allow employees to contribute to a different department without leaving their current role. They support retention by satisfying the employee’s need for variety and skill-building, effectively “scratching the itch” for change without the risk of a full-scale resignation or transfer.

How can a company start an internal mobility program with limited resources?

Start by mapping the skills your organization needs for its top three innovation goals. Then, identify employees in unrelated departments who possess those skills as hobbies or previous experience. Create a simple “Internal Shadowing” program where these employees spend 4 hours a week with the target team. This low-cost pilot demonstrates value and builds the cultural appetite for more formal mobility later.

Extra Extra: Because innovation is all about change, Braden Kelley’s human-centered change methodology and tools are the best way to plan and execute the changes necessary to support your innovation and transformation efforts — all while literally getting everyone all on the same page for change. Find out more about the methodology and tools, including the book Charting Change by following the link. Be sure and download the TEN FREE TOOLS while you’re here.

Image credits: Unsplash

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Are You Prepared to Run a Digital Business for the Digital Age?

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Are You Prepared to Run a Digital Business for the Digital Age?

In our digital age, all companies must change how they think, how they interact with customers, partners, and suppliers, and how their business works on the inside. Customer, partner, and supplier expectations have changed, and a gap is opening between what they expect from their interaction with companies and what those companies are currently able to deliver. Companies must immediately work to close this expectation gap, or their entire business is at risk.

If digital natives attack, they will do it with a collection of digital strategies that utilize the power of the digital mindset to more efficiently and effectively utilize the available people, tools, and technology, and to design better, more seamlessly interconnected, and automated processes that can operate with only occasional human intervention.

To defend your company’s very existence, you must start thinking like a technology company or go out of business. Part of that thinking is to fundamentally re-imagine how you structure and operate your business. You must look at your business and your industry in the same way that a digital native startup will if they seek to attack you and steal your market. To make this easier, ask yourself these five foundational questions:

If I were to build this business today, given everything that I know about the industry and its customers and the advances in people, process, technology and tools, how would I design it?

From the customers’ perspective, where does the value come from?

What structure and systems would deliver the maximum value with the minimum waste?

What are the barriers to adoption and the obstacles to delight for my product(s) and/or service(s) and how will my design help potential customers overcome them?

Where is the friction in my business that the latest usage methods of people, process, technology, and tools can help eliminate?

There are, of course, other questions you may want to ask, but these five should get you most of the way to where you need to go in your initial strategic planning sessions. What questions do you think are key for enterprises to ask themselves if they are to survive and thrive in the digital age?

Digital Strategy vs. Digital Transformation

How much appetite for digital change do you have?

Understanding how your management and your enterprise is likely to answer this question will help you identify whether your business should pursue a digital strategy or a digital transformation. The two terms are often misused, in part by being used interchangeably when they are in fact two very different things.

A digital strategy is a strategy focused on utilizing digital technologies to better serve one group of people (customers, employees, partners, suppliers, etc.) or to serve the needs of one business group (HR, finance, marketing, operations, etc.). The scope of a digital strategy can be quite narrow, such as using digital channels to market to consumers in a B2C company; or broader, such as re-imagining how marketing could be made more efficient using digital tools like CRM, marketing automation, social media monitoring, etc. and hopefully become more effective at the same time.

Meanwhile, digital transformation is an intensive process that begins by effectively building an entirely new organization from scratch, utilizing:

The latest best practices and emerging next practices in process (continuous improvement, business architecture, lean startup, business process management, or BPM, crowd computing, and continuous innovation using a tool like The Eight I’s of Infinite Innovation™)

The latest tools (robotics, sensors, etc.)

All the latest digital technologies (artificial intelligence, predictive analytics, BPM, etc.)

The optimal use of the other three to liberate the people who work for you to spend less time on bureaucratic work and more time creating the changes necessary to overcome barriers to adoption and obstacles to delight through better leadership methods, reward/recognition systems, physical spaces, collaboration, and knowledge management systems, etc.

It ends with a plan of how to transform from the old way of running the business to the new way.

