The Seven P’s of Raising Money from Investors

The Seven P's of Raising Money from Investors

GUEST POST from Arlen Meyers, M.D.

Budding sickcare entrepreneurs inevitably want to know, “How do I raise money for my idea?” Most of the time, they are not ready for fundraising prime time and they have not taken the necessary steps to begin to do so or understand when and if it is the prudent thing or right time to do.

Here are the 7 P’s of raising money from investors:

1. Preparation

You should prepare to raise money by 1) derisking your idea as much as possible and 2) understanding what it will take to raise money i.e. technical, clinical and commercial (traction) validation.

When you have an exciting new idea, it’s easy to focus on all its benefits and jump to action. But doing so can lead to failure. Your limited perspective may mean you’re not seeing potential hurdles — and you may be leaving other promising options unexplored.

If you want the best ideas to flourish, you need to open your mind to different people from people beyond your team, whom you don’t usually talk to — and ask open-ended questions. After presenting your idea, ask: What stands out to you, and what’s missing? What would our critics say? Consider the failure of your idea: What would your premortem reveal? Consider other people outside the room and ask: What would someone on the frontlines say? Finally, put yourself in your competitors’ shoes. What flaws or weaknesses in your idea would they celebrate if you were successful?

Do you understand the regulatory requirements and rules for raising private money?
Do you know how much money you should raise and in what form: debt, diluting funds or non-diluting funds, like grants, contracts or some proof of concept awards?
Have you validated the underlying hypotheses of your business model and demonstrated product-market fit? Do you have traction? What is the evidence? But, is product-market fit really enough?
Do you have a reimbursement or revenue plan?
Do you have a plan to create and protect your intellectual property?
Do you have a regulatory approval or compliance plan?
Have you created the appropriate corporate entity and corporate governance documents?
Are you prepared to bootstrap your startup and dedicate the time, effort and capital required to be successful?
Have you created the necessary fundraising and marketing collateral like a website, executive summary, social media channels to create awareness, engagement and buzz about your company?
Can you answer these three questions: Is the market for the problem you want to solve big enough to make your journey worth it? How many customers want it and are willing and able to pay for it or get someone else to pay for it? Can you win at it give market competitors?

2. Plan/Strategy

After answering these questions, assuming you decide to proceed, you will need a capital raising plan and strategy. A capital raising strategy is essentially a roadmap for how your organization will pursue and obtain the funds it needs to fuel its growth. The capital raising process can take a long time and it’s a serious undertaking. However, while you may stay up late at night searching for new investors, writing pitch decks, and pouring over financial spreadsheets, building your strategy is the simplest part of the entire process. Here are the parts to the plan.

3. Pitch deck

Your pitch deck should tell your story. Who are the villains? Who are the heros? How did they win? There are many resources available to help you craft and polish your short, medium and long pitches, depending on the circumstances and the audience. Here is something to start:

4. Platform

You will need a CRM or tracking platform to keep track of the people who have contacted and how you intend to convert them as leads to investors. Crowdfunding platforms are another resource.

5. People

Do you have the right people on your startup team who can raise money? Are the founders the right people to do it? Do you have robust enough networks and contacts? Do you need a fractional of full-time accountant, controller or chief financial officer?

6. Process

The process should describe how and who will execute your fundraising plan, whether you are starting a company or scaling one. Since what you are doing is selling and marketing your idea and your team, what is your marketing, sales operations and sales enablement process?

7. Performance indicators

Performance indicators help you measure your progress and inform your strategy and execution adjustments moving forward. Here are some fundraising metrics for non-profits.

Raising money from investors is a lot like renovating your kitchen. It will take much longer than you thought it would, the costs in time, money and effort will be much bigger than you assumed and, when you see the final results, you will wish you had done some things differently.

Good luck and be sure to follow the right rainbow.

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Practical Futures Thinking for Leaders

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Beyond the Crystal Ball

Practical Futures Thinking for Leaders

GUEST POST from Art Inteligencia

My partner in crime Braden Kelley’s focus is relentlessly on empowering leaders to navigate and drive change in a world that shifts faster than ever before. We’ve all seen the dazzling presentations of “futurists” with their glossy predictions, but true leadership demands more than passive stargazing. It demands a pragmatic, actionable approach to what’s coming next. That’s why today, I want to demystify strategic foresight in ‘Beyond the Crystal Ball: Practical Futures Thinking for Leaders’.

The future isn’t a fixed destination we can predict; it’s a dynamic landscape we actively shape. The traditional planning cycles, rigid five-year strategies, and reliance on historical data are increasingly insufficient in an age of exponential change. Leaders who merely react to disruptions will inevitably fall behind. Those who thrive will be the ones who cultivate a continuous, systematic practice of futures thinking, moving beyond speculation to strategic preparedness and proactive innovation.

