Tag Archives: Innovation

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.

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-centered approach and emergent structure (Theory U) to innovation, within your unique context. Find out more

Image credit: Unsplash.com

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At the Heart of Successful Digital Transformations are Humans and Data

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At the Heart of Successful Digital Transformations are Humans and Data

Digital transformation has become an overused buzzword.

When most people speak about digital transformation, they are really speaking about digitization, digitalization, or digital strategy.

They are all very different and none of them are digital transformation.

Let’s look at each of these four terms so that we can be very clear about what we are talking about:

Digitization – Digitization is the process of converting information into a digital (i.e. computer-readable) format (source: Wikipedia)
Digitalization – Digitalization is the adaptation of a system, process, etc. to be operated with the use of computers and the internet (source: Oxford Dictionary)
Digital strategy – In the fields of strategic management, marketing strategy, and business strategy, digital strategy is the process of specifying an organization’s vision, goals, opportunities and related activities in order to maximize the business benefits of digital initiatives to the organization (source: Wikipedia)
Digital transformation – A digital transformation is the journey between a company’s current business operations to a reimagined version from the perspective of how a digital native would build the same business operations leveraging the latest technology and scientific understandings of management science, leadership, decision science, business and process architecture, design, customer experience, etc. (source: bradenkelley.com)

At the heart of successful digital transformation, innovation, disruption, and even customer experience are two things:

Humans
Data

Digital transformation is not about digitizing physical objects, systems, or processes or about building a strategy for operating in the digital space, although all of those things may play a part, but it’s about people, the information they want, and the information you have – and information comes from data.

If you have the right data, connected in the right ways it turns into information, and when you consider the information you possess through the right lenses, you can create the knowledge and insights necessary to understand your customers’ needs and your future business success. But many organizations start building a digital transformation approach without putting a solid human-centered data foundation in place to build success on top of.

Where Insights Come From Braden Kelley

Insights are developed from the connection, distillation and analysis of data, information and knowledge to identify WHY the behaviors occur at all. Building upon my “Where Insights Come From” framework above, let’s look at an example of the distillation of data into insights:

DATA will tell us that we sold 20 black cars, 19 blue cars and 17 white cars in Atlanta.
INFORMATION identifies that we sold more black cars than any other color in Atlanta.
KNOWLEDGE helps us see that we sold 20 of 100 available black cars, 19 of 50 available blue cars, and 17 of 17 available white cars in Atlanta, meaning that Atlanta residents are crazy about white cars and we should be making more of them.
INSIGHTS will tell us that the white cars sold out because people prefer white cars that stay cooler in the hot sun, and so perhaps in addition to building more white cars we should experiment with offering more light colors for sale in Atlanta.

Looking through the insights lens forces us to focus on why things are happening and go beyond what the data, the information, or even our intelligence is telling us to get to the human influence on the situation we are evaluating.

The insight lens forces us to look carefully at the data we are gathering to identify whether it will help us answer the WHY question and identify situations where we need to make modifications in our data strategy to help answer the WHY question or to commission separate research to answer it.

Focusing on insights helps us be more empathetic, human-centric and to break out of the vicious cycle of gathering data just because we can.

But, it is only when we gather the right data and connect it all together that the magic happens. When a customer calls in, you can only anticipate their needs if your data is connected. For example, if your phone system doesn’t know all of the following, you are likely to underwhelm your customer:

Two weeks ago they purchased the latest version of your product
They called customer service last week
Sentiment analysis of the call recording indicates it was a problem call
A replacement product was shipped out
Before yesterday they haven’t called customer service for seven years
They have been a loyal customer for fifteen years
They purchased an extended warranty on their previous product but not this one
They received the shipment of an accessory yesterday

Customers don’t want to start from the beginning every time they call, but most companies do exactly that because their data lives in silos, it’s not connected, and they’re drowning in technical debt. Customers hope companies know them, and can anticipate their needs, but too often we let them down.

Every time a customer has a great experience – somewhere else – this becomes their new baseline. The companies moving the humans to the center of everything that they do (including their employees) are changing the game for everyone.

But it’s not all about delivering better customer service & support. When you create a human-centric data model free from silos, it empowers you to progress from creating better service to an overall improved customer experience, and beyond towards improved products & services and insight into marketing and innovation opportunities that will keep your company resonant and relevant.