The planning of the digital transformation is all done collaboratively on paper, whiteboards, and asynchronous electronic communication (definitely not email) powered by a collection of tools like the Change Planning Toolkit™.

The goal is to think like a digital native, to think like a startup, to approach the idea of designing a company by utilizing all the advances in people, process, technology, and tools to kill off the existing incarnation of your company. Because if you don’t re-invent your company now and set yourself up with a new set of capabilities that enable you to continuously reinvent yourself as a company, then a venture capitalist is going to see an opportunity, find the right team of digital natives, and give them the funding necessary to enter your market and reinvent your entire industry for you.

What do you want to re-invent?

Our team at Oracle was created to use design thinking, innovation and transformation tools and methods to help Oracle customers tackle their greatest business challenges, to re-imagine themselves for the digital age, and to discover and pursue their greatest innovation, transformation and growth opportunities.

We call this human-centric problem-solving and together we create plans to make our customers’ solution vision real in just weeks. And along the way, this new Oracle approach helps increase collaboration across business functions and accelerate future decision-making.

Find out more about how to protect your business from digital disruption, building upon these five foundational questions with additional questions and frameworks contained in my latest success guide Riding the Data Wave to Digital Disruption.

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Designing Work for Deep, Collaborative Focus

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Flow State for Teams

Designing Work for Deep, Collaborative Focus

GUEST POST from Chateau G Pato
LAST UPDATED: January 7, 2026 at 12:26PM

In our current world, the noise of the digital world has reached a deafening crescendo. We have more tools than ever to “connect,” yet we find ourselves more fragmented than at any point in history. As an innovation speaker and practitioner of Human-Centered Innovation™, I consistently remind leaders that innovation is change with impact. However, impact is impossible if your team’s most valuable resource – their collective attention – is being harvested by the Corporate Antibody of constant interruption.

We have long understood individual “Flow” — that psychological state of optimal experience where time disappears and creativity peaks. But in 2026, the real competitive advantage lies in Team Flow. This is the ability of a group to synchronize their cognitive efforts, moving as a single, high-performance organism toward a shared outcome. To achieve this, we must stop leaving focus to chance and start designing for it as a core architectural requirement of the organization.

“Collective flow is the highest form of human-centered efficiency. When a team synchronizes their focus, they don’t just work faster; they inhabit the future together, turning the ‘useful seeds of invention’ into reality before the status quo even realizes the soil has been disturbed.” — Braden Kelley

The Architecture of Deep Collaboration

Many organizations fall into the Efficiency Trap, assuming that because information flows quickly through instant messaging and real-time dashboards, innovation must be happening. In reality, this “hyper-connectivity” often acts as a barrier to deep work. Team Flow requires a deliberate balancing act between high-bandwidth collaboration and uninterrupted cognitive solitude.

Now, the most successful firms are moving away from “Always-On” cultures toward “Rhythmic Focus” models. This involves aligning team schedules so that everyone enters deep work states at the same time, followed by structured, high-energy “bursts” of collaboration. By synchronizing the Cognitive (Thinking), Affective (Feeling), and Conative (Doing) domains like we do in Outcome-Driven Change, we reduce the friction of “context switching” that kills momentum.

Case Study 1: The “Silent Co-Creation” at Atlassian 2026

The Challenge: Despite being a leader in remote collaboration, Atlassian found that their cross-functional teams were suffering from “Meeting Fatigue,” where 70% of the day was spent discussing work rather than doing it.

The Human-Centered Shift: They implemented “Flow Blocks” — four-hour windows twice a week where all notifications are silenced, and teams engage in what they call “Silent Co-Creation.” During these blocks, team members work on a shared digital canvas without verbal interruption, using agentic AI to summarize changes in real-time for later review.

The Result: Project velocity increased by 45%. More importantly, employee engagement scores surged as engineers and designers felt they were finally being given the “permission to focus.” They successfully bypassed the Corporate Antibody of the “quick check-in” and fostered a culture of deep, impactful change.

Case Study 2: Designing Physical Focus at The LEGO Group

The Challenge: As LEGO expanded its digital services division, the physical open-office environment became a source of friction, preventing the deep concentration required for complex algorithmic and design work.