Why “Futures Thinking” Isn’t Just for Futurists

Many leaders shy away from futures thinking, viewing it as an academic exercise detached from daily realities. This is a critical misconception. Practical futures thinking is not about making precise predictions; it’s about:

Anticipating Disruption: Identifying emerging trends, weak signals, and potential discontinuities before they become crises.
Challenging Assumptions: Breaking free from mental models based on the past, which often limit our perception of future possibilities.
Exploring Multiple Futures: Understanding that various plausible futures exist, enabling robust strategies that are resilient across different scenarios.
Identifying Opportunities: Spotting white space for innovation and new value creation that might be invisible through a traditional lens.
Building Resilience: Developing adaptable plans and organizational capacities to navigate uncertainty rather than being paralyzed by it.
Empowering Action: Translating insights about potential futures into concrete strategic choices and immediate innovation initiatives.

This isn’t about guesswork; it’s about structured inquiry, creative exploration, and critical analysis applied to uncertainty. It’s about proactive leadership in a volatile world.

Case Study 1: The Retail Giant That Foresaw the Experience Economy

In the early 2000s, a major department store chain was grappling with declining foot traffic and intense competition from burgeoning e-commerce. Traditional metrics pointed to optimizing store layouts and discount strategies. However, their internal futures thinking unit began to identify weak signals pointing to a profound shift in consumer values.

They didn’t just read reports; they ran workshops using scenario planning. They explored futures where:

“Pure Efficiency” dominated, with consumers only caring about price and speed (Amazon’s rise).
“Hyper-Personalization” was key, driven by advanced AI.
“Experience as the Ultimate Luxury” redefined value, with consumers seeking unique, immersive interactions over mere product acquisition.

Through this exercise, they realized that while efficiency was important, the “Experience as Luxury” scenario presented both the greatest threat and the biggest opportunity for a physical retailer. They foresaw that simply selling products would no longer suffice; they needed to sell experiences.

Practical Futures Thinking in Action: This foresight led to a radical strategic pivot. Instead of doubling down on traditional retail, they began experimenting with in-store cafes, pop-up events featuring local artisans, interactive product demonstrations, and personal styling services. They transformed their flagship stores into “cultural hubs” that offered more than just merchandise. This wasn’t a sudden epiphany; it was the result of a deliberate, human-centered futures thinking process that challenged their core assumptions about what a retail store is. While many legacy retailers struggled and disappeared, this company adapted, evolving its business model to become a destination for unique consumer experiences, carving out a distinct niche that was resilient against pure e-commerce disruption. They didn’t predict the future, they prototyped for it.

Case Study 2: The Healthcare Provider Anticipating the Blurring Lines of Care

A large integrated healthcare provider was historically focused on brick-and-mortar hospitals and clinics. Their operational planning revolved around capacity management, staffing, and insurance models. However, their strategic foresight team initiated a deep dive into the “Future of Health and Wellness.”

They employed a technique called trend analysis and wild cards to explore forces like:

The rise of consumer wearables and home diagnostics.
The aging global population and increasing chronic disease burden.
Advances in AI for diagnostics and remote monitoring.
Changing patient expectations for convenience and personalized care.
Potential “wild cards” like novel pandemics or widespread mental health crises.

They generated scenarios where traditional hospitals became less central, and care shifted dramatically to homes, community centers, and virtual platforms. They saw a future where “healthcare” blurred with “wellness,” “lifestyle management,” and even “preventative coaching.”

Practical Futures Thinking in Action: This comprehensive analysis helped them understand that simply building more hospitals wasn’t a sustainable long-term strategy. Instead, they began investing heavily in telehealth infrastructure, developing remote patient monitoring programs, partnering with community wellness organizations, and exploring AI-driven preventative health apps. They started training their medical staff not just as diagnosticians but as “health coaches.” By anticipating the shift from reactive, episodic care to proactive, continuous wellness management, this provider positioned itself as a leader in a transformed healthcare landscape. They didn’t just plan for incremental growth; they prepared for a foundational shift in how humans receive and manage their health, enabling them to meet future demand effectively and deliver human-centered care more broadly.

Cultivating a Foresight Culture in Your Organization

Futures thinking isn’t a one-off project; it’s a continuous capability that must be embedded into an organization’s DNA. Here’s how leaders can foster this culture:

Designated Foresight Function (Even Small): Dedicate resources (people, time, budget) to systematically scan the horizon, even if it’s just a small cross-functional team meeting monthly.
Democratize Access to Insights: Share foresight outputs (scenarios, trend reports, weak signals) broadly across the organization to spark conversations and challenge status quo thinking.
Integrate into Strategy & Innovation: Make futures insights an explicit input into annual strategic planning, R&D roadmaps, and new product development processes.
Encourage “What If” Thinking: Create safe spaces for employees to ask provocative questions, challenge assumptions, and explore radical possibilities without fear of judgment.
Learn from the Edges: Actively seek out perspectives from diverse sources—startups, academics, artists, marginalized communities—who often see the future forming before mainstream.
Practice Scenario Planning: Regularly engage leadership and key teams in workshops to build multiple plausible future scenarios and develop robust, adaptable strategies for each.