Don’t be afraid to ask for help in creating a human-centric data model that pulls your customers and employees to the center of everything you do, they’ll thank you for it, and your shareholders will too.

Accelerate your change and transformation success

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What is innovation? – EPISODE ONE – Ask the Consultant

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Live from the Innovation Studio comes EPISODE ONE of a new ‘Ask the Consultant’ series of short form videos. EPISODE ONE tackles the question people ask me more than any other:

“What is innovation?”

If you’d like to see additional potential definitions of innovation you can find 60+ additional innovation definitions here (sorry, link expired).

My definition of innovation, refined over the years, is the following:

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

The video above covers why I have defined innovation in this way, and why it is so important for every organization to have a clear definition of innovation that they disseminate WIDELY across the organization.

What question should I tackle in the next video episode of “Ask the Consultant” live from my innovation studio?

Contact me with your question

}} Click here to watch the video {{

Click to access the other episodes of Ask the Consultant

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At What Point Does Smart Become Stupid?

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At What Point Does Smart Become Stupid?

In addition to 2020 being the year of the Coronavirus COVID-19, some would also say that it was the year of the voice-activated smart device. Sales of smart speakers in 2019 reached 146.9 million units and 2020 will likely approach 200 million units or more. The final number depends on how many showed up under Christmas trees as the 4th quarter. In addition, during 2020 we started to see Alexa advertised for other contexts, including in Buick automobile advertisements. Which brings up a couple questions.

Question 1: Is the advertisement below a real advertisement or an April Fool’s Day fake advertisement?

Question 2: At what point does the trend that smart speakers began reach the point of stupidity?

To answer that question I recommend that we revisit my definition of innovation:

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

The one thing that many product managers often forget is that invention and innovation are not the same thing, and so at some point product managers are likely to invest past the invisible line on different value dimensions beyond what people are willing to pay for.

This leads to products being designed and launched that while they might be revolutionary and inventive, they actually end up being unprofitable and not innovative at all because the foundations of the new offering never reach wide adoption.

Are we approaching this point with smart devices?

Let’s try and answer this question by answering the first question about the video.

YES – This is in fact a real product.

Now, how many of you are going to rush out to your home improvement store and purchase one of these faucets to replace your existing kitchen faucet?

What if I told you that it would cost you $800-1,000 compared to very nice kitchen faucets that can cost under $100?

Very few people are likely to replace their kitchen faucet unless it stops working or starts leaking profusely.

At the same time, Moen will definitely sell some of these faucets to people who must have the latest gadgets.

If you were the product manager or innovation manager involved with this product, before launching it you should ask:

Will we sell enough of this smart faucet to justify the cost of developing and marketing it?

Will this smart faucet create enough of a brand halo to help us sell more of our traditional faucets?

The answers to these questions may very well be – yes.

But if not, then we have reached a point where SMART starts to become STUPID.

But, don’t stop there. You should also ask yourself questions like:

Does it take longer to get a glass of water using the smart method than the easy manual way?

Could my grandmother install and use it without reading the directions?

Is this new capability valuable enough to drive replacement?

If you are an inventor or a product manager, these kinds of questions are the type that you must always be asking yourself – even if you don’t like the answers.

If you still decide to go ahead with a product that will be unprofitable, you will at least do so with open eyes – and for the right reasons.

For more on this topic, please be sure and check out my previous article – Innovation or Not – Amazon Echo Frames

Keep innovating!

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Innovation Through Experimentation

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Strategies for Rapid Iteration

Innovation Through Experimentation

GUEST POST from Chateau G Pato

In today’s fast-paced and constantly evolving business landscape, innovation is the key to staying ahead of the competition. However, traditional approaches to innovation may not be enough to keep up with rapidly changing customer needs and preferences. To foster innovation, organizations must embrace a culture of experimentation and adopt strategies for rapid iteration. In this article, we will explore the importance of experimentation in driving innovation and discuss two case study examples to illustrate successful implementation.

Case Study 1: Google’s “20% Time”

One of the most famous examples of fostering innovation through experimentation is Google’s “20% time.” This initiative allows employees to spend 20% of their workweek, or one day, working on projects that interest them outside of their core responsibilities. This flexible structure encourages employees to explore new ideas and experiment with innovative solutions.

