The concept of the Triple Bottom Line (TBL) pivots on the idea that the success of a business should be measured not only by the traditional financial bottom line but also by its impact on the broader social and environmental systems. In today’s rapidly evolving world, businesses face unprecedented scrutiny and new societal expectations. Stakeholders now demand that companies consider a broader array of metrics, leading to the consideration of the Triple Bottom Line: Profit, People, and Planet.
Understanding the Triple Bottom Line
John Elkington introduced the TBL framework in 1994, revolutionizing how organizations perceive their role in society. The TBL framework suggests that companies should commit to focusing equally on:
Profit: Traditional financial performance and value creation for shareholders.
People: Social responsibility, including fair labor practices, community engagement, and equitable growth.
Planet: Environmental sustainability, such as reducing carbon footprints, sustainable resource management, and mitigating climate change.
Case Study 1: Patagonia
Patagonia – A Commitment to Environmental Stewardship
Patagonia, an outdoor apparel company, is a stellar example of an organization successfully balancing the Triple Bottom Line. The company’s commitment to environmental sustainability is woven into its core mission. Patagonia donates 1% of its sales to environmental causes through their self-imposed Earth Tax. They also spearhead initiatives like the Worn Wear program, encouraging customers to repair, share, and recycle products rather than buying new ones.
Socially, Patagonia champions workers’ rights and strives for fair labor practices across its supply chain. Its Fair Trade certification program has benefited thousands of workers by ensuring fair wages and better working conditions.
Financially, Patagonia remains profitable and continues to expand while staying true to its mission of environmental and social responsibility. By embracing the TBL, Patagonia has cultivated a robust and loyal customer base that values the company’s transparency and ethical stance.
Case Study 2: Unilever
Unilever – Integrating Sustainability into Corporate Strategy
Unilever, a giant in the fast-moving consumer goods sector, has made significant strides in embedding sustainability into its corporate strategy. The company’s Sustainable Living Plan sets ambitious goals to improve health and well-being, reduce environmental impact, and enhance livelihoods.
On the environmental front, Unilever commits to halving the environmental footprint of its products across the value chain. Initiatives such as reducing greenhouse gases, using renewable energy, and promoting sustainable agriculture are key components of their strategy.
From a social perspective, Unilever focuses on enhancing livelihoods by supporting smallholder farmers and committing to fair labor practices. They have reached over a billion people with their health and hygiene programs, improving public health outcomes and education.
Financial performance remains strong, with Unilever showing that it is possible to grow the business while prioritizing sustainability. Investors increasingly look to companies like Unilever as they have proven that integrating the Triple Bottom Line can lead to long-term profitability and shareholder value.
Moving Forward
The Triple Bottom Line represents a paradigm shift in how businesses operate in the 21st century. Organizations that successfully integrate profit, people, and planet into their core strategies stand to benefit from enhanced reputation, reduced risk, and sustainable growth. To thrive in the future, businesses must embrace the principles of TBL, fostering innovation that addresses global challenges and creates value for all stakeholders.
As leaders and change-makers, we must continue to push the envelope, encouraging businesses of all sizes and industries to adopt and implement the Triple Bottom Line framework. The path forward is clear: balance profit with social and environmental responsibility to create a sustainable and equitable future for all.
SPECIAL BONUS: The very best change planners use a visual, collaborative approach to create their deliverables. A methodology and tools like those in Change Planning Toolkit™ can empower anyone to become great change planners themselves.
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In the rapidly changing world of business, innovation is the lifeblood of sustained success. Harnessing creativity, collaboration, and experimentation is crucial, yet these elements can only thrive in an environment where team members feel psychologically safe. Psychological safety is the belief that one will not be punished or humiliated for speaking up with ideas, questions, concerns, or mistakes. This article explores the vital role of psychological safety in fostering innovation and presents case studies to illustrate its impact in real-world scenarios.
Understanding Psychological Safety
Coined by Harvard Business School professor Amy Edmondson, psychological safety describes a workplace culture where individuals feel secure enough to take interpersonal risks. This concept is critical for innovation because it encourages openness, where employees can freely share ideas, experiment without fear of failure, and embrace creative problem-solving processes.
Benefits of Psychological Safety for Innovation
Encourages Idea Generation: Team members are more likely to propose innovative ideas if they are confident they won’t be ridiculed or dismissed.</ li>
Facilitates Learning from Mistakes: A psychologically safe environment allows teams to learn and grow from failures, turning setbacks into stepping stones for future success.
Enhances Collaboration: When employees feel safe, they are more likely to share knowledge, ask for help, and work together effectively.
Increases Employee Engagement: Psychological safety fosters a sense of belonging and motivation, leading to higher levels of engagement and productivity.
Case Studies
Case Study 1: Google’s Project Aristotle
Google embarked on a quest to understand what makes a team effective, which led to Project Aristotle in 2012. Through extensive research, they discovered that psychological safety was the most critical factor in high-performing teams.
Challenges Faced: Google identified that many of their teams struggled with collaboration due to fear of judgment or reproach.
Actions Taken: Google implemented practices to foster psychological safety. This included promoting open dialogue, encouraging risk-taking without penalization, and ensuring every team member’s voice was heard.
Results: Teams that embraced psychological safety showed significant improvements in innovation output, efficiency, and employee satisfaction. The project reinforced that fostering a safe environment for risk-taking and open communications was essential to driving innovation.
Case Study 2: W.L. Gore & Associates
W.L. Gore & Associates, the company behind Gore-Tex, is renowned for its unique organizational culture that emphasizes psychological safety.
Challenges Faced: As a company rooted in innovative product development, ensuring continuous creativity while managing market pressures posed significant challenges.