Beyond the crystal ball lies not certainty, but clarity. Clarity about the forces shaping our world, the potential paths ahead, and the choices we can make today to create a desired future. By embracing practical futures thinking, leaders move from being victims of change to architects of progress, ready to innovate for the human challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. It’s time to build the future, not just observe it.

Extra Extra: Futurology is not fortune telling. Futurists use a scientific approach to create their deliverables, but a methodology and tools like those in FutureHacking™ can empower anyone to engage in futurology themselves.

Image credit: Pixabay

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Beyond ROI: Measuring the Human Impact of Innovation

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Beyond ROI: Measuring the Human Impact of Innovation

GUEST POST from Chateau G Pato

My unwavering commitment is to innovation that genuinely serves humanity. In boardrooms and brainstorms, we often hear the relentless drumbeat of “ROI” — Return on Investment. While financially prudent, this narrow focus risks blinding us to the true, holistic value of our innovations. Today, I want to champion a broader, more profound metric: Beyond ROI: Measuring the Human Impact of Innovation.

The pursuit of innovation isn’t merely about optimizing profit margins or shaving off a few percentage points of cost. True, sustainable innovation transforms lives, empowers individuals, strengthens communities, and shapes a better future. When we prioritize only financial returns, we risk creating technologies and solutions that are technically brilliant but humanly deficient, failing to resonate or even causing unintended harm. Human-centered innovation demands that we look beyond the balance sheet to the profound effects our work has on people.

The Imperative of Human Impact Metrics

Why is this so crucial now? Because the complexity and pervasiveness of modern technology mean its impact—positive or negative—is amplified. An innovation designed solely for efficiency might inadvertently dehumanize work, erode trust, or create new forms of exclusion. Conversely, an innovation that deliberately targets human well-being can yield exponential societal benefits that far outweigh direct financial gains, often leading to unforeseen economic opportunities down the line.

Measuring human impact isn’t about being altruistic at the expense of business success; it’s about redefining what success truly means in the 21st century. It’s about building resilient, future-proof organizations that are deeply connected to the needs and aspirations of their users, employees, and the broader society. It requires a shift from:

Outputs to Outcomes: Not just what we produce, but what change we effect in people’s lives.
Transactions to Relationships: Valuing long-term engagement and trust over single sales.
Efficiency to Well-being: Recognizing that human flourishing is a powerful driver of productivity and creativity.
Quantitative to Qualitative (and Blended): Incorporating richer, narrative data alongside traditional numbers.

Case Study 1: Transforming Education – Beyond Test Scores with Personalized Learning Platforms

For decades, the success of educational innovation was often measured by improved test scores or reduced administrative overhead. While these are valid metrics, they often miss the deeper, human impact. Consider the introduction of personalized learning platforms in schools. Initially, ROI might focus on software licensing costs versus teacher salaries saved, or a slight uptick in standardized test performance.

However, the true innovation lies in its human impact. One ed-tech company, in partnership with a school district, shifted its focus to measuring student engagement, self-efficacy, and tailored learning pathways. They didn’t just track grades; they tracked:

Student Voice: Surveys and qualitative interviews about how students felt about their learning experience, their sense of progress, and their ability to get help when needed.
Teacher Empowerment: How the platform freed up teachers’ time from grading to focus on one-on-one mentorship, creative lesson planning, and addressing individual student needs.
Reduced Learning Anxiety: Tracking anecdotal evidence and student feedback on reduced stress levels and increased confidence due to self-paced learning and immediate feedback.
Parental Involvement: How accessible dashboards and communication tools fostered greater parent-teacher collaboration and understanding of student progress beyond just report cards.

Measuring Human Impact in Action: By moving beyond simply tracking test scores to understanding the experience of learning, the company and district uncovered profound benefits: students felt more motivated and less stressed, teachers felt more effective and engaged, and parents became more integrated partners in their children’s education. This “human ROI” led to higher student retention, greater teacher satisfaction, and ultimately, a more vibrant and effective learning environment, all of which indirectly contributed to the school’s long-term success and reputation in ways that pure financial metrics could never capture.