One notable outcome of Google’s 20% time is the creation of Gmail. Originally developed as an experiment by a Google engineer, the project emerged from the employee’s personal interest in improving email communication. Through rapid iteration and continuous experimentation, Gmail was refined and eventually launched as one of Google’s most successful products. This case study demonstrates how giving employees the freedom to experiment can lead to significant innovation and long-term success.

Case Study 2: Amazon’s A/B Testing

Amazon, the e-commerce giant, is renowned for its customer-centric approach and its relentless pursuit of innovation. One of the strategies Amazon uses to continuously iterate and improve its offerings is A/B testing. By testing different variations of a webpage, product listing, or feature, Amazon gathers quantitative data to make informed decisions about which version performs better. This data-driven approach allows them to quickly adapt and optimize their offerings to meet customer expectations.

An example of Amazon’s A/B testing is its product recommendation engine. By experimenting with different algorithms and design variations, Amazon continuously refines its recommendation engine to provide highly personalized and relevant product suggestions. This iterative process has played a significant role in enhancing the customer experience, boosting sales, and establishing Amazon as an industry leader.

Key Strategies for Rapid Iteration

1. Embrace Failure as Learning: Encourage a culture where failure is seen as an opportunity to learn and improve. Failure should not be punished but celebrated as a stepping stone towards success. By fostering an environment that values experimentation and risk-taking, organizations can encourage employees to think creatively and push boundaries.

2. Establish Rapid Feedback Loops: Implement processes that allow for quick feedback and iteration. Regularly gather feedback from customers, employees, and other stakeholders to identify areas for improvement. This feedback loop enables organizations to make iterative changes based on real-world data and inputs, leading to more relevant and effective solutions.

3. Set Clear Goals and Metrics: Clearly define innovation goals and establish measurable metrics to track progress. By setting concrete objectives, organizations can evaluate the success of their experiments and measure the impact on key performance indicators. This data-driven approach helps focus efforts on what truly matters and ensures that innovation initiatives align with overall business objectives.

Conclusion

Innovation through experimentation is crucial for organizations aiming to thrive in today’s rapidly changing business landscape. By adopting strategies for rapid iteration, businesses can foster a culture that encourages and celebrates innovation. The case study examples of Google’s “20% time” and Amazon’s A/B testing demonstrate how organizations can drive significant innovation by allowing employees to experiment and by leveraging quantitative data to inform decision-making. By embracing failure, establishing feedback loops, and setting clear goals and metrics, organizations can unleash their creative potential, adapt to evolving market dynamics, and stay ahead of the competition.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Braden Kelley’s Experiment Canvas™ can be a super useful FREE tool for your innovation or human-centered design pursuits.

“The Experiment Canvas™ is designed to help people instrument for learning fast in iterative new product development (NPD) or service development activities. The canvas will help you create new innovation possibilities in a more visual and collaborative way for greater alignment, accountability, and more successful outcomes.”

Image credit: misterinnovation.com

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How to Identify Trends and Patterns for Breakthrough Innovation

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Connecting the Dots

How to Identify Trends and Patterns for Breakthrough Innovation

GUEST POST from Art Inteligencia

Breakthrough innovation, one of the most sought-after but largely elusive concepts in business, happens when an idea has the power to revolutionize an industry or disrupt the status quo. In a sea of ideas, the only way to guarantee a truly groundbreaking product is to identify the trends and patterns that will allow you to develop a concept that is both unique and ahead of the competition. By connecting the right dots, you will sometimes stumble upon something revolutionary that no one else has thought of.

So how do you start to identify the patterns and trends that will lead to a breakthrough innovation? There are several methods, but here are a few of the most effective:

1. Analyzing the competition

A great starting point for coming up with a breakthrough innovation is to analyze the competition. By studying what others in the same industry or space have done in the past, you can identify any gaps in the market and figure out how your product or service can fill them. This doesn’t mean stealing ideas or copying what they’ve done; instead, it’s about realizing what hasn’t been done yet and coming up with a concept to address that.

Case study: When Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen first proposed the idea of using personal computers in the home, he wasn’t the first person to think of that concept. In fact, home computing had been a concept since the late 1970s—and while many tried to make it a reality, no one was able to successfully launch a commercial product. By closely examining the competition, analyzing their mistakes, and applying his own knowledge of computer hardware and software, Allen was able to identify the patterns that would allow him to revolutionize the industry with the introduction of the first home computer.

