Tag Archives: collaboration

Innovation Teams Do Not Innovate

Guest Post from Janet Sernack

In our first blog in this series of three blogs, we reinforced and validated the importance and role of collaboration. We then described the range of emerging new, inspirational, and adaptive models that lean into complexity and catalyze and embed sustainable innovative workplace culture change. Where some organizations, like Alibaba, Disney, Google, Salesforce, and GE, developed their future fitness by courageously investing in catalyzing, igniting, and leading change through innovation teams.

Innovation teams are teams that don’t innovate!

Conventional team collaboration performance and development approaches are still relevant and foundational to long-term organizational success. And, a new range of organizational needs are emerging in our fast-changing and disruptive world, that complement conventional team development processes including the importance of:

Providing a unified and holistic and systemic “collective mind” focussed on adding value to customers,
Being agile, focused, and in charge to make faster decisions,
Sharing resources and insights to reduce costs,
Working interdependencies to improve efficiencies and productivity,
Shifting focus from being competitive towards co-creating ecosystems to solve bigger, more complex problems, to lead, embed, and sustain value-adding change in a disruptive world.

According to the authors of Eat, Sleep Innovate, an innovation team is formed to develop “something different that creates value” and do this best in a culture where such behaviors come naturally.

These behaviors include:

Curiosity
Customer obsession
Adeptness to ambiguity
Collaboration
Empowerment
Accountability

Purpose of innovation teams

The purpose of an innovation team is to create an environment that unlocks an organization’s collective intelligence (capacity, competence, and confidence) and builds the capability to change as fast as change itself.

Usually, through providing mentorship, coaching, and learning process in ways that align, engage, enable, equip and leverage peoples’ collective intelligence to:

Adapt to higher levels of ambiguity and uncertainty,
Challenge the status quo and help break a conventional business as usual habits, leadership styles, and comfortable ways of working,
Provoke future “fast forward” (horizon three) thinking,
Support the implementation of digital and organizational transformational efforts,
Collectively and collaboratively drive innovation across organizations pragmatically and make it a reality,
Leverage synergies across ecosystems to solve complex problems and deliver increased value to customers.

Ultimately, to provoke and evoke future “fast forward” creative discoveries and experiment with new platforms and possible future business models to help guide future renewal and reinventions.

Delivering these, as smart and multi-disciplinary teams in ways that are timely, agile, and disciplined that potentially support and bring significant value to customers, the market, and to the organization.

Unconventional stretch collaboration requires connection, cognitive dissonance, and conflict

Experimenting with, iterating, and adapting new collaborative models, enables organizations and their leaders, to shift their focus – from being defensively competitive towards being creatively constructive.

Where the goal is to create a high performing, connected, and networked workplace culture where people:

Have the time and space to deeply connect, collaborate, and co-create value,
Maximize differences and diversity of thought,
Generate the urgency and creative energy to innovate,
Feel safe and have permission to freely share ideas, wisdom, knowledge, information, resources, and perspectives.

Innovation teams create discord and generate conflict

At ImagineNation™ we have found that the best way for innovation teams to perform is through building safety and trust, whilst simultaneously being safely provocative and evocative in creating discord and conflict to disrupt peoples conventional thought processes, behaviors, and habits.

To engage people in maximizing differences and diversity to generate creative ideas, and experiment with inventive prototypes, that ultimately solve big and complex problems and deliver commercially astute, innovative solutions.

By connecting, networking, and focussing on co-creation and emphasizing collaboration, inclusion, and mutual accountability, and not on being competitive.

Dealing with the organizational blockers – Innovation teams

At ImagineNation™ our experience has enabled us to understand and reduce the range of key common blockers to transformational and innovation-led change initiatives.

Where we support clients identify, and resolve and remove them by enabling and equipping innovation teams to:

Develop agile and innovation mindsets: building capability in safely exposing and disrupting rigid mindsets through customized mindset shifting, behavioral-based, skills development programs.
Understand the impact of the organization’s collective mindset: supporting teams to develop an empathic understanding of one another, then shifting how they feel and think to act differently, and cultivate the discomfort resilience when facing the challenges and failures in the innovation rollercoaster ride.
Enable leadership development: through educating, mentoring, and coaching leaders to grow their adaptive, collaborative, engaging, and innovative team leadership and membership capabilities.
Foster the development of an adaptive and innovative culture: by applying the cultural assessment and diagnostic processes that result in pragmatic culture change initiatives.
Ensure strategic alignment: sensing, perceiving, and developing a mutual focus, common language and understanding, and a collaborative networked way of working, that bridges the gap between the current and desired states.