Case Study 2: Reimagining Urban Mobility – Enhancing Community Well-being with Smart City Solutions

Smart city innovations often promise economic efficiency, reduced congestion, and lower carbon footprints. While important, focusing solely on these can overlook critical human elements. Imagine a city implementing an AI-powered traffic management system. The initial ROI might be calculated in terms of reduced commute times and fuel consumption.

However, a forward-thinking urban planning initiative recognized the need to measure the human impact on community cohesion and accessibility. They implemented a smart mobility platform that went beyond just traffic flow, tracking metrics like:

Access to Essential Services: How effectively the new system connected residents, especially those in underserved areas, to healthcare, grocery stores, and job centers, measured by travel time and mode availability.
Social Interaction and Public Space Use: Qualitative and quantitative data on how easily people could access public parks, community centers, and local businesses, and whether reduced traffic noise improved the quality of public spaces.
Sense of Safety and Security: Resident surveys on their perception of safety while walking, cycling, or using public transport due to better lighting, integrated surveillance (with privacy safeguards), and optimized pedestrian flows.
Reduced Stress and Improved Mental Health: Anecdotal evidence and surveys capturing residents’ reported stress levels related to commuting and navigating the city.

Measuring Human Impact in Action: By measuring beyond simple efficiency—by actively seeking to understand how the smart mobility solution influenced people’s ability to access opportunities, connect with others, and feel safe in their environment—the city found unexpected dividends. Residents reported greater satisfaction with urban living, a stronger sense of community belonging, and even improved mental well-being due to less stressful commutes and superbly accessible public spaces. This human-centric approach solidified public support for further smart city initiatives and attracted new businesses and residents seeking a high quality of urban life, demonstrating that human well-being is a powerful, albeit indirect, driver of economic prosperity.

The Path Forward: Integrating Human-Centered Metrics

Integrating human impact metrics into our innovation processes is not a simple task. It requires:

Empathy-Driven Research: Deeply understanding user needs, pain points, and aspirations through qualitative research (interviews, ethnographic studies).
Clear Definitions: Defining what “human impact” means for your specific innovation and how it aligns with your organizational values.
Diverse Data Collection: Blending quantitative data (e.g., usage patterns, time saved) with qualitative insights (e.g., sentiment analysis, testimonials, observational data).
Long-Term Perspective: Recognizing that human impact often unfolds over time and requires sustained monitoring.
Collaborative Design: Involving users and affected communities in the design and evaluation process from the outset.
Ethical Review: Ensuring that the pursuit of impact doesn’t inadvertently lead to privacy breaches, data misuse, or other ethical compromises.

As human-centered change leaders, our greatest challenge—and our greatest opportunity—lies in expanding our definition of success. When we look beyond the immediate financial returns and actively measure the human impact of our innovations, we don’t just create better products or services. We create a better world. Let’s champion this broader vision, for it is in the true flourishing of humanity that the ultimate value of our innovation will be found.

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 credit: Gemini

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People Cannot Work Forever

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People Cannot Work Forever

GUEST POST from Mike Shipulski

When cars run out of gas, they can no longer get the job done until their tanks are filled up. And it’s the same with people, except people are asked to keep on truckin’ even though their tanks are empty.

When machines are used for a certain number of hours, they are supposed to be given rest and routine maintenance. If the maintenance isn’t completed as defined in the operator’s manual, the warranty is voided.

Maybe we could create a maintenance schedule for people. And if it’s not done, we could be okay with reduced performance, like with a machine. And when the scheduled maintenance isn’t performed on time, maybe we could blame the person who prevented it from happening.

If your lawnmower could tell you when you were using it in a way that would cause it damage, would you listen and change your behavior? How about if a person said a similar thing to you? To which one would you show more compassion?

When your car’s check engine light comes on, would you pretend you don’t see it or would you think that the car is being less than truthful? What if a person tells you their body is throwing a warning light because of how you’re driving them? Would you believe them or stomp on the accelerator?

We expect our machines to wear out and need refurbishment. We expect our cars to run out of gas if we don’t add fuel. We expect our lawnmowers to stall if we try to mow grass that’s two feet tall. We expect that their capacities and capabilities are finite. Maybe we can keep all this in mind when we set expectations for our people.

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The Narrative Advantage

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How Storytelling Fuels Innovation Adoption

The Narrative Advantage

GUEST POST from Art Inteligencia

My work centers on understanding how human beings embrace and drive change. In this pursuit, I’ve consistently found that logic and data, while essential, often fall short of igniting true transformation. What truly captures hearts and minds, what bridges the gap between a novel idea and widespread adoption, is the power of story. Today, I want to explore The Narrative Advantage: How Storytelling Fuels Innovation Adoption.

We are wired for stories. From ancient cave paintings to modern-day blockbusters, narratives have been the primary vehicle for transmitting knowledge, building connections, and inspiring action. Innovation, at its core, represents a change from the familiar. To overcome the inherent resistance to the new, we must frame our innovations not just as solutions, but as compelling stories that resonate with human needs, desires, and aspirations.