Actions Taken: W.L. Gore adopted a flat organizational structure and a philosophy called “lattices,” where associates have the freedom to speak up, propose ideas, and lead projects without hierarchical constraints.
Results: This approach led to groundbreaking products and technologies, such as the Gore-Tex fabric. By sustaining an environment where associates felt safe to experiment and potentially fail, Gore consistently maintained a pipeline of innovative products.
Conclusion
Innovation thrives where psychological safety is prioritized. Organizations that nurture an environment of trust and openness not only unlock their employees’ creative potential but also drive sustainable growth and success. Leaders must actively foster psychological safety to build dynamic, innovative teams ready to tackle the challenges of the future.
This article features a thorough examination of the role of psychological safety in innovation, with practical insights conveyed through notable case studies from Google and W.L. Gore & Associates, reinforcing the concept’s critical importance in real-world applications.
Bottom line: Futurology is not fortune telling. Futurists use a scientific approach to create their deliverables, but a methodology and tools like those in FutureHacking™ can empower anyone to engage in futurology themselves.
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Now that we have all been stuck inside for almost two years, many of us are suffering from an exacerbation of worthless meeting syndrome (WMS) , most recently remotely.
Of course, worthless meeting syndrome is a well-described chronic disease which has periodic exacerbations. It can be endemic or global with recovery and remissions. Here are the signs and symptoms.
One meeting expert notes that bad meetings are the bane of the corporate world — and yet despite what appears to be an overwhelming consensus that they’re often unnecessary and unproductive, many workplaces continue to struggle to avoid them. In this piece, the authors discuss the psychological pitfalls that lead us to schedule and attend too many meetings, and share strategies to help employees, managers, and organizations overcome those challenges. While there’s no way to completely eliminate the universal human biases that drive these tendencies, a greater awareness of the psychological factors at play can help us all work towards healthier communication norms, more-effective interactions, and cleaner calendars.
My recommended treatment is to refuse to attend any meetings:
Where there is no agenda
Where it is informational that could be communicated some other way
Where we discuss what we discussed last time without taking action
Where my input is required to inform a decision or take action on something
Where there is no psychological safety
Where a working group could have done the grunt work offline and reported their findings for approval or modification
On weekends or nights unless absolutely required due to mission critical time zone issues or deadlines
The meeting last longer than 45 min, if not 30
No one takes minutes and there are action items for next (if necessary) meeting
There are more than 7 people in the meeting
Lobby your congressional delegation to make them illegal As remote work becomes more widespread, the parliament of Portugal recently passed a law banning bosses from contacting employees after working hours by phone, message or email. Violations of the new law — designed to “respect the privacy of the worker,” including rest and family time — could result in fines. Employees there have also been given the right to opt out of remote work, and to be reimbursed for expenses incurred while working from home.
Note: Ivermectin has not been shown to be clinically effective.
If your boss insists that you attend and you are accused of not being a team player, then get a note from your doctor. They are available online at www.wms.com
For the meeting junkie who has everything, we are also offering a clock at our WMS store that not only measures the length of the meeting, but also the prorated amount of money you are paying for the people to attend the meeting, similar to the US National Debt clock.
Image credit: BringTIM.com
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In today’s rapidly changing business environment, fostering leadership at all levels of an organization is no longer a luxury but a necessity. Leadership isn’t just for those in the C-suite; it’s for everyone in the organization. By empowering employees across the organizational hierarchy to take initiative, innovate, and drive results, companies can adapt more swiftly to market changes, boost employee engagement, and achieve sustained success.
Why Leadership at All Levels Matters
The traditional top-down approach to leadership is becoming obsolete. It fails to leverage the full potential of an organization’s workforce. When leadership is distributed throughout the organization, employees are more likely to take ownership of their roles, collaborate effectively with colleagues, and contribute to the company’s objectives. This democratization of leadership enables organizations to cultivate a culture of continuous improvement and innovation.
Strategies to Cultivate Leadership throughout the Organization
Here are some strategies to foster leadership at all levels:
Provide Training and Development: Offer regular training programs to develop leadership skills, such as problem-solving, decision-making, and emotional intelligence.
Establish Clear Communication Channels: Create platforms where employees can share ideas and feedback openly, fostering a culture of transparency and trust.
Encourage Autonomous Decision-Making: Give employees the autonomy to make decisions within their scope of work, reinforcing their role as leaders.
Recognize and Reward Initiative: Acknowledge and reward employees who take initiative and exhibit leadership qualities, encouraging others to follow suit.
Mentorship and Coaching: Pair less experienced employees with seasoned mentors to guide their professional development.
Case Studies: Successful Implementation of Leadership at All Levels
Case Study 1: Zappos
Zappos, the online shoe and clothing retailer, is renowned for its unique company culture and commitment to customer service. Tony Hsieh, the former CEO, believed in empowering employees at all levels to act like leaders. The company’s culture is built on the principle of ‘Holacracy,’ a management structure where traditional hierarchies are replaced by a series of circles that hold various responsibilities.
Through this approach, employees are encouraged to take ownership of their roles, make decisions, and solve problems without excessive managerial oversight. This decentralized leadership model has led to high levels of employee engagement and customer satisfaction. Employees feel valued and empowered, leading to a more innovative and resilient organization.
Case Study 2: W.L. Gore & Associates
W.L. Gore & Associates, the company behind the famous GORE-TEX® brand, has a long-standing reputation for fostering a leadership culture across all levels. The company operates without traditional managers, instead favoring a lattice structure where employees are encouraged to take the lead on projects and initiatives.