2. Focusing on customer needs

When trying to create a breakthrough innovation, it’s important to focus on the needs and wants of the customer. This requires understanding their problems and coming up with solutions that will truly meet their needs. To do this, companies must engage in active customer research and listen to their feedback. By figuring out what the customers are looking for and thinking outside the box, companies can come up with solutions that are not only valuable, but also unique.

Case study: Airbnb is one such example of a company that saw a need in the market and sought to fill it. After surveying customers, it became clear that people were looking for a more affordable and convenient way to travel. To meet this need, the company launched its online platform that allowed users to rent out their properties—a concept that, at the time, was completely unheard of. Through active customer research and new thinking, the company was able to connect the dots and create a revolutionary concept that changed the industry.

3. Scanning the environment

Sometimes the most unexpected patterns and trends can be identified by simply looking around at the environment. Paying attention to political, economic, and social changes can often reveal an untapped opportunity that no one has thought of. Companies must stay up to date with the latest news and be alert for signs of change in their field. By looking at the bigger picture and constantly challenging the status quo, companies can come up with innovations no one has ever seen before.

Case study: In 2009, Uber was founded with the goal of getting rid of car ownership and replacing it with shared rides. While this concept was unheard of at the time, the founders analyzed changes in the environment that allowed them to make it a reality. They saw that customers were increasingly looking for convenience, along with the rise of smartphones and GPS technology that would allow customers to track rides and pay for them digitally. With these changes in the environment, they saw an opportunity to pursue their vision and connect the dots from ideas no one had thought possible.

Conclusion

Breakthrough innovation requires more than just the right idea and some luck—it requires the ability to connect the dots and identify patterns that will lead to a truly revolutionary product or service. By analyzing the competition, focusing on customer needs, and scanning the environment, companies can identify trends that will allow them to develop something new and groundbreaking. With perseverance, companies can unlock the resources and potential that will revolutionize an industry and create something truly unique.

Image credit: Pixabay

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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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Balanced Scorecard for Change

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A Holistic View of Innovation Performance

Balanced Scorecard for Change - A Holistic View of Innovation Performance

GUEST POST from Chateau G Pato
LAST UPDATED: January 27, 2026 at 2:47PM

In the quest for sustainable innovation, organizations often fall into the trap of measuring what’s easy, not what’s impactful. They focus on R&D spend, patent counts, or the number of new products launched. While these metrics have their place, they paint an incomplete and often misleading picture. Just like a financial balance sheet, innovation requires a balanced scorecard — a holistic framework that evaluates performance across multiple dimensions, recognizing that true change is about more than just a new product; it’s about a new way of being.

The traditional Balanced Scorecard, pioneered by Kaplan and Norton, offered four perspectives: Financial, Customer, Internal Business Processes, and Learning & Growth. While foundational, for innovation, we need a slight recalibration — a shift towards metrics that capture the dynamic, human-centered aspects of driving change. We must look beyond the immediate output and assess the organizational health that fuels ongoing adaptability and purposeful transformation.

“Measuring innovation isn’t just about counting new ideas; it’s about evaluating how well we’re cultivating the soil in which those ideas grow and thrive.” —

Braden Kelley

The Four Perspectives of the Innovation Balanced Scorecard

Here are the four refined perspectives crucial for assessing innovation performance holistically:

Value Creation (Financial & Customer Impact): This isn’t just about revenue from new products, but the broader value delivered. Think of customer lifetime value, market share shifts, cost reductions from process innovations, and the societal or environmental impact of your solutions. It ties innovation directly to tangible, measurable benefits for both the business and its stakeholders.
Organizational Agility & Process Excellence: How quickly can your organization sense changes, adapt, and execute? Metrics here include cycle time from idea to market, the number of successful pivots, efficiency gains from new processes, and the reduction of bureaucratic roadblocks. It measures your ability to move with intention and purpose.
Cultural & Talent Development: This is arguably the most critical and often overlooked perspective. It assesses the human infrastructure for innovation. Look at employee engagement in innovation initiatives, the diversity of innovation teams, training hours in new skills (e.g., design thinking, agile methodologies), psychological safety scores, and retention rates of key innovators. This perspective ensures you are cultivating a culture where “purposeful learning” thrives.
Ecosystem Engagement & Learning: Innovation rarely happens in a vacuum. This perspective measures how well you connect with the external world. Metrics include the number of strategic partnerships, active participation in industry forums, adoption of open innovation practices, insights gained from customer co-creation efforts, and the ability to integrate external knowledge. It reflects your capacity for continuous adaptation and external sensing.