Beyond Features and Benefits: The Emotional Connection

Too often, we launch innovations by focusing on technical specifications, features, and benefits. While this information is important, it primarily appeals to the rational mind. Adoption, however, is often an emotional decision. People need to see themselves within the innovation’s narrative, to understand how it will impact their lives, solve their problems, or fulfill their ambitions on a personal level.

Storytelling allows us to create this emotional connection. A well-crafted narrative can:

Build Empathy: By sharing stories of real people whose lives have been improved by the innovation, we foster empathy and make the abstract tangible.
Create Understanding: Complex technologies become more accessible and understandable when woven into a relatable narrative.
Inspire Action: Compelling stories can ignite passion and motivate individuals to embrace the new.
Foster Trust: Authentic and transparent storytelling builds trust in the innovation and the organization behind it.
Drive Advocacy: People who connect with an innovation’s story are more likely to become advocates, spreading the word and encouraging adoption.

Case Study 1: The Little Blue Elephant That Could – Democratizing Data with a Human Touch

Consider the challenge of introducing sophisticated data analytics tools to teams that have traditionally relied on intuition or basic spreadsheets. The technology might offer immense potential for improved decision-making and efficiency, but the learning curve and perceived complexity can be significant barriers to adoption.

One company I worked with faced this exact scenario. Their new data platform, while technically brilliant, was met with lukewarm reception. Teams felt overwhelmed by the dashboards and the sheer volume of information. That’s when we shifted our approach to emphasize storytelling.

Instead of bombarding teams with technical manuals, we developed a series of “day-in-the-life” stories featuring individuals from different departments. We created a fictional persona, “Eleanor the Analyst” (represented internally by a small blue elephant plush toy – a memorable visual anchor). Each story showcased Eleanor using the new platform to overcome a specific challenge her team faced – optimizing marketing campaigns, streamlining supply chain issues, or improving customer service.

These weren’t dry use cases; they were narratives with relatable characters, clear challenges, and triumphant resolutions, all made possible by the new data platform. We focused on the “how it felt” for Eleanor and her team – the sense of empowerment, the clarity gained, the time saved.

The Narrative Advantage in Action: By personifying the technology and illustrating its impact through engaging stories, we made the abstract concrete and the complex accessible. The little blue elephant became a symbol of data-driven success. Adoption rates soared as teams began to see themselves as the protagonist in similar success stories. The narrative shifted from “a complicated new tool we have to learn” to “a powerful ally that can help us achieve our goals.”

Case Study 2: The Silent Guardian – Building Trust in Autonomous Vehicles Through Transparent Storytelling

The advent of autonomous vehicles (AVs) presents a paradigm shift in transportation. The technology promises increased safety, efficiency, and accessibility. However, it also evokes anxieties related to trust, control, and the unknown. Overcoming this resistance is crucial for widespread adoption.

One leading AV developer understood that simply showcasing the technology’s capabilities wouldn’t be enough. They recognized the need to build a narrative of safety and reliability. Their approach centered on transparent storytelling that addressed public concerns head-on.

They created a series of short videos and blog posts that went behind the scenes of their rigorous testing processes. They featured the engineers and safety experts who were meticulously designing and validating the AV software and hardware. They shared stories of the countless simulations and real-world trials their vehicles underwent, highlighting the redundancies and fail-safe mechanisms built into the system.

Crucially, they also addressed potential failure scenarios openly and honestly, explaining how the AV system was designed to respond safely in unexpected situations. They didn’t shy away from the complexities but rather sought to demystify them through clear and accessible language.

The Narrative Advantage in Action: By telling the story of their meticulous development process, their commitment to safety, and their proactive approach to addressing potential risks, this AV developer built a narrative of trust and reliability. This transparency helped to alleviate public anxieties and fostered a greater sense of confidence in the technology. The narrative shifted from “a potentially dangerous robot car” to “a carefully engineered and rigorously tested silent guardian.”

Crafting Your Innovation Narrative

Developing a compelling innovation narrative requires more than just telling a story; it demands strategic thinking and a deep understanding of your audience. Consider these elements:

Identify Your Protagonist: Who is the hero of your story? Often, it’s the user whose problem is being solved or whose life is being improved.
Define the Challenge: What problem or pain point does your innovation address? Make it relatable and emotionally resonant.
Present Your Innovation as the Guide: How does your innovation help the protagonist overcome their challenge and achieve their goal?
Illustrate the Transformation: What does the “happily ever after” look like? How will the protagonist’s life or work be better because of your innovation?
Maintain Authenticity: Your story must be genuine and believable. Avoid hyperbole and focus on the real impact of your innovation.