Employees at Gore have the freedom to identify opportunities and take action without needing permission from a superior. This autonomy has led to a highly innovative environment, with numerous breakthrough products emerging from employee-led initiatives. The company’s success in creating a leadership culture is evident in its consistent ranking as one of the best places to work.
Conclusion
Fostering leadership at all levels of the organization is crucial for long-term success. By implementing strategies such as training and development, promoting open communication, and encouraging autonomous decision-making, companies can create an environment where employees thrive as leaders. As demonstrated by the case studies of Zappos and W.L. Gore & Associates, empowering employees to lead not only drives innovation but also enhances overall organizational performance.
In the end, the journey towards a democratized leadership culture is continuous and requires commitment from all stakeholders. The benefits, however, are immense—resulting in a more dynamic, adaptable, and resilient organization ready to face any challenges that the future may bring.
SPECIAL BONUS: The very best change planners use a visual, collaborative approach to create their deliverables. A methodology and tools like those in Change Planning Toolkit™ can empower anyone to become great change planners themselves.
Image credit: Unsplash
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Given that innovation is responsible for roughly 85% of economic growth, it’s without a doubt a pretty big deal for the success of both individual organizations, as well as for the society at large.
However, to achieve the level of impact that many are looking for from innovation, you can’t simply “create something new”, and then just hope the results will come. You will need to commit to systematically pursuing those results by scaling viable ideas into products or businesses that create value – at scale.
That is of course easier said than done. If you think it’s hard to come up with innovations, just try scaling one up. In this article, we’ll explore the topic in more detail and provide you with actionable tips on how to actually scale an innovation.
What does it mean to scale an innovation?
To explain what it means to scale an innovation, let’s first take a step back and look at the lifecycle of an innovation.
To begin, every innovation starts from a rough idea or concept. Often you may have a specific goal in mind, or a problem to be solved, but sometimes it can just be a cool idea that you think could really make an impact. From there, you first need to validate that the idea makes sense, and then build a product or a service that meets a real need in the market.
With these steps taken care of, the next part is to scale the innovation. At this point, we have all the pieces in place to create value, but we haven’t yet unlocked that value for the vast majority of the available market.
So, as you may see from the chart above, scaling is the part where most of the value creation and impact comes from. With that said, we can define scaling an innovation as the process of expanding the presence and the use of the innovation to be as widespread as possible to maximize that impact.
Scaling innovation is the process of expanding the presence and the use of the innovation to be as widespread as possible to maximize the impact the innovation can have.
While on paper that sounds straightforward enough, it’s extremely important to first clarify the vision of what successful scaling looks like for your innovation, and what metrics you will use to measure your success here. For some, it might just be revenue or profit, for others it could be the number of customers or users, the impact you’ve delivered, and so on.
Most of these metrics are of course related, but when you start with the end in mind and gradually work backwards from there, you are much more likely to succeed because everyone in the organization will know what it actually is that you’re aiming for.
With that goal in mind, you can start narrowing in on the methods required to get there, which is what we’ll be focusing on next.
Dimensions of scaling an innovation
Traditionally, scaling innovation is seen as a matter of advancing the adoption, or the diffusion, of innovation. This is best visualized with a chart depicting the adoption curve, which you’ll find below.
The idea is that to scale an innovation, you need to cross that chasm and go from a few early adopters to the mainstream market where the volumes are significantly higher.
While that is certainly true, we can dig a bit deeper to understand scaling in a more nuanced, and more practical, way.
In reality, there are three dimensions to scaling an innovation.
Let’s look at each of them a little closer.
Scaling Up
First, scaling up is about creating the preconditions for scaling effectively.
Before we start talking about scaling up, we’ll assume that the basic prerequisites for scaling are in place, namely that there’s a clear vision and a product-market fit for your innovation, and that the market potential is large enough for there to be something to scale to, even if the market isn’t there today.
Assuming those prerequisites are there, you need to ensure that:
you can produce enough of the innovation to scale
you can do that efficiently enough to be financially and operationally viable
For some products, such as software and other immaterial goods, that first part is pretty straightforward. For others, such as most complex manufactured goods, even the first one will be a real challenge.
Having said that, the second part of being efficient enough will prove to be a challenge for virtually every innovation. Even for a software product, acquiring, serving, and retaining customers profitably at scale is often more difficult than people realize. For other, fundamentally less scalable goods and services, this is often excruciating.
In addition to these two more practical aspects, there’s a third and more ambiguous component to scaling up, and that is the social and institutional adoption of the innovation.
How well you scale up affects how large of a scale you can ultimately reach.
For example, with an innovation as mundane as the modern umbrella, men who used it were initially ridiculed. So, before the umbrella could really take off as an innovation, societal norms needed to change. In other cases, there may be regulatory hurdles or other institutional considerations that might need to be addressed before an innovation can ultimately scale.
Regardless of the specifics, scaling up is necessary for every innovation that wants to reach significant scale.
However, what many people don’t pay enough attention to is that how well you scale up affects how large of a scale you can ultimately reach. If you can’t produce the goods at volume, and at low enough of a price while still being profitable at a unit economics level, there’s an obvious limit to your potential to scale.
Scaling Out
Scaling out is what most people think of when it comes to scaling an innovation. It’s the geographical or demographical expansion of the innovation to a larger audience.
In its simplest form, scaling out simply means getting a wider market share and audience for the innovation within an existing market. As we covered earlier, this typically means moving from those early adopter market segments towards the mainstream.
Scaling out is what most people think of when it comes to scaling innovation as it’s where you expand the innovation to a larger audience.