Case Study 1: Transforming a Legacy Manufacturing Giant

A global manufacturing company, traditionally focused on incremental improvements, recognized the need for radical innovation. They implemented an Innovation Balanced Scorecard. Under “Value Creation,” they tracked not just new product revenue but also the reduction in material waste from new sustainable processes, which resonated with environmentally conscious customers. For “Organizational Agility,” they measured the average time it took for a pilot project to move from concept to MVP. Crucially, “Cultural & Talent Development” saw them introducing innovation sabbaticals, allowing employees to spend time on passion projects, leading to a 30% increase in patent applications and a significant boost in employee satisfaction scores related to creativity and autonomy. Their “Ecosystem Engagement” expanded to include partnerships with startups specializing in AI and advanced robotics, which diversified their knowledge base significantly.

Case Study 2: The E-commerce Pivot

An online retailer, facing intense competition, used an Innovation Balanced Scorecard to guide a strategic pivot. Their “Value Creation” metrics shifted from pure sales volume to customer retention rates and average order value, driven by personalized recommendations. Under “Organizational Agility,” they tracked the success rate of A/B tests and the speed of implementing user experience (UX) improvements. Their “Cultural & Talent Development” perspective emphasized cross-functional hackathons and a mentorship program to foster digital skills. They saw a 25% improvement in their Net Promoter Score (NPS) within two years. Finally, “Ecosystem Engagement” involved actively participating in industry consortia focused on future retail technologies and forming alliances with logistics providers for last-mile innovation, ensuring they were always ahead of emerging trends.

The Measurement Trap

Traditional innovation metrics tend to reward certainty. Business cases must be precise, forecasts must be confident, and returns must be predictable. This creates a paradox: the more radical the idea, the less likely it is to survive the measurement process.

The result is an innovation portfolio optimized for incrementalism. Safe ideas flourish. Transformative ones die quietly.

A Balanced Scorecard for Change re-frames success. It asks not only What did we deliver? but What did we learn, and how did we grow?

The Four Perspectives That Matter

Strategic Relevance

Innovation without strategic relevance becomes distraction. This dimension ensures efforts are anchored to real organizational challenges.

Learning Velocity

Learning velocity measures progress under uncertainty. Fast feedback loops outperform detailed plans in complex environments.

Capability Maturity

This perspective tracks whether people, teams, and leaders are becoming better at innovating, not just busier.

Sustained Impact

Outcomes are evaluated over time, recognizing that early learning creates future options long before revenue appears.

“Measurement is never neutral. It shapes behavior, reinforces values, and ultimately determines whether innovation survives or suffocates.”

— Braden Kelley

Leading With Balance

A Balanced Scorecard for Change does more than track progress. It legitimizes learning, protects exploration, and aligns leadership behavior with the realities of innovation.

When leaders measure what matters, they create permission for people to do the hard, uncertain work of meaningful change.

Implementing Your Balanced Scorecard for Change

The beauty of this framework lies in its flexibility. It encourages you to think beyond silos and see innovation as an enterprise-wide capability. Start by identifying 2-3 key metrics within each perspective that genuinely reflect your strategic innovation goals. These shouldn’t be abstract numbers but tangible reflections of the human judgment, creativity, and systems thinking that drive real change. Regular review — quarterly, not annually — ensures that the scorecard remains a living document, guiding your organization toward a future where “wisdom, purpose, and synthesis” are the true measures of success.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is a Balanced Scorecard important for innovation?

A Balanced Scorecard ensures that innovation performance is measured holistically, going beyond just financial returns to include organizational health, agility, culture, and external engagement, providing a more complete picture of success.

How do these innovation perspectives differ from the traditional Balanced Scorecard?

While building on the traditional framework, the innovation perspectives are specifically tailored to capture the dynamic, human-centered elements of change, focusing more on adaptability, cultural development, and ecosystem collaboration as drivers of innovation.

What is the first step to implementing an Innovation Balanced Scorecard?