The Human-Centered Shift: Following the principles of Outcome-Driven Change, they redesigned their innovation hubs into “Library Zones” and “Marketplaces.” The Library Zones are zero-interruption areas designed for Group Flow, utilizing localized noise-canceling technology and visual signals to indicate when a sub-team is in a “Flow State.”

The Result: By physicalizing the boundaries of focus, LEGO reduced unintended interruptions by 60%. This environmental nudge helped teams move from transactional tasks to transformational innovation, ensuring that their useful seeds of invention had the quiet space necessary to take root.

Leading Companies and Startups to Watch in 2026

The infrastructure for Team Flow is being built by a new wave of visionary companies. Flow Club and Focusmate have evolved from individual tools into enterprise-grade “Deep Work Orchestrators,” using AI to match team members’ biological rhythms for peak focus. Humu, now more integrated than ever, uses behavioral science to “nudge” managers to protect their team’s flow windows. Keep a close eye on Reclaim.ai and Clockwise, which are shifting from simple calendar management to “Cognitive Load Balancing,” ensuring that no team is scheduled into a state of burnout. These organizations recognize that in the 2026 economy, attention is the ultimate currency.

Conclusion: Protecting the Human Heart of Focus

Ultimately, designing for Team Flow is an act of empathy. It is an acknowledgment that your people are not processors to be maximized, but creators to be protected. When we move beyond the Efficiency Trap and embrace Human-Centered Innovation™, we create environments where brilliance is not the exception, but the baseline.

We can and should be dedicated to helping our teams build a future where focus is the foundation of every breakthrough. We don’t just change for the sake of change; we change to create a world that works for humans.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. How do you prevent Team Flow from becoming “groupthink”?

Team Flow is about the process of concentration, not the homogenization of ideas. By ensuring high levels of psychological safety and diverse perspectives before entering the flow state, the period of deep focus actually amplifies the unique contributions of each member rather than suppressing them.

2. Can Team Flow work in a fully remote or hybrid environment?

Yes, but it requires digital discipline. Remote teams must use “digital boundaries” — dedicated focus channels, synchronized Do Not Disturb modes, and “Office Hours” for interruptions. The technology must serve the focus, not the other way around.

3. What is the biggest barrier to achieving Group Flow?

The Corporate Antibody. This is the organizational reflex to prioritize immediate visibility and “busy-ness” over long-term impact. Leaders must be willing to sacrifice the illusion of constant accessibility to gain the reality of profound innovation.

Image credits: Google Gemini

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Human-Centered Innovation for Health Monitoring

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Wearable Tech and Wellness

Human-Centered Innovation for Health Monitoring

GUEST POST from Chateau G Pato
LAST UPDATED: January 6, 2026 at 12:36PM

Welcome to the future. We have reached a point of saturation where wearable technology is no longer a novelty; it is an extension of our biological selves. Most of us are adorned with rings, watches, patches, or smart textiles that continuously stream biometric data to the cloud. We have successfully turned the human body into an emitter of massive amounts of data. But we must pause and ask the difficult question: Has this deluge of data actually resulted in a healthier, happier populace?

The answer is complicated. We have fallen into a classic Efficiency Trap in the wellness sector. We have become incredibly efficient at capturing heart rate variability, blood oxygen levels, and sleep staging, but we have often failed at the human-centered aspect of interpreting what that data means for daily life. True innovation in this space is no longer about better sensors or longer battery life; innovation is change with impact. In health monitoring, impact means shifting behavior and reducing anxiety, not just generating a prettier dashboard.

If we want wearable technology to fulfill its promise, we must pivot from treating humans as machines to be optimized, and instead treat them as complex biological and emotional beings who need context, agency, and empathy.