However, it doesn’t have to be limited to just that. Sometimes the same products or services can be sold and used in other geographical areas, or even in other industries or entirely different use cases, both of which unlock new markets and additional demand, and thus lead to a larger impact for the innovation. A well-known example of this is Tesla using their experience and innovations in electric car batteries to expand to stationary energy storage.
Regardless of which path you choose, often these efforts to scale out to new segments or industries do require additional work to adapt the innovation or its positioning to the differing characteristics of these new segments, markets, and audiences.
Scaling out to new market segments can increase complexity a lot, so be mindful of the operational implications of your strategic decisions here.
This naturally adds complexity, which makes the scaling up part we covered earlier more challenging. So, be mindful of how you scale out and what the operational implications of your strategic decisions here will be.
Scaling Deep
The third, and the least well-known method for scaling innovation is scaling deep. This essentially means that you unlock more impact for your innovation by expanding and maximizing the use of it, typically for the people who already have access to it.
This usually requires you to either change people’s behavior to increase usage, or alternatively come up with innovative means for improving the utilization rate by enabling more people to make use of the same assets. Scaling deep is partly a matter of culture and mindset, and partly a more practical matter of having the right components in place for enabling and encouraging active use of the innovation.
A classic, albeit somewhat controversial example of the first type would be social media algorithms. They are designed to provide users with engaging content to keep them entertained and thus stay in the service for longer, which leads to more revenue from the same number of users.
An example of the second type would be cloud computing. By adding network, virtualization, and software layers on top of the computing hardware, cloud providers can get more use out of the same hardware, which unlocks value for both the service provider and the customers.
This is how Amazon not just significantly reduced costs in one of their major cost centers, IT infrastructure, but actually turned that into Amazon Web Services (AWS), an additional growth business that now accounts for the majority of the profits for the entire organization.
Scaling deep is about unlocking more impact for your innovation by expanding and maximizing the use of it. This can help reduce the need to scale up or out, or alternatively maximize the impact from doing so.
Scaling Deep can reduce the need to scale up or out, or alternatively, maximize the impact from doing so. As such, it’s an excellent compliment for most innovations. However, it’s just that: a compliment. Your primary method of scaling should always be either to Scale Up or Scale Out depending on whether your bottleneck is more on the supply or demand side.
Even in the case of AWS, which has created entirely new vectors for scaling out and has dramatically subsidized their costs for scaling up, it obviously wouldn’t have been possible without Amazon already being at significant scale.
What’s the takeaway? These dimensions are distinct but very much intertwined.
If you can scale on all three of these dimensions in a coordinated way, you will not only be much more likely to achieve significant scale with your innovation in the first place, but also maximize the potential for scale and impact from those efforts. If you build momentum on one of the dimensions, some of that momentum will carry over to the other dimensions, which again helps you accelerate change going forward.
As such, pay attention to each of these dimensions and try to consider all of them in your plans to scale innovation. That doesn’t mean you should focus on all three from the get-go, on the contrary, but planning with the big picture in mind can allow you to make much more educated decisions.
Scaling innovation in practice
As we’ve established above, there unfortunately isn’t a one-size fits all solution to scaling innovation.
Achieving breakthrough success with an innovation, which is the goal of scaling innovation, always requires many related and adjacent (usually more incremental) innovations.
This is an extremely common pattern that you will see happening over and over again if you just start paying attention to it. Square co-founder Jim McKelvey has done a great job in describing that in more detail in his recent book called the Innovation Stack.
A well-known example is the lightbulb. Edison patented his famous design back in 1879, but most households didn’t yet have access to electricity, so it wasn’t something they could benefit from. It took countless other innovations and another 45 years before even half of US homes had one, even though the benefits were obvious.
In practice, scaling an innovation is simply an iterative and exploratory process where you focus on eliminating whatever bottleneck is preventing you from scaling, one by one. And, as we saw in the example of the lightbulb, sometimes these can be much bigger and more fundamental than you may think at first.
Often you can just copy solutions other people have already used for the same or a similar problem (which you should always go for if you can), but many times you will also need to innovate something completely new and occasionally even go beyond your core product.
With that said, there are some common patterns that can be helpful for structuring your thinking when faced with some of these bottlenecks. However, as each innovation is ultimately new, and thus unique, these won’t necessarily fit every case.
Having said that, we’ll share one framework for each dimension of scaling below. We’ve also created a toolkit that includes the frameworks as editable templates, along with some examples and other supporting material, which you can download here.
Demand side
For most organizations and innovations, the demand side is likely the source of most bottlenecks.
The way we see it, this is not just about drumming up interest and demand for your product, but also about making sure that it fits the needs and budgets of the buyers in your market. And of course, you need to make sure you’re in a market, or at least one that has the potential to become, large enough to accommodate your scaling efforts.
Unlike what people often think, product-market fit isn’t enough for a business to be scalable. You also need to have the right business and operating models, as well as use the right channels.
In other words, scaling out isn’t just about product-market fit, as people often mistakenly think. You also need to have the right business and operating models and use the right channels. Brian Balfour has written an excellent five-part series about this, which I highly recommend you read.
The basic idea is pretty simple: your business needs to align all of these aspects in a cohesive manner to be able to scale. If even one of them is wrong, growth will feel like, as Balfour puts it, “pushing a boulder uphill”. It will take way too much capital, effort, and time. However, get the four elements right together, and the growth will come naturally.
What’s important to understand here is that the model isn’t a static picture you just do once. If the market changes, or you run into challenges that force you to change one of these elements, you’ll need to review each element and make sure the big picture still works.
Supply side
For some products and businesses, especially those with physical products, the supply side often becomes a key consideration.