Setting up an innovation team – the critical success factors

At ImagineNation™ we have also helped our clients identify, and embed the critical success factors, that enable innovation teams to drive and embed innovation-led change and transformational initiatives by ensuring:

Alignment to the mission, vision, purpose, values.
Strategic allocation of resources.
Leadership team sponsorship and mentorship.
Investment in team members and leader’s capability development.
Thinking big and focussing on clarifying and delivering future “fast forward” far-reaching solutions to highly impactful challenges.
Organization engagement and enrolment in implementing changes and creating, inventing, and delivering innovative solutions.
Lines of sight to stakeholders, eco-system players, and customers, taking an empathic value-adding perspective at all times.

Innovation teams – an unfreezing opportunity to co-create future-fit organizations

Embracing this type of collaborative approach creates an unprecedented opportunity for organizations, who have been upended as a result of the Covid-19 crisis, to develop a sense of urgency toward unfreezing and eliminating their corporate antibodies.

Empathizing with the range of challenges leaders are facing right now, where many are slowly waking up to a post-covid world, where there is an unprecedented and urgent opportunity to co-create a “new normal” that is well-designed to lift any of the emotional barriers to teamwork, locked-down relationships and online fatigue.

Opening the door to a new kind of co-creative, collaborative and cohesive team spirit that allows and encourages people to re-imagine, re-learn, reinvent and co-create new, fresh future fit, adaptive and innovative, people and customer-centric systems, structures, business models, and ecosystems.

All of which are mandatory for delivering future “fast forward” strategies for applying the collaborative and collective intelligence required for increasing value in innovative ways that people and customers appreciate and cherish, in ways we have not previously imagined, that connect with and contribute to, the good of the whole.

Find out about our learning products and tools, including The Coach for Innovators Certified Program, a collaborative, intimate, and deep personalized innovation coaching and learning program, supported by a global group of peers over 8-weeks, starting Tuesday, October 19, 2021.

It is a blended and transformational change and learning program that will give you a deep understanding of the language, principles, and applications of a human-centred approach and emergent structure (Theory U) to innovation, within your unique context. Find out more

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Catalysing Change Through Innovation Teams

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Catalysing Change Through Innovation Teams

Guest Post from Janet Sernack

What makes Israel so innovative? And what has this got to do with teaming? One of the key discoveries, we made, almost ten years ago, when we relocated to Israel, was the power of its innovation eco-system – the result of a collaboration between the state, venture capital firms, successful entrepreneurs, educational system, business system, incubators, and accelerators. Reinforcing and validating the importance and role of collaboration, where a range of new, inspirational, and adaptive models that lean into complexity and catalyze and embed innovative workplace culture changes, have emerged. Where some organizations have strategically and systemically, courageously invested in applying these new models internally, in catalyzing change through innovation teams.

Transform creative discoveries

Innovation teams transform creative discoveries and ideas into new platforms and business models in timely, agile, and disciplined ways that bring significant value to the market and organization. Who, according to Nick Udall, CEO and co-founder of nowhere, effectively deliver the desired step-changes, breakthrough innovations, and organizational transformation, in ways that “move beyond what we know and step into the unknown, where the relationship between cause and effect is more ambiguous, hidden, subtle and multi-dimensional.”

New collaborative models

The range of new collaborative models, include teams and teaming, tribes, collectives, and eco-systems, are all designed to help organizations innovate in turbulent times.

Where they empower and enable everyone to be involved in innovating, and in responding to the diverse assortment of complex challenges emerging from the Covid-19 crises. They also empower and enable people to co-sense and co-create inventive solutions to the range of “complex” challenges, in ways that potentially engineer 21st-century adaptability, growth, success, and sustainability, in countries, communities, and organizations.

Capacity to change

Groups, teams, and teaming are now the “DNA of cultures of innovation”, who fuel organizations, with an “evolutionary advantage – the capacity to change as fast as change itself.” As we transition from our pre-Covid-19 conventional business-as-usual “normals”, organizations have the opportunity to adapt to the high levels of ambiguity by leveraging their peoples’ collective genius.

Utilizing innovation teams to multiply their value and co-create innovation cultures that catalyze growth, in the post-Covid-19 world through:

Emerging and exploring possibilities
Discovering creative opportunities
Making strategic decisions
Incubating and accelerating new ideas.