“The greatest failure of early wearable technology was the assumption that data equals insight. It does not. To innovate in wellness, we must stop bombarding people with metrics that induce anxiety and start providing context that induces agency. The goal isn’t a quantified self; it’s an understood self.” — Braden Kelley

Moving Beyond the “Nagging” Interface

For years, the dominant paradigm of wearable tech was the “nudge,” which often felt more like a nag. Devices buzzed to tell us we hadn’t moved enough, slept enough, or breathed deeply enough. This approach ignores the psychological reality of change management. When technology acts as a stern taskmaster, the human “antibody” response kicks in — we ignore the notifications, or worse, abandon the device entirely because it makes us feel inadequate.

Human-centered innovation requires designing systems that understand why we aren’t moving. Are we stressed? Ill? Overworked? A sensor can detect a lack of steps, but it requires human-centered AI to discern the context and offer a compassionate, actionable suggestion rather than a generic demand to “stand up.”

Case Studies in Human-Centered Adaptation

The market winners in 2026 are those who recognized that raw data, without human context, is a liability. Here are two examples of organizations that shifted the paradigm.

Case Study 1: The Paradigm Shift from “Activity” to “Recovery” (Whoop & Oura)

In the early 2020s, a significant shift occurred in the athletic and wellness communities, led by companies like Whoop and Oura. The previous generation of wearables gloried in the “hustle” — 10,000 steps, closing rings, pushing harder. This often led to burnout and injury.

These innovators realized that the missing piece of the human performance puzzle wasn’t exertion; it was rest. They reframed health monitoring around “Recovery” and “Readiness” scores. By using data (HRV, resting heart rate, sleep temperature) to tell a user, “Your body needs rest today, do not push hard,” they provided permission for self-care. This was a profound psychological shift. It changed the user relationship from serving the device’s demands for activity to the device serving the user’s need for balance. It was change with impact because it fundamentally altered behavior toward sustainable health rather than short-term metrics.

Case Study 2: Ignoring the “Default Male” and Innovating for Inclusivity (Oura & Natural Cycles)

For decades, medical research and subsequently, health tech, treated the male physiology as the default, often ignoring the complex biological rhythms of half the population. This is the antithesis of human-centered design.

A major breakthrough in human-centered wellness came when wearable companies began seriously integrating menstrual cycle tracking into their core biometric analysis. Oura, for example, utilized its precise temperature sensors to partner with Natural Cycles, allowing for FDA-cleared birth control capabilities via a wearable ring. Furthermore, they began contextualizing other metrics — why sleep quality might dip or respiratory rate might rise — based on hormonal phases. By acknowledging and designing for these distinct biological realities, they didn’t just add a feature; they validated the lived experiences of millions of women, creating deep product loyalty and genuine wellness outcomes that generic algorithms never could.

The Future: Agentic Health and Invisible Tech

Looking ahead, the next frontier of human-centered wellness tech will focus on invisibility and agency. We are moving toward “agentic AI” in health — systems that don’t just report data but can, with our permission, take micro-actions on our behalf. Imagine your wearable detecting rising stress levels and automatically adjusting your smart home lighting to a calming hue, or rescheduling a low-priority meeting on your calendar to create breathing room.

However, the success of these future systems rests entirely on trust. To overcome the natural resistance to having tech intervene in our lives, these systems must prove they are acting in our best interests, prioritizing our well-being over engagement metrics. The technology must fade into the background so that life can come to the foreground.

Frequently Asked Questions on Wearable Wellness

Isn’t having constant health data making people more anxious rather than healthier?

It certainly can if the data is presented without context. This is what I call the “Efficiency Trap” of data collection. Human-centered innovation means moving away from raw numbers that induce anxiety (orthosomnia) and toward synthesized insights that give users a sense of control and agency over their outcomes.

How do we ensure privacy as wearables collect increasingly intimate biological data?

Privacy is the foundational trust requirement for future adoption. We must move beyond simple consent forms toward “sovereign data” models, where the individual owns their biometric data absolutely and grants temporary, revocable access to service providers, rather than the device manufacturer owning the data by default.

What is the biggest mistake companies make when designing wellness wearables?

They forget that health is a behavior change problem, not a technology problem. They build excellent sensors but terrible change management tools. They rely on nagging and generic goals instead of empathy, personalization, and an understanding of the psychological barriers to adopting healthier habits.

Image credits: Google Gemini

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