Here, the bottlenecks can be extremely varied, and dependences on external suppliers can lead to challenges that are hard to overcome.
In general, what top innovators do differently from the rest of the companies is that they almost always vertically integrate their value chain as they are working towards scaling up.
There are many benefits to this approach, such as reduced overhead, but the key differences are in increased quality, and most importantly, the company’s ability to control their own destiny and innovate more freely because they’re not being constrained by their supply chain.
Top innovators vertically integrate their value chain to address bottlenecks and turn cost centers into additional sources of growth and profit.
The classic example is Apple, and the way that they control both the hardware and software of their products. In recent years, they’ve been increasing that integration in both directions. They’re moving upstream to offer more services on top of their operating systems, as well as downstream by designing their own processors, which has provided them with a big performance advantage.
However, there are many others. Amazon, Microsoft, Tesla, Google, Netflix, Nvidia, and pretty much every innovative company is trying to do the same in the scope of their own business.
The basic idea is again simple: if a part of your supply chain becomes a major bottleneck, or is a major cost center, you should try to take control of those parts to address the bottlenecks and turn cost centers into additional sources of growth and profit, just like Amazon has done with AWS, but also warehousing and shipping.
That isn’t to say that vertical integration wouldn’t be challenging or have downsides. It certainly is and does. Because of these limitations, it’s generally advisable to only vertically integrate to the parts of your supply chain that either are a clear bottleneck or could become a key competitive advantage for you. However, top innovators often have little choice but to take these steps if they want to move fast enough and have enough control to be able to scale their innovation to its full potential.
Another key consideration on the supply side is simply the architecture of your products and services, and the process you have for delivering them. It’s obviously much easier to have a scalable architecture and automated processes for purely software or content focused businesses, but how you craft these does play a huge role for complex physical products too.
This is again a very extensive topic on its own, but the goal should be to try to make the manufacturing, delivery, and service of your products as seamless and scalable as possible. As with everything else we’ve discussed so far, this too is an iterative process.
However, to provide you with a slightly more practical framework to get started, here’s Elon Musk explaining how he’s learned to approach this topic after his early struggles of trying to do that with the extremely complex products at SpaceX and Tesla.
While Musk specifically talks about the process in the scope of engineering for scale, these same principles also apply to your organization and internal processes too.
And, as Musk explained in the video, it’s easy to get tempted by the promises of optimizing for efficiency and automation, but if you haven’t addressed the big picture first, these will often end up just being a big waste of time and money.
So, make sure to start by first eliminating those unnecessary requirements and parts or tasks, and try to simplify the design before you focus too much on optimizing for efficiency and automating.
Utilization
In addition to supply and demand, we still have the third dimension of utilization to cover. The idea with this “scaling deep” part is to find creative ways to make the most out of existing supply to either unlock new demand, maximize the utilization of those assets, or simply to increase your customer retention by finding ways to get more value for them from your products.
As you may have guessed by now, the specifics vary quite a lot on a case-by-case basis, but the flowchart below can hopefully serve as a starting point for your efforts in this area.
To summarize, there are three common paths you may take here.
The first is to find ways to increase the usage of assets that are only being used a fraction of the time through practices such as asset sharing and virtualization.
The second is to move from one-off purchases to a subscription to eliminate friction and increase the usage of the services.
The third is to find additional ways to expand the use of the product. This is usually done either by finding new value-adding uses for the same product, or simply by activating usage through means such as improved quality, usability, better communication etc.
However, sometimes it might even be necessary to work around tougher and more pervasive issues, such as regulatory considerations or even the changing of societal norms.
While increased utilization isn’t often that glamorous or exciting, it can really make a difference in making your business and operating models efficient enough to allow you to scale volume faster and more sustainably.
Conclusion
Scaling an innovation won’t be easy. It will always take years, and an endless amount of hard work with an extreme focus on solving each and every bottleneck standing in your way.
Hopefully you’ll find some of the frameworks and playbooks we’ve introduced in this article useful for shaping your thinking, and for building your organization and processes, but you’ll inevitably come across plenty of challenges where you’ll just need to figure out the solutions yourself. Still, if you want to truly succeed with innovation, that’s what you’re in for.
So, be prepared for those challenges, and be realistic with your expectations and timelines. For example, the “growth gap” can easily sneak up on your organization if top management has unrealistic expectations for the financial returns of innovation.
In general, large organizations have some disadvantages, but they also have huge advantages when it comes to scaling an innovation, so look for ways to leverage those advantages to your benefit.
And finally, make sure to surround yourself with top talent that’s prepared for the ride. Scaling innovation is teamwork, and it takes a special kind of a team to pull it off. You need people that are used to constant change, have a growth mindset, and the skills needed to solve whatever problems your domain may have.
As mentioned, scaling innovation is a journey that happens in small increments, and at times, it will feel frustrating. But if your team persists, keeps on learning and solving problems, you can eventually close in on whatever the full potential of your innovation is.
Image credits: Pexels, Viima
This article was originally published in Viima’s blog.
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In today’s fast-paced work environment, employee engagement plays a crucial role in driving productivity and job satisfaction. With the rapid advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) technology, organizations have a unique opportunity to leverage AI tools to enhance employee engagement and create a more productive and fulfilling workplace.
Case Study 1: Chatbots as Virtual Mentors
One innovative way organizations are using AI to improve employee engagement is through the use of virtual chatbots as mentors. These chatbots are programmed to provide guidance, support, and feedback to employees in real time, helping them navigate challenges and develop their skills.