In conclusion, in a world saturated with information, stories cut through the noise and forge meaningful connections. By harnessing the power of narrative, we can transform innovative ideas from abstract concepts into compelling realities that people understand, trust, and ultimately adopt. The narrative advantage isn’t a marketing afterthought; it’s the very foundation upon which successful innovation adoption is built. So, let us ask ourselves not just what our innovation does, but what story it tells. For it is in that story that we will find the key to unlocking widespread embrace and realizing the full potential of our creations.

Image credit: Pexels

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6 Ways to Create Trust with Your Employees

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6 Ways to Create Trust with Your Employees

GUEST POST from Shep Hyken

Last week I wrote an article, 4 Ways to Create Trust with Your Customers. I don’t think anyone would argue (and the stats prove it) that a customer who trusts you is more likely to do more business with you. After all, why would they want to risk doing business elsewhere?

Well, it’s the same for employees. With so many employment issues today, it’s more important than ever to get and keep good employees. One of the crucial areas that can drive employee retention is trust. Just like customers, if employees don’t trust you, they may eventually leave for a competitor. And in the world of employee retention, a competitor is any other company that offers employment opportunities.

With that in mind, here are six ways to build trust with your employees.

1. Listen to your employees. Ask them for feedback. Frontline employees often have a better opportunity to know what customers think and say about you than anyone else in the company. Listen to them. And many employees have suggestions about processes and systems that can be improved. Creating an easy way for employees to share feedback and make suggestions can be a powerful way to improve the experience—for both customers and the employees themselves.

2. Act on the feedback and insights employees share with you. If you ask your employees for their feedback and insights and do nothing with it, employees eventually resent that they took the time to offer up their ideas and suggestions. And at some point, they will see it as a futile effort and waste of time, even if what they share with you is important. Employees often provide even more valuable feedback than customers. So, even if you choose not to use their suggestions, at least acknowledge their effort, express appreciation and let them know why.

3. Make sure leadership and management are accessible. If there is a metaphorical wall between employees and leadership, employees will always feel like they are on the outside. And if they feel like outsiders, any organization that may make them feel more included and appreciated could be the next place your employee—who you thought was happy—ends up working. There are different ways to go about this. An open-door policy is not always realistic. As an alternative, consider having “office hours”—a special time each week when employees can make an appointment. The point is that it needs to be easy for employees to connect with their managers, supervisors, and leadership.

4. Get out of the office and mingle with “the people.” If the only time employees see management or leadership is when there are problems, then the sight of them will create a level of fear and tension. Years ago, I read Tom Peter’s strategy he referred to as MBWA, Management by Wandering Around. The idea is that employees would not fear the sight of management, because they become used to seeing their bosses and leaders walking around. If a manager shows up just to point out problems or criticize, employees will always have concern whenever they see a manager or leader walking anywhere near them. The goal is to achieve trust, not fear.

5. Trust employees to do the jobs you hired them to do. If you hire good people and train them well, let them do their jobs. If employees feel like they are always being watched, scrutinized for their work and not being allowed to make the decisions you hired them to make, they will feel unfulfilled and frustrated. This is “Empowerment 101.”

6. Treat employees the way you want the customer to be treated. I refer to this as The Employee Golden Rule. You can’t expect employees to behave toward customers and each other in a way that’s different—as in better—than the way they are treated by their managers and leaders. Your actions and attitude toward your employees must be congruent with how you want them to treat your customers. You can’t invite them to your office, yell at them and then them, “Now go out there and be nice to our customers.”

What’s happening on the inside of the organization is felt on the outside by customers. To create the best customer experience, you must create a similar employee experience, if not even better. While there are many components that go into creating a great culture for an organization, trust is one of the essentials. Without it, you can’t expect to get and keep your best employees.

This article originally appeared on Forbes

Image Credit: Shep Hyken

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Innovation with Integrity

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Navigating the Ethical Minefield of New Technologies

Innovation with Integrity - Navigating the Ethical Minefield of New Technologies

GUEST POST from Chateau G Pato

My life’s work revolves around fostering innovation that truly serves humanity. We stand at a fascinating precipice, witnessing technological advancements that were once the stuff of science fiction rapidly becoming our reality. But with this incredible power comes a profound responsibility. Today, I want to delve into a critical aspect of this new era surrounding innovating with integrity.

The breakneck speed of progress often overshadows the ethical implications baked into these innovations. We become so enamored with the “can we?” that we forget to ask “should we?” This oversight is not just a moral failing; it’s a strategic blunder. Technologies built without a strong ethical compass risk alienating users, fostering mistrust, and ultimately hindering their widespread adoption and positive impact. Human-centered innovation demands that we place ethical considerations at the very heart of our design and development processes.