Realm of the creative team

According to Dr. Nick Udall in “Riding the Creativity Roller-Coaster” – creative teams embrace and work with the unknown, intangible, invisible, the unconscious and the implicate, that their key challenges are “to wander with wonder into the unknown.”

Through cultivating a 21^st-century skill set, including – attending and observing, questioning, listening and differing, risk-taking and experimenting, and teaming and networking that enables them to be, think and act differently.

Catalyzing change through innovation teams involves creating a culture of innovation, which according to the authors of “Eat, Sleep, Innovate” – is one in which (mindsets) and behaviors that drive innovation come naturally.

Where creative teams are formed around a Passionate Purpose, that propels them into the unknown, in an unpredictable world, where they connect and stretch with cognitive dissonance and creative tension, through developing discomfort resilience. To co-create collective breakthroughs that shift them beyond managing the probable, toward leading what’s possible.

Role of collective mindsets and behaviors

One of the key elements that we can intentionally cultivate is our ability to develop habits that build our mental toughness and emotional agility to cope with stress and adversity, at the same time, paradoxically, create, invent and innovate.

The one thing that we can all control, and is controllable, are our individual and collective mindsets – how we think, feel and choose to act, in solving complex problems, performing and innovating, to dance on the edges of our comfort zones, in the face of the kinds of uncertainties we confront today.

Challenges in creating a culture of innovation

Our research at ImagineNation™ has found that many organizations are disappointed and disillusioned with many of the conventional approaches to effecting culture change, largely because of variables including:

Confusion between the role of climate, culture, and engagement assessments and processes, knowing which one aligns to their purpose, strategy, and goals and delivers the greatest and most relevant value.
The typically large financial investment that is required to fund them.
The time it takes to design or customize, and implement them.
The complexity of tools and processes available that are involved in contextualizing and measuring desired changes.
Designating responsibility and accountability for role modeling, leading, and implementing the desired changes.
Building peoples’ readiness and receptivity to the desired change.
Efforts are required in removing the systemic blockers to change.
Designing and delivering the most appropriate change and learning interventions.
The false promises of “innovation theatre”.
The time it takes to reap desired results, often years.

In response to our client’s need for speedy, cost-effective, and simple, internal and collaborative culture change initiatives, we developed an integrated, simple, yet profoundly effective approach that integrates three powerful streams for catalyzing change through innovation teams:

Team development and teaming skills
Education and learning interventions
Coaching and mentoring initiatives

By taking these variables into account, focussing on building the internal capability, and offering a different and fresh perspective towards catalyzing change through innovation teams.

Creating a culture of innovation – the innovation team

We took inspiration from our 32 years of collective knowledge, wisdom, and experience across the domains of change management, culture, leadership, and team development as well as from our 8 years of iterating and pivoting our approach to the People Side of Innovation.

Coupling this with our extensive research sources, we developed and customized a team-based action and blended learning and coaching methodology for innovation teams, described as:

Change catalysts who operate with senior leadership sponsorship, empowered and equipped to trigger internal change management, engagement, and learning initiatives.
Teachers, coaches, and mentors who provide coaching and mentoring support to educate people in innovation principles and processes that cultivate sustainable innovation through co-creating learning programs and events.
A small effective and cohesive team, of evangelists, agitators, coaches, and guides and enables the whole organization to participate through partnering and collaborating on potentially ground-breaking (Moonshot) projects, aligned to the organization’s vision, purpose, and strategy.
Amazing networkers and influencers who work both within and outside of silos to inspire and motivate people to co-operate and collaborate by taking a systemic perspective, leveraging organizational independencies, to co-sense and co-create groundbreaking (Moonshot) prototypes that they pitch to senior leaders.
Being customer-obsessed and equipped with the innovation agility – capacity, competence, and confidence to adapt, transform, and constantly innovate to maximize the impact of innovation across the organization to affect growth, and deliver improved value by making innovation everyone’s job, every day, to make innovation a habit and way of life.

Developing the future fit future-facing company

Involves a commitment toward catalyzing change through innovation teams, leveraging teams, tribes, collectives as internal growth engines, who collaborate quickly to respond to ambiguity, turbulence, and rapid developments. By being nimble and agile, leading with open minds, hearts, and will to be present and compassionate to emerging human needs, courageously experiment with different business models, and creatively contribute to an improved future, for everyone.