For example, a large tech company implemented a virtual mentor chatbot for its customer service team. The chatbot was programmed to provide on-the-job training, answer questions, and offer personalized feedback based on the employee’s performance. As a result, employees felt more supported and engaged in their roles, leading to an increase in productivity and job satisfaction.
Case Study 2: AI-Driven Performance Management
Another way AI is transforming employee engagement is through AI-driven performance management systems. These systems use algorithms and data analytics to provide real-time insights into employee performance, leading to more personalized feedback and development opportunities.
A leading financial services firm implemented an AI-driven performance management system that analyzed employee data, such as productivity metrics and feedback, to identify areas for improvement and growth. The system then provided targeted feedback and recommendations to help employees enhance their skills and performance.
As a result, employees felt more engaged and empowered to take ownership of their development, leading to higher levels of job satisfaction and productivity across the organization.
Conclusion
AI has the potential to revolutionize employee engagement by providing personalized support, feedback, and development opportunities. By leveraging AI tools like virtual mentors and performance management systems, organizations can create a more engaging and fulfilling workplace that drives productivity and job satisfaction. It is essential for organizations to embrace AI as a tool to enhance employee engagement and create a more productive and successful work environment.
Bottom line: Futurology is not fortune telling. Futurists use a scientific approach to create their deliverables, but a methodology and tools like those in FutureHacking™ can empower anyone to engage in futurology themselves.
Image credit: Pixabay
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Using Game Elements to Boost Engagement and Creativity
GUEST POST from Chateau G Pato
In today’s fast-paced and competitive business environment, companies are constantly looking for innovative ways to engage and motivate their employees. One method that has gained popularity in recent years is gamification – the use of game elements and principles in non-game contexts to drive desired behaviors. By incorporating elements such as points, badges, leaderboards, and rewards into everyday tasks and processes, organizations can increase employee engagement, productivity, and creativity.
Case Study 1: Salesforce
One company that has successfully implemented gamification in the workplace is Salesforce. The global customer relationship management software company uses a gamified platform called “Trailhead” to train and motivate its employees. Trailhead allows employees to earn points, badges, and rewards for completing training modules and challenges, creating a sense of accomplishment and friendly competition among teams. As a result, employees are more invested in their learning and development, leading to increased productivity and retention.
Case Study 2: Microsoft
Another example of gamification in the workplace is Microsoft’s “The Ribbon Hero” game. Designed to help employees improve their skills in using Microsoft Office applications, the game challenges players to complete tasks and challenges within the programs, earning points and moving up levels as they progress. By making learning fun and interactive, Microsoft has seen a significant increase in employee engagement and proficiency with their software tools.
Conclusion
Incorporating gamification into the workplace can have numerous benefits for organizations, including increased employee engagement, motivation, and creativity. By tapping into employees’ natural desire for competition, recognition, and achievement, companies can create a more dynamic and fulfilling work environment. As technology continues to advance and the workforce becomes increasingly diverse and digital, gamification will play an essential role in driving innovation and success in the modern workplace.
SPECIAL BONUS: The very best change planners use a visual, collaborative approach to create their deliverables. A methodology and tools like those in Change Planning Toolkit™ can empower anyone to become great change planners themselves.
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In 1983, McKinsey consultant Julien Phillips published a paper in the journal, Human Resource Management, that described an ‘adoption penalty’ for firms that didn’t adapt to changes in the marketplace quickly enough. His ideas became McKinsey’s first change management model that it sold to clients.
But consider that research shows in 1975, during the period Phillips studied, 83% of the average US corporation’s assets were tangible assets, such as plant, machinery and buildings, while by 2015, 84% of corporate assets were intangible, such as licenses, patents and research. Clearly, that changes how we need to approach transformation.
When your assets are tangible, change is about making strategic decisions, such as building factories, buying new equipment and so on. Yet when your assets are intangible, change is connected to people—what they believe, how they think and how they act. That’s a very different matter and we need to reexamine how we approach transformation and change.
The Persuasion Model Of Change
Phillips’ point of reference for his paper on organizational change was a comparison of two companies, NCR and Burroughs, and how they adapted to changes in their industry between 1960 and 1975. Phillips was able to show that during that time, NCR paid a high price for its inability to adapt to change while it’s competitor, Burroughs prospered.
He then used that example to outline a general four-part model for change:
Creating a sense of concern
Developing a specific commitment to change
Pushing for major change
Reinforcing and consolidating the new course
Phillips’ work kicked off a number of similar approaches, the most famous of which is probably Kotter’s 8-step model. Yet despite the variations, the all follow a similar pattern. First you need to create a sense of urgency, then you devise a vision for change, communicate the need for it effectively and convince others to go along.
The fundamental assumption of these models, is that if people understand the change that you seek, they will happily go along. Yet my research indicates exactly the opposite. In fact, it turns out that people don’t like change and will often work actively to undermine it. Merely trying to be more persuasive is unlikely get you very far.
This is even more true when the target of the change is people themselves than when the change involves some sort of strategic asset. That’s probably why more recent research from McKinsey has found that only 26% of organizational transformations succeed.
Shifting From Hierarchies To Networks
Clearly, the types of assets that make up an enterprise aren’t the only thing that has changed over the past half-century. The structure of our organizations has also shifted considerably. The firms of Phillips’ and Kotter’s era were vlargely hierarchical. Strategic decisions were made at the top and carried out by others below.
Yet there is significant evidence that suggests that networks outperform hierarchies. For example, in Regional Advantage AnnaLee Saxenian explains that Boston-based technology firms, such as DEC and Data General, were vertically integrated and bound employees through non-compete contracts. Their Silicon Valley competitors such as Hewlett Packard and Sun Microsystems, on the other hand, embraced open technologies, built alliances and allowed their people to job hop.