The Ethical Imperative in Technological Advancement

Think about it. Technology is not neutral. The algorithms we write, the data we collect, and the interfaces we design all carry inherent biases and values. If we are not consciously addressing these, we risk perpetuating and even amplifying existing societal inequalities. Innovation, at its best, should uplift and empower. Without a strong ethical framework, it can easily become a tool for division and harm.

This isn’t about stifling creativity or slowing progress. It’s about guiding it, ensuring that our ingenuity serves the greater good. It requires a shift in mindset, from simply maximizing efficiency or profit to considering the broader societal consequences of our creations. This means engaging in difficult conversations, fostering diverse perspectives within our innovation teams, and proactively seeking to understand the potential unintended consequences of our technologies.

Case Study 1: The Double-Edged Sword of Hyper-Personalization in Healthcare

The promise of personalized medicine is revolutionary. Imagine healthcare tailored precisely to your genetic makeup, lifestyle, and real-time health data. Artificial intelligence and sophisticated data analytics are making this increasingly possible. We can now develop highly targeted treatments, predict health risks with greater accuracy, and empower individuals to take more proactive control of their well-being.

However, this hyper-personalization also presents a significant ethical minefield. Consider a scenario where an AI algorithm analyzes a patient’s comprehensive health data and identifies a predisposition for a specific condition that, while not currently manifesting, carries a social stigma or potential for discrimination (e.g., a neurological disorder or a mental health condition).

The Ethical Dilemma: Should this information be proactively shared with the patient? While transparency is generally a good principle, premature or poorly communicated information could lead to anxiety, unwarranted medical interventions, or even discrimination by employers or insurance companies. Furthermore, who owns this data? How is it secured against breaches? What safeguards are in place to prevent biased algorithms from recommending different levels of care based on demographic factors embedded in the training data?

Human-Centered Ethical Innovation: A human-centered approach demands that we prioritize the patient’s well-being and autonomy above all else. This means:

Transparency and Control: Patients must have clear understanding and control over what data is being collected, how it’s being used, and with whom it might be shared.
Careful Communication: Predictive insights should be communicated with sensitivity and within a supportive clinical context, focusing on empowerment and preventative measures rather than creating fear.
Robust Data Security and Privacy: Ironclad measures must be in place to protect sensitive health information from unauthorized access and misuse.
Bias Mitigation: Continuous efforts are needed to identify and mitigate biases in algorithms to ensure equitable and fair healthcare recommendations for all.

In this case, innovation with integrity means not just developing the most powerful predictive algorithms, but also building ethical frameworks and safeguards that ensure these tools are used responsibly and in a way that truly benefits the individual without causing undue harm.

Case Study 2: The Algorithmic Gatekeepers of Opportunity in the Gig Economy

The rise of the gig economy, fueled by sophisticated platform technologies, has created new forms of work and flexibility for millions. Algorithms match individuals with tasks, evaluate their performance, and often determine their access to future opportunities and even their earnings. This algorithmic management offers efficiency and scalability, but it also raises serious ethical concerns.

Consider a ride-sharing platform that uses an algorithm to rate drivers based on various factors, some transparent (e.g., customer ratings) and some opaque (e.g., route efficiency, acceptance rates). Drivers with lower scores may be penalized with fewer ride requests or even deactivation from the platform, effectively impacting their livelihood.

The Ethical Dilemma: What happens when these algorithms contain hidden biases? For instance, if drivers who are less familiar with a city’s layout (potentially newer drivers or those from marginalized communities) are unfairly penalized for slightly longer routes? What recourse do drivers have when they believe an algorithmic decision is unfair or inaccurate? The lack of transparency and due process in many algorithmic management systems can lead to feelings of powerlessness and injustice.

Human-Centered Ethical Innovation: Innovation in the gig economy must prioritize fairness, transparency, and worker well-being:

Algorithmic Transparency: The key factors influencing algorithmic decisions that impact workers’ livelihoods should be clearly communicated and understandable.
Fair Evaluation Metrics: Performance metrics should be carefully designed to avoid unintentional biases and should genuinely reflect the quality of work.
Mechanisms for Appeal and Redress: Workers should have clear pathways to appeal algorithmic decisions they believe are unfair and have their concerns reviewed by human oversight.
Consideration of Worker Well-being: Platform design should go beyond simply matching supply and demand and consider the broader well-being of workers, including fair compensation, safety, and access to support.

In this context, innovating with integrity means designing platforms that not only optimize efficiency but also ensure fair treatment and opportunity for the individuals who power them. It requires recognizing the human impact of these algorithms and building in mechanisms for accountability and fairness.