Begin by clearly defining your organization’s strategic innovation goals. Then, identify 2-3 specific, measurable metrics for each of the four perspectives (Value Creation, Organizational Agility, Cultural & Talent Development, Ecosystem Engagement) that directly align with those goals.

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: ChatGPT

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25 Free Futures Research and Futurology Resources

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25 Free Futures Research and Futurology Resources

GUEST POST from Art Inteligencia

One of the biggest barriers to getting started in futurology or futures research is knowing where to go to find information to educate and inform oneself about some of the basics of becoming a futurist and for raw materials to use in support of your first future studies or futurology efforts.

To help with that I have compiled a list of twenty-five resources to get you started in addition to this web site and Braden Kelley’s very excellent FutureHacking™ tools. So, without further delay, here is the list:

1. The Institute for the Future:

https://www.iftf.org/ – The Institute for the Future is a research organization that is focused on understanding emerging trends and long-term changes in the world.

2. The World Future Society

https://www.wfs.org/ – The World Future Society is a global network that works to explore and shape the future.

3. The Millennium Project

http://www.millennium-project.org/ – The Millennium Project is an independent global think tank that works to create a vision and action plan for a better future.

4. The Foresight Institute

https://www.foresight.org/ – The Foresight Institute is an organization that seeks to promote the responsible development of nanotechnology and other emerging technologies.

5. The Institute for New Economic Thinking

https://www.ineteconomics.org/ – The Institute for New Economic Thinking is a global think tank that works to promote critical economic analysis and new economic models.

6. The Hub of Futurism

https://www.hubof-futurism.com/ – The Hub of Futurism is a platform that brings together and connects futurists, thinkers, and innovators.

7. The Center for Science and the Imagination

https://scifi.asu.edu/ – The Center for Science and the Imagination is a research center dedicated to exploring the intersection of science and culture.

8. The Future of Life Institute

https://futureoflife.org/ – The Future of Life Institute is a research center that works to study, protect, and promote the future of life on Earth.

9. The Futurist Magazine

https://www.wfs.org/futurist – A magazine published by the World Future Society that features articles on technological, social, and economic changes and their implications on the future.

10. IEEE Spectrum

https://spectrum.ieee.org/ – A magazine published by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers that covers the technological advances and their effects on the future.

11. Singularity Hub

https://singularityhub.com/ – A website featuring articles on topics related to artificial intelligence, robotics, biotechnology, nanotechnology and their implications for the future.

12. Futurism

https://futurism.com/ – A website featuring news and opinion pieces about developments in science, technology, and the future.

13. The Futurist Podcast

https://thefuturistpodcast.com/ – A podcast featuring interviews with leading experts and thought leaders on topics related to the future.

14. The Institute for the Future

https://www.iftf.org/ – A research organization that provides resources and research on the future of technology, work, and society.

15. World Economic Forum

https://www.weforum.org/ – A platform featuring reports and discussions on topics related to the global economy and the future of work.

16. The Long Now Foundation

https://longnow.org/ – A foundation providing resources about long-term thinking and decision making for the future.

17. The Technology Review

https://www.technologyreview.com/ – A website featuring news and opinion pieces about emerging technologies and their implications for the future.

18. The Future of Life Institute

https://futureoflife.org/ – A research institute providing resources and research on the implications of emerging technologies on the future.

19. Futurism.com

https://futurism.com/ – A website dedicated to exploring the world of technological advances and the future of humanity.

20. Futurum Research

https://futurumresearch.com/ – An independent research firm that provides insights, analysis, and forecasts about the future of business and technology.

21. The Futures Agency

https://www.thefuturesagency.com/ – A consultancy dedicated to helping organizations, leaders, and individuals identify and prepare for the future.

22. Future of Life Institute

https://futureoflife.org/ – A research and outreach organization dedicated to exploring the potential of artificial intelligence and its implications for the future of humanity.

23. Long Now Foundation

https://longnow.org/ – A nonprofit organization that works to inspire long-term thinking and foster responsibility in the framework of the next 10,000 years.

24. Center for the Study of the Drone

https://dronecenter.bard.edu/ – A research center that provides analysis, education, and policy advice on the use of unmanned aerial systems (drones).

25. Massive Change Network

https://massivechangenetwork.org/ – An international network of organizations, cities, and individuals working to create a more sustainable and equitable world.

This is of course not an exhaustive list of all the futurology and futures research resources out there, but it is a good start to supplement all of the futurology articles here on this website.