The Boston-based companies, which dominated the microcomputer industry, were considered to be very well managed, highly efficient and innovative firms. However, when technology shifted away from microcomputers, their highly stable, vertical-integrated structure was completely cut off from the knowledge they would need to compete. The highly connected Silicon Valley firms, on the other hand, thrived.
Studies have found similar patterns in the German auto industry, among currency traders and even in Broadway plays. Wherever we see significant change today, it tends to happen side-to-side in networks rather than top-down in hierarchies.
Flipping The Model
When Barry Libenson first arrived at Experian as Global CIO in 2015, he knew that the job would be a challenge. As one of the world’s largest data companies, with leading positions in the credit, automotive and healthcare markets, the CIO’s role is especially crucial for driving the business. He was also new to the industry and needed to build a learning curve quickly.
So he devoted his first few months at the firm to looking around, talking to people and taking the measure of the place. “I especially wanted to see what our customers had on their roadmap for the next 12-24 months,” he told me and everywhere he went he heard the same thing. They wanted access to real-time data.
As an experienced CIO, Libenson knew a cloud computing architecture could solve that problem, but concerns that would need to be addressed. First, many insiders had concerns that moving from batched processed credit reports to real-time access would undermine Experian’s business model.. There were concerns about cybersecurity. The move would also necessitate a shift to agile product management, which would be controversial.
As CIO, Libenson had a lot of clout and could have, as traditional change management models suggest, created a “sense of urgency” among his fellow senior executives and then gotten a commitment to the change he sought. After the decision had been made, they then would have been able to design a communication campaign to persuade 16,000 employees that the change was a good one. The evidence suggests that effort would have failed.
Instead, he flipped the model and began working with a small team that was already enthusiastic about the move. He created an “API Center of Excellence” to help willing project managers to learn agile development and launch cloud-enabled products. After about a year, the program had gained significant traction and after three years the transformation to the cloud was complete.
Becoming The Change That You Want To See
The practice of change management got its start because businesses needed to adapt. The shift that Burroughs made to electronics was no small thing. Investments needed to be made in equipment, technology, training, marketing and so on. That required a multi-year commitment. Its competitor, NCR, was unable or unwilling to change and paid a dear price for it.
Yet change today looks much more like Experian’s shift to the cloud than it does Burroughs’ move into electronics. It’s hard, if not impossible, to persuade a product manager to make a shift if she’s convinced it will kill her business model, just it’s hard to get a project manager to adopt agile methodologies if she feels she’s been successful with more traditional methods. .
Libenson succeeded at Experian not because he was more persuasive, but because he had a better plan. Instead of trying to convince everyone at once, he focused his efforts on empowering those that were already enthusiastic. As their efforts became successful, others joined them and the program gathered steam. Those that couldn’t keep up got left behind.
The truth is that today we can’t transform organizations unless we transform the people in them and that’s why change management has got to change. It is no longer enough to simply communicate decisions made at the top. Rather, we need to put people at the center and empower them to succeed.
They might as well quit since managing innovation will take them in the wrong direction. Instead, they should be leading innovators. Here’s why:
1. Everyone seems to have a different definition of innovation. Be sure you are leading people who have the same understanding and objectives.
2. Managing innovation implies that the core competence of an innovative enterprise is their system or culture. While that is important, successful innovation comes from living, breathing humans who innovate or try to repeatedly despite big obstacles.
3. Managing is about optimizing the efficacy and efficiency or resources. Entrepreneurs or intrapreneurs, some of whom are innovators, pursue opportunity with limited resources with the goal of creating user defined value through the deployment of innovation.
4. Leaderpreneurs are different than managers and have a different role. They provide vision, direction and inspiration. Unfortunately, most “leaders” provide motivation, not inspiration. Here are the differences:
External vs. Internal: The first key difference is while motivation is typically accomplished through external factors, inspiration is an internal force. Wayne Dyer puts it this way: “If motivation is when you get hold of an idea and carry it through to its conclusion, inspiration is the reverse. An idea gets hold of you and carries you where you are intended to go.”
Duration and Effectiveness: Since inspiration is an internal force, it lasts longer and is more effective. Motivation, particularly when connected to a system of external rewards, is only effective as long as you are able to keep the system of rewards consistent. Inspiration has deeper roots; its influence sticks with you and propels you further than mere motivation can.
People’s Responses: People respond to inspirational leadership exponentially better than they do to compensation or coercion. People are always more eager to do something when it is an idea they feel connected to and invested in. While external forces can be a key motivator, people will react far better to a personal investment.
5. Managing is about preserving or building the status quo. Innovating is about making the status quo obsolete.
6. Managers rarely assume the roles of intrapreneurial sponsors. Leaderpreneurs have to to be successful.
7. Managers get in the way by controlling. Leaderpreneurs get out of the way by inspiring.
8. Leaderpreneurs create innovation management systems that can be scaled with the goal of making themselves obsolete as quickly as possible. Managers create systems to protect their jobs.
9. Leaderpreneurs organize chaos and serendipity. Managers strive to standardize.
10. Managers think short term costs. Innovation leaderpreneurs measure things as longer term investments.
Leaders jointly created a vision with their colleagues.Some have thought leadership to be about coming up with a grand strategy, and then enticing the troops to follow you up the hill. But our data showed leaders creating a vision collaboratively, not in a directive manner.
They build trust. We interviewed leaders who were in the top 1% of their organization on creativity. One quality stood out. These leaders trusted their people and in turn their colleagues had an enormous trust in them. One person noted, “To take a risk demands that you feel really safe.” “She always has our back,” said another.