This is the first in a series of three blogs about catalyzing change through innovation teams, why innovation teams are important in catalyzing culture change, and what an innovation team does.

Check out our second blog which describes how an innovation team operates and our final blog which includes an evidence-based case study of an effective and successful innovation team in a client organization.

It is a blended and transformational change and learning program that will give you a deep understanding of the language, principles, and applications of a human-centered approach and emergent structure (Theory U) to innovation, within your unique context. Find out more

Image credit: Unsplash.com

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The Role of Empathy in Change Management

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Discussing the Power of Empathy in Fostering Understanding, Trust, and Collaboration Throughout the Change Journey

The Role of Empathy in Change Management

GUEST POST from Chateau G Pato

Change is an inevitable part of any organization’s growth and evolution. However, successfully navigating change can be a challenge, often resulting in resistance and disruption among team members. Empathy, the ability to understand and share the feelings of others, plays a pivotal role in change management, as it helps foster deeper connections and enables a smoother transition. In this thought leadership article, we delve into the power of empathy in driving successful change initiatives, using two case studies to highlight its impact.

Case Study 1: A Large Manufacturing Company

In a large manufacturing company, the leadership team decided to implement a significant organizational restructuring aimed at adapting to market trends. This transformation involved several departmental mergers, role realignments, and process changes. To ensure a seamless transition, the change management team prioritized empathy throughout the process.

Empathy enabled the change management team to connect with employees affected by the changes on a personal level. Managers held town halls and one-on-one discussions, giving employees the space to express their concerns, fears, and doubts. By genuinely listening and understanding their experiences, the change management team effectively alleviated tension and built trust.

Additionally, the team established mentorship programs, pairing those affected by the changes with experienced colleagues who had previously undergone similar transformations. Through these relationships, empathy thrived, as mentors not only provided guidance but also shared personal stories of their own change journeys. As a result, the affected employees felt supported and understood, enabling them to adapt more smoothly to the new organization structure.

Case Study 2: A Tech Startup

In a fast-paced tech startup, the leadership recognized the need for a cultural shift to improve collaboration and innovation. The change initiative aimed to create a more inclusive and diverse workplace environment that encouraged employees to bring their unique perspectives to the table. Empathy became the cornerstone of this transformation.

To enact change successfully, the startup’s leaders made a concerted effort to understand the varying backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives of their employees. They conducted empathy-building activities such as diversity workshops, team-building exercises, and open forums for discussion. These initiatives helped employees feel valued and seen, fostering a sense of belonging within the organization.

Moreover, the leadership team actively sought out and acknowledged employees’ feedback throughout the change process, demonstrating their commitment to understanding their concerns. By incorporating employee input and involving them at all stages of decision-making, the change initiative garnered buy-in and genuine support from the entire workforce.

Conclusion

Empathy acts as a powerful catalyst in change management. The case studies of the manufacturing company and tech startup illustrate the significant impact empathy can have on a successful change journey. By embracing empathy, organizations can foster understanding, trust, and collaboration among employees, leading to smoother transitions and heightened employee satisfaction.

As leaders and change agents, it is crucial to acknowledge the human side of change. By cultivating empathy, we can create an environment where individuals feel heard, understood, and supported throughout the transformation process. Ultimately, empathy not only drives successful change initiatives but also contributes to a positive and inclusive organizational culture.

SPECIAL BONUS: 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: Pexels

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The Role of Design Thinking in Business Strategy

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The Role of Design Thinking in Business Strategy

GUEST POST from Art Inteligencia

Design thinking is a method of problem solving that has been around since the 1970s but has become increasingly popular in business strategy in the last decade. This approach to problem solving relies on creative thinking to find user-centered solutions and has proven to be an effective way to improve customer experience and increase profits. Design thinking has become a key element in crafting business strategy and can help organizations gain a competitive edge. Here are ten ways design thinking can help craft business strategy:

1. Identifying customer needs: Design thinking starts with looking at the user and understanding their needs. Through research and observation, organizations can identify and prioritize customer needs and then use that information to create strategies that are tailored to their customer base.

2. Developing empathy: Design thinking requires organizations to put themselves in the shoes of their customers and understand their motivations, values, and preferences. This helps organizations develop empathy for their customers and design strategies that are tailored to their needs.

3. Improving customer experience: Design thinking helps organizations create a better customer experience by focusing on the user journey and understanding their needs and pain points. This can help organizations create strategies that improve customer experience and increase customer loyalty.