Bottom line: Futurology and prescience are 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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What innovation hasn’t changed something?

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What innovation hasn't changed something? Can you think of a single innovation that didn’t change something?

I didn’t think so.

Innovation is change, or at least, innovation requires change.

In my role as an innovation keynote speaker and workshop facilitator, I recently led a German-based industrial company’s North American IT leadership team through an innovation workshop, during which we spent part of the time working to define their common language of innovation (as described in my book Stoking Your Innovation Bonfire). For companies looking to build a sustainable innovation capability this is an important first step.

One of the biggest reasons it is important to define innovation and to spend time creating a common language of innovation is that the word innovation means something different to every individual. It is very easy for companies to spin their wheels when people don’t have the same understanding of what constitutes innovation and what doesn’t.

Because of this danger, when working with companies to help build an innovation system I always make sure that we define what they want innovation to mean in their organization and what their vision, strategy and goals are going to be for innovation. This helps get everyone on the same page and causes people to start seeing some of the changes required in order to build a strong innovation capability in the organization.

Defining Innovation

As part of this most recent workshop discussion around what constitutes innovation I shared my definition of innovation and we worked together to create a definition that is going to fit their culture and their business.

My own personal definition of innovation is:

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

I’ve worked pretty hard over the years to refine this definition, and I like my definition because it highlights a couple of inherent tensions and relationships that people must consider. These include:

Invention vs. innovation
Useful vs. valuable
The requirement for an innovation to be widely adopted
The requirement for an innovation to replace the existing solution

Because innovation requires change, a potential innovation must:

Create so much value that people are willing to go through the discomfort of abandoning or migrating away from their existing solution (even if it is the oft-ignored ‘do nothing’ solution);
At the same time, you must also do an outstanding job of helping people access that value through design, packaging, education, etc. so that the product or service is a delight to use and so that you potentially simultaneously increase the overall value of the solution;
And, finally you must provide a very clear value translation for your potential customers of how this new solution will fit into their lives and is worth the disruption that comes with adopting it.

For those of you familiar with my book Stoking Your Innovation Bonfire, or with my other writings, you may recognize my Value Innovation Framework and my views on what it takes to achieve successful innovation captured in the above three points.

Organization Size and History Matters

Inside a large organization (or one with a longer history), a potential innovation often inflicts a lot of change on the organization. Inside a large organization or an organization with a longer history, the organization will have grown up around one or two initial solutions and built an infrastructure to maximize the success of those initial solutions. As a result, any potential innovation will often require knowledge, skills, and other resources in order to build and scale it that are new to the organization. This may involve building new distribution channels, hiring people with the necessary skills and expertise, and many more changes required to build the capabilities needed to make the potential innovation a success.

Inside a startup organization this is not the case, and this is the reason why it is often easier and faster for a startup to create and implement a potential innovation than an established company. Because everything is new, there is nothing to change, other than the minds of the customers in order to get them to replace their existing solution and the minds of potential partners to convince them to work with you. This is the advantage that startups have over existing companies.

But the disadvantage startups have is that startups usually have to spend more of their time chasing the funding they need to transform their idea into a realized innovation. Whether the advantages or the disadvantages are larger depends on the startup. And, whether the startup can beat the established organization depends on how good the established organization is at managing change, and how fast it can change.

Final Thoughts

Most of us work in established organizations that have either grown large because of successful leadership, strategic vision, efficient operations, and continuous improvement and innovation, or we work for an organization that has at least established some level of longevity as a going concern. This means that for most of us we MUST get better at change. We must accept change as a constant and as a key (along with innovation) to our organization continuing to thrive in a sea of rising global competition. We must also get FASTER at change.

One way to do this is to change HOW we change by embracing a new more visual, more collaborative approach to planning our change efforts using tools like my Change Planning Toolkit™. I will be introducing this toolkit in my new book Charting Change, releasing March 9, 2016. People who buy a copy of my book Charting Change will get access to the Change Planning Canvas™ and 25 other tools from the toolkit. As a special gift for everyone else, I will be making a series of 10 free downloads available on my web site from the 50+ frameworks, worksheets and other tools contained in the toolkit (including the popular Visual Project Charter™).

I hope it is now clear that to be successful at innovation that you must become better at change, and I encourage you all to do so!

This article originally appeared on the Planview blog

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