Innovation champions were characterized by a willingness to constantly challenge the status quo.People described innovative leaders as fearless and doing what’s right versus what may be politically correct. Some highly effective leaders of innovation were characterized as being “inverse to the environment.”
Leaders who fostered innovation were noted for their deep expertise.Colleagues noted that it was this “T” quality that defined these leaders. These leaders had a wide range of intellectual curiosity on a horizontal axis, while at the same time were grounded deeply in their knowledge of the technology at the center of what their group did.
They set high goals. Leaders who created innovative teams were noted for setting the bar extremely high, and giving their colleagues the challenge and opportunity to achieve what they believed would be beyond their reach.
Innovative leaders gravitate toward speed. These leaders move at a quick pace. They believe things can be accomplished sooner, not later. They gravitate toward the quick prototype that is put together with duct tape and paper clips in one day over a more perfect result they could create in six months. The graph below shows 360 results for 57,113 leaders who were rated on their speed of execution and their ability to innovate. Note that leaders who move slowly are on average rated at the 12th percentile on their ability to innovate while those who are in the top 10 percent are at the 89th percentile.
They crave information. Innovative leaders keep the team on the same page by flooding them with relevant facts. They excel at asking good question and then being exceedingly good listeners. The combination of “catch and pitch” helps the team to excel at innovation.
They excel at teamwork. The next characteristic of the most innovative leaders was excelling at teamwork and collaboration. It was never about “me.” It was always about the team creating something of value.
They value diversity and inclusion. The most innovative leaders recognize that the creative process feeds on bringing people together who possess sharply differing views and experience. It is the blending of these elements that creates highly innovative solutions.
In general, successful innovators primarily focus on four areas: creating a vision, building an organization that can achieve that vision, leading and empowering their team to succeed in that, as well as ultimately adapting their approach based on what they’ve learned along the way.
One author noted that “the first step in creating meaningful, long-term, sustainable innovation in any organization is to recognize that cultures cause outcomes. And if this is true, bad cultures will cause bad outcomes. And if this is true, it further follows that bad leadership causes bad cultures, which in turn cause bad outcomes.”
Harvard Business School Professor Gary Pisano reminds us , though, that the innovation culture must balance easy to like behaviors with some that are less fun and designed to address the main dysfunctions of teams: an intolerance for incompetence, rigorous discipline, brutal candor, a high level of individual accountability and strong leadership.
Innovation is not a nebulous concept tucked some where in a strategic plan. Like any combat team, it has a face, a heart and a soul and needs to nurtured and led, not managed. In the end, it’s the people, stupid.
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The rapid pace of change in today’s business environment demands agility and a willingness to take risks. However, fostering a risk-taking mindset in an organization is easier said than done. It requires deliberate strategy, clear communication, and a supportive culture. Here, we’ll explore practical steps to encourage this mindset by examining two case studies from companies that have successfully navigated this transformation.
Case Study 1: 3M
Overview
3M, a global innovation company, is often cited as a model for fostering a risk-taking culture. Known for its wide range of products and significant number of patents, 3M has embedded risk-taking in its corporate DNA.
Actions Taken
15% Rule: 3M encourages its employees to spend 15% of their work time on ideas of their choosing. This policy gives employees the freedom to explore and experiment without the immediate pressure of delivering results.
Cross-Functional Teams: By forming cross-functional teams, 3M brings diverse perspectives together, promoting creative solutions and informed risk-taking.
Learning from Failure: 3M celebrates both successes and learnings from failures. They hold ‘failure parties’ to dissect what went wrong and how it can be avoided in the future, thereby destigmatizing failure.
Results
3M’s risk-taking culture has led to products like Post-it Notes and Scotch Tape, revolutionizing the stationery market. Their approach demonstrates that calculated risks, backed by support and learning, can lead to groundbreaking innovations.
Case Study 2: Google
Overview
Google, a pioneer in the tech industry, is another example of a company that thrives on a risk-taking ethos. Their rapid expansion into a variety of tech-related fields is a testament to their willingness to venture into the unknown.
Actions Taken
Psychological Safety: Google places high importance on creating environments where employees feel safe to take risks. Project Aristotle highlighted psychological safety as a key component of their high-performing teams.
Dedicated Innovation Labs: Google runs innovation labs like X (formerly Google X), which are dedicated to ‘moonshot’ projects with high risk and high reward.
Clear Metrics: For each experimental project, Google sets clear milestones and metrics, allowing for informed go/no-go decisions rather than arbitrary cuts based on gut feeling.
Results
Google’s approach to risk-taking has birthed revolutionary products like Google Search, Gmail, and self-driving car technology. By emphasizing psychological safety and creating dedicated spaces for risk, Google continues to lead in innovation.
Key Takeaways
From these case studies, we can extract several key practices that any organization can implement to foster a risk-taking mindset:
Encourage Time for Exploration: Allocate time for employees to work on passion projects and explore new ideas.
Promote Cross-Functional Collaboration: Bring together diverse teams to fuel innovative thinking.
Create a Safe Environment for Failure: Celebrate learnings from failures to reduce the stigma and fear associated with taking risks.
Set Clear Metrics and Milestones: Provide clarity on what success looks like to make informed decisions.
Support from Leadership: Ensure that leaders actively support and model risk-taking behavior.
By embedding these practices into the fabric of your organization, you can create a dynamic environment where innovation thrives, and calculated risks lead to transformative successes.
Bottom line: Futurology is not fortune telling. Futurists use a scientific approach to create their deliverables, but a methodology and tools like those in FutureHacking™ can empower anyone to engage in futurology themselves.
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