4. Creating innovative solutions: Design thinking encourages organizations to think outside the box and come up with innovative solutions to problems. This can help organizations create strategies that are different from the competition and give them an edge.

5. Enhancing team collaboration: Design thinking encourages collaboration and creativity within teams by encouraging different perspectives and ideas. This helps organizations create strategies that are more effective and efficient.

6. Generating new ideas: Design thinking helps organizations generate new ideas and perspectives that can help them craft better strategies. This can help organizations stay ahead of the competition and create unique solutions.

7. Facilitating decision-making: Design thinking helps organizations make informed decisions by providing them with the data and insights they need to make informed decisions. This can help organizations make decisions that are better for the business and its customers.

8. Improving communication: Design thinking helps organizations communicate more effectively by focusing on the customer and understanding their needs. This can help organizations create strategies that are more effective and better tailored to their customers.

9. Enhancing user-centered design: Design thinking helps organizations create user-centered designs that focus on the user and their needs. This can help organizations create strategies that are more effective and better tailored to their customers.

10. Increasing profits: Design thinking helps organizations create strategies that are more effective and efficient, which can lead to increased profits. This can help organizations increase their competitive edge and stay ahead of the competition.

Design thinking is an effective tool for crafting business strategy and can help organizations gain a competitive edge. Through research and observation, organizations can identify customer needs and then use that information to create strategies that are tailored to their customer base. Design thinking can also help organizations create innovative solutions, improve customer experience, and increase profits. By utilizing design thinking, organizations can create strategies that are more effective and efficient, which can help them gain a competitive edge.

SPECIAL BONUS: Braden Kelley’s Problem Finding Canvas can be a super useful starting point for doing design thinking or human-centered design.

“The Problem Finding Canvas should help you investigate a handful of areas to explore, choose the one most important to you, extract all of the potential challenges and opportunities and choose one to prioritize.”

Image credit: Pixabay

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Measuring Competencies Like Empathy and Collaboration

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Certifying Soft Skills

Measuring Competencies Like Empathy and Collaboration

GUEST POST from Chateau G Pato
LAST UPDATED: January 19, 2026 at 12:29PM

For decades, the corporate world has operated on a convenient fiction: that “hard skills” — coding, accounting, engineering — are the solid bedrock of business, while “soft skills” are the fuzzy, unenforceable garnishes. We hire for the hard, and we fire for the lack of the soft.

As we navigate an era defined by rapid technological disruption and the rise of Artificial Intelligence, this distinction is not just obsolete; it is dangerous. When machines can crunch numbers faster and generate code cleaner than any human, the true differentiator for an organization — the engine of sustainable innovation and successful change management — becomes the intensely human capacity to connect, understand, and co-create.

The problem has never been that organizations don’t value empathy or collaboration. The problem is that they haven’t known how to measure them with rigor. If we cannot measure it, we cannot manage it, and we certainly cannot certify it. To build truly human-centered organizations, we must crack the code on credentialing the very competencies that make us human.

“We are entering an age where your technical expertise gets you in the room, but your ability to empathize and collaborate determines your impact once you are there. Innovation is a social endeavor; if we can’t measure the quality of our connection, we can’t improve the quality of our creation.”

— Braden Kelley

Moving Beyond the “Vibe Check”

The historical skepticism toward certifying soft skills stems from a reliance on self-assessment. Asking an employee, “How empathetic are you on a scale of 1 to 10?” is useless data. True measurement requires moving from sentiment to demonstrated behavior in context.

We must shift our focus from assessing internal states (how someone feels) to external applications (what someone does with those feelings to drive valuable outcomes). A certification in empathy, for example, shouldn’t signify that a person is “nice.” It should signify that they possess a verified toolkit for uncovering latent user needs and the emotional intelligence to navigate complex stakeholder resistance during change initiatives.

Case Study 1: The “Applied Empathy” Badge in Service Design

The Challenge

A prominent financial services firm found that its digital transformation efforts were stalling. Their product teams were technically proficient but were building solutions based on assumptions rather than user realities, leading to poor adoption rates. They needed to embed deep user understanding into their development lifecycle.

The Measurement Solution

Instead of a generic communications workshop, the firm worked to develop an “Applied Empathy Practitioner” certification. To earn this, candidates had to pass a rigorous, multi-stage evaluation:

Scenario-Based Simulation: Candidates engaged in role-play scenarios with “difficult customers,” evaluated not on appeasement, but on their ability to use active inquiry to uncover the root cause of frustration.
Portfolio of Evidence: Candidates had to submit documented examples of how an insight gained through empathetic interviewing directly altered a product roadmap or service feature. They had to prove the application of the skill.

The Outcome

The certification became a prerequisite for lead design roles. The company saw a 40% reduction in post-launch rework because consumer friction points were identified earlier. They moved empathy from a “nice-to-have” trait to a measurable, certifiable professional competency linked to reduced risk.

Case Study 2: Certifying Collaboration in a Siloed Tech Giant

The Challenge

A global software enterprise was struggling with innovation velocity. While individual departments were high-performing, cross-functional projects frequently died on the vine due to territorialism and a lack of psychological safety. They needed leaders who could act as bridges, not gatekeepers.

The Measurement Solution

The organization realized that certifying collaboration couldn’t be based on a multiple-choice test. They developed a “Master Collaborator” credential focused on network dynamics and team environment:

Organizational Network Analysis (ONA): Instead of just asking “Are you a team player?”, the company used anonymized metadata to map communication flows. They identified individuals who served as high-trust connectors between disparate groups.
360-Degree “Safety” Index: Peers and subordinates evaluated candidates specifically on their ability to create psychological safety—the environment where people feel safe to take risks and voice dissenting opinions without fear of retribution.

The Outcome

Leaders who achieved this certification were placed in charge of critical, high-risk innovation initiatives. The data showed that teams led by certified collaborators brought new products to market 25% faster, primarily because information flowed freely and failures were treated as learning opportunities rather than punishable offenses.

“In the symphony of innovation, empathy isn’t just a note — it’s the harmony that binds the orchestra together, allowing every voice to resonate.”

— Braden Kelley

Case Study 3: Google’s Project Oxygen

Google, a pioneer in data-driven decision-making, launched Project Oxygen in 2008 to identify what makes a great manager. Through extensive analysis of over 10,000 performance reviews, feedback surveys, and interviews, they discovered that technical skills ranked eighth on the list of top behaviors. Instead, top managers excelled in coaching, empowering teams, and showing genuine concern for team members’ success and well-being — hallmarks of empathy.

To certify these competencies, Google developed comprehensive training programs and certification pathways
integrated into their leadership development. Managers undergo rigorous assessments, including peer reviews, self-evaluations, and behavioral interviews focused on specific actions like “is a good coach” and “has a clear vision and strategy for the team.” Successful participants earn internal certifications that directly influence promotions, compensation, and leadership opportunities.

The impact has been profound. Teams led by certified managers report higher satisfaction scores, lower attrition rates, and up to 20% better performance metrics in areas like project delivery and innovation output. This case study illustrates how quantifying soft skills through structured, data-backed feedback can translate into measurable business outcomes, proving that empathy isn’t just nice — it’s a competitive advantage.

Case Study 4: IBM’s Digital Badge Program

IBM has been at the forefront of skills certification with their open badges initiative, launched in 2015. This program extends beyond technical proficiencies to include soft skills like collaboration, agility, and empathy. For instance, to earn a “Collaborative Innovator” badge, employees must complete real-world projects involving cross-functional teams, submit detailed evidence of their contributions, and receive endorsements from at least three peers or supervisors.

A particularly compelling application was during IBM’s transition to hybrid work models following the global pandemic. Employees pursuing certification participated in immersive virtual reality simulations where they navigated complex team conflicts, such as resolving disagreements in diverse groups. These scenarios tested empathy through active listening exercises, inclusive decision-making, and emotional support simulations. Performance is evaluated using AI analytics that score interactions based on predefined empathy and collaboration rubrics.

Badges are issued on a blockchain platform, ensuring they are secure, verifiable, and portable across careers. Data from IBM indicates that employees with soft skill badges are 15% more likely to be promoted internally and report 25% higher job satisfaction levels. Moreover, teams with a higher density of certified collaborators exhibit faster problem-solving times and more innovative patent filings. IBM’s model showcases how blending technology with human-centric evaluation can standardize soft skill certification while preserving the authenticity of interpersonal dynamics.

The Future of Human-Centered Credentialing

Certifying these skills is not about creating a new layer of bureaucracy. It is about signaling value. By creating rigorous standards for empathy, collaboration, adaptability, and resilience, we provide a roadmap for employees to develop the skills that actually matter in a volatile future.

These certifications cannot be “one-and-done.” Just as technical certifications require renewal, soft skill credentials must be dynamic, requiring ongoing evidence of application in increasingly complex scenarios. This ensures that the skills are living capabilities, not just framed certificates.

As leaders in human-centered change, we must champion the idea that the “hardest” skills to master — and the most valuable to measure — are the ones that connect us.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is it difficult to measure soft skills like empathy?

Soft skills are inherently subjective and context-dependent. Unlike technical skills which have binary outcomes (the code works or it doesn’t), soft skills like empathy rely on behavioral indicators, the perception of others, and the ability to apply emotional intelligence in varied scenarios, making quantitative measurement challenging.

How can organizations effectively certify collaboration?

Effective certification moves beyond self-assessments and utilizes 360-degree feedback mechanisms, Organizational Network Analysis (ONA) to see who genuinely connects silos, and scenario-based evaluations that test a person’s ability to foster psychological safety and manage conflict constructively.

What is the business value of certifying soft skills?

Certifying soft skills provides a tangible framework for creating a human-centered culture. It leads to better innovation through diverse perspectives, faster adoption of change initiatives due to higher trust, and improved retention by valuing the human element of work.

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: Google Gemini

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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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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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Building a Culture of Continuous Innovation

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Building a Culture of Continuous Innovation

Excerpt from the May/June 2017 edition of The European Business Review

Every company begins as the nimble startup, organized around the solution to a single customer problem and executing that solution better than anyone else in the market (including incumbents with deep pockets). But this emerging leader soon becomes a follower as the organization evolves and scales into a more complex (but capable) next generation incumbent. Inevitably, every growing organization finds itself so focused on capturing all of the business for its existing solutions, that it finds itself becoming disconnected from evolving customer preferences.

The companies that last the longest manage to fulfill existing customer needs with well-delivered solutions, and identify new customer needs to satisfy as customer preferences continue to shift. But many large or growing companies fail to do so quickly enough, especially in our new digital reality where it is easier than ever to start and scale a solution around the globe with limited resources. Innovation is the key to remaining relevant with customers. Winning the War for Innovation is the key to remaining alive.

Click to access a PDF version of the Building a Culture of Continuous Innovation article

Click to continue reading the article on The European Business Review site

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The Eleven Change Roles

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Change is Hard

The Eleven Change Roles Change can be complicated, change can be confusing, and change can be difficult to successfully implement in any organization. This is why 70% of change initiatives have been found to fail.

To help make change less overwhelming, and instead more visual and more collaborative, I set out to create the Change Planning Toolkit™ for project managers, change managers, and leaders everywhere to pick up and use with their change leadership teams to better plan and execute their organizational change initiatives, and even projects.

Change Planning Team Contributions

Creating a change planning team that can bring the information and influence to the table that you really need is one of the keys to the eventual success of your change planning sessions and the overall change effort as a whole. The information you need will obviously be driven by the topics that your team should cover as part of your change planning efforts. These include:

What is the current state?
What are the change drivers? (It is helpful to discuss history, context, and the main proponents.)
Is there a budget for both planning and executing this change?
What other change programs are in progress or about to begin?
How ready are we as an organization to make this change?
To see the rest of this list, please get yourself a copy of my book Charting Change

Who needs to be involved in change?

Nothing is more important for creating successful change in an organization than getting the right people in the room and engaged during the change planning process. And if you want to get your change effort off to a strong start and set it up for success, then I encourage you to focus more on knowledge than authority. Think about who knows the most about the key components of a holistic change plan.

Take a moment to consider which individuals in your organization will have the most knowledge and information on the intended change, and which individuals will provide the most considered viewpoints on the topics that you will focus on as you work through the series of worksheets and other tools in the Change Planning Toolkit™ on your way to creating your roadmap and series of fully populated change execution plans.

As we consider all of the data, personalities, ecosystem interactions and work items that must be considered, you’ll quickly see that change is a team sport and that there are many different roles for people to play.

With this in mind, I’ve created The Eleven Change Roles™ to identify the eleven roles that are important to the forming of a balanced and successful change leadership team, so start considering your candidates for:

1. Authority Figures/Sponsors

Somebody has to be in charge. This includes one main sponsor and a coalition of authority figures that can help push things forward when a push is required.

2. Designers

Designers are your big picture thinkers, people that can see how the pieces fit together, are skilled meeting facilitators, can quickly achieve mastery of new methodologies (like my Change Planning Toolkit™), and can help keep people on track as you build out the plans for your change effort.

3. Influencers

Influencers are well-respected and forceful people in the organization. They may lack the formal position power of a sponsor or authority figure, but they can help rally people to the cause with their words and actions.

4. Integrators

Integrators are good at bridging silos, building relationships that cut across geographies and hierarchies, and finding ways for different work teams and departments to work together to achieve a common goal.

The Eleven Change Roles

5. Connectors

Connectors are slightly different than Integrators, and the difference is that they know where the overt and hidden resources lie in the organization, and have the personal connections and influence necessary to open a dialogue that hopefully results in both needed connections AND access to resources.

6. Resource Controllers/Investors

These people have things that you need – human resources, information resources, physical resources, and human resources. You must convince them to invest those resources in helping you successfully achieve your desired change.

7. Troubleshooters

There are always going to be hiccups and problems that emerge along the way, some expected, and some not. Troubleshooters are really good at helping to identify those up front and enjoy the challenge of finding ways around, over, or under these potential barriers when they crop up. It is even better when the team can identify ways to avoid or overcome them before broader communications begin. Troubleshooters can help with this and often have the deep domain knowledge or the deep insight into the change target’s mindset necessary to also help move minds and resources to support the change program.

8. Evangelists/Storytellers

Every change effort has a story to tell about how the desired future state is better than the current state, and is worth the disruption of making the change. There is the building of a vision, the creation of themes that will weave together into your story, and symbols that will reinforce and show your commitment to realizing the goals you set out for the change effort. Without these, evangelism and storytelling will find it hard to help people understand or support the change goals. So, you need to have evangelists and storytellers at the ready.

9. Endorsers/Supporters

Getting people to agree to talk up the change effort, even if they are not taking an active role in pushing it forward towards completion, is incredibly powerful. Don’t be afraid to reach out and ask for this seemingly insignificant assistance, but be sure and arm these individuals with the themes, symbols and stories that will reinforce the change vision and sustain the change effort’s momentum.

10. The Impacted (key groups of impacted individuals)

Who’s going to be affected by this change? Don’t be afraid to invite these people into your planning efforts early on to voice their concerns so that you can understand their otherwise unvoiced objections, identify solutions or mitigations, and potentially recruit them as impactful Evangelists or Endorsers/Supporters.

11. The External (perspectives from people not affected)

It’s easy to miss risks, assumptions, barriers, and points of potential resistance when you get too close to the effort. Inviting people from outside your organization into your planning process, or to provide feedback on your change effort, will prove enlightening through the additional perspectives they contribute.

Conclusion

When you take the time to thoughtfully recruit people into all of The Eleven Change Roles™ listed above you will have a richer set of inputs, a much livelier discussion, and a stronger set of outputs from your change planning process.

Getting the right people with the right knowledge in the room and engaged during the change planning process will get you off to a strong start and set your change effort up for success. Having people with a strong ability to verbalize meaningful, well intentioned and well informed contributions around the key components of the planning process will provide powerful content as you work through the series of worksheets and other tools contained in the Change Planning Toolkit™ and ultimately populate your Change Planning Canvas™ and your execution plans. The toolkit includes more than 50+ tools including an Eleven Change Roles Worksheet™ that you can use in your change planning meetings or off-site to make sure you have all eleven roles filled.

CLICK HERE to get an 11” x 17” version of The Eleven Change Roles™ shown above as a FREE DOWNLOAD

Image credit: beaconinitiative.net and Charting Change by Braden Kelley (publisher: Palgrave Macmillan)

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Microsoft’s Latest Vision of Future Productivity

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Microsoft's Latest Vision of Future Productivity I came across the latest vision of future productivity from Microsoft today and thought I would share it with you, along with a whole series of previous videos from Microsoft taking a look at the same subject area, ranging from 2009-2015. It is interesting to see what has changed and what has stayed the same over those six years in their view of the future.

So, here is Microsoft’s latest vision of future productivity:

And here is a closer in, more present-oriented view of changes in how people think about technology, collaboration, and productivity from Julia White, General Manager, WW Office Marketing, Microsoft:

(sorry, someone made this video private)

It can also be interesting to see how visions of the future evolve over time, so here is Microsoft’s vision of the future from October 2011:

And their 2009 vision:

Does anything jump out that has either worked its way into Microsoft’s vision of the future of productivity or worked its way out of their vision that is notable?

I’d be curious to hear your thoughts and reactions to this series of videos and where you think things are going in the near term and longer term.

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