Building an Ethical Innovation Ecosystem

Navigating the ethical minefield of new technologies requires a multi-faceted approach. It’s not just about creating a checklist of ethical considerations; it’s about fostering a culture of ethical awareness and responsibility throughout the innovation lifecycle. This includes:

Ethical Frameworks and Guidelines: Organizations need to develop clear ethical principles and guidelines that inform their technology development and deployment.
Diverse and Inclusive Teams: Bringing together individuals with diverse backgrounds and perspectives helps to identify and address potential ethical blind spots.
Proactive Ethical Impact Assessments: Before deploying new technologies, organizations should conduct thorough assessments of their potential ethical and societal impacts.
Continuous Monitoring and Evaluation: Ethical considerations should not be a one-time exercise. We need to continuously monitor the impact of our technologies and be prepared to adapt and adjust as needed.
Open Dialogue and Collaboration: Engaging in open discussions with stakeholders, including users, policymakers, and ethicists, is crucial for navigating complex ethical dilemmas.

Innovation with integrity is not a constraint; it’s a catalyst for building technologies that are not only powerful but also trustworthy and beneficial for all of humanity. By embracing this ethical imperative, we can ensure that the next wave of technological advancement truly leads to a more just, equitable, and sustainable future. Let us choose to innovate not just brilliantly, but also wisely.

Image credit: Gemini

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You Can’t Innovate Without This One Thing

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You Can't Innovate Without This One Thing

GUEST POST from Robyn Bolton

It just landed on your desk. Or maybe you campaigned to get it. Or perhaps you just started doing it. How the title of “Innovation Leader” got to your desk doesn’t matter nearly as much as the fact that it’s there, along with a budget and loads of expectations.

Of course, now that you have the title and the budget, you need a team to do the work and deliver the results.

Who should you look for? The people that perform well in the current business, with its processes, structures, and (relative) predictability, often struggle to navigate the constant uncertainty and change of innovation. But just because someone struggles in the process and structure of the core business doesn’t mean they’ll thrive creating something new.

What are the qualities that make someone a successful innovator?

70 answers

A lot of people have a lot to say about the qualities and characteristics that make someone an innovator. When you combine the first four Google search results for “characteristics of an innovator” with the five most common innovation talent assessments, you end up with a list of 70 different (and sometimes conflicting) traits.

The complete list is at the end of this article, but here are the characteristics that appeared more than once:

Curious
Persistent
Continuously reflective
Creative
Driven
Experiments
Imaginative
Passionate

It’s a good list, but remember, there are 62 other characteristics to consider. And that assumes that the list is exhaustive.

+1 Answer

It’s not. Something is missing.

There is one characteristic shared by every successful innovator I’ve worked with and every successful leader of innovation. It’s rarely the first (or second or third) word used to describe them, but eventually, it emerges, always said quietly, after great reflection and with dawning realization.

Vulnerability.

Whether you rolled your eyes or pumped your fist at the word made famous by Brene Brown, you’ve no doubt heard it and formed an opinion about it.

Vulnerability is the “quality or state of being exposed to the possibility of being attacked or harmed, either physically or emotionally.” Without it, innovation is impossible.

Innovation requires the creation of something new that creates value. If something is new, some or all of it is unknown. If there are unknowns, there are risks. Where there are risks, there is the possibility of being wrong, which opens you up to attack or harm.

When you talk to people to understand their needs, vulnerability allows you to hear what they say (versus what you want them to say).

In brainstorming sessions, vulnerability enables you to speak up and suggest an idea for people to respond to, build on, or discard.

When you run experiments, vulnerability ensures that you accurately record and report the data, even if the results aren’t what you hoped.

Most importantly, as a leader, vulnerability inspires trust, motivates your team, engages your stakeholders, and creates the environment and culture required to explore, learn, and innovate continuously.

n + 1 is the answer

Just as you do for every job in your company, recruit the people with the skills required to do the work and the mindset and personality to succeed in your business’ context and culture.

Once you find them, make sure they’re willing to be vulnerable and support and celebrate others’ vulnerability. Then, and only then, will you be the innovators your company needs.

Here’s the full list of characteristics:

Action-oriented, gets the job done
Adaptable
Ambitious
Analytical, high information capacity, digs through facts
Associative Thinker, makes uncommon connections
Breaks Boundaries, disruptive
Business minded
Collaborative
Compelling Leader
Competitive
Consistent
Continuously reflects (x3)
Courageous
Creative (x3)
Curious (x4), asks questions, inquisitive, investigates
Delivers results, seeks tangible outcomes
Disciplined
Divergent Thinker
Driven (x3)
Energetic
Experiments (x2)
Financially oriented
Flexible, fluid
Formally educated and trained
Futuristic
Giving, works to benefit others, wants to make the world better
Goal-oriented
Has a Growth mindset
Highly confident
Honest
Imaginative (x2)
Influential, lots of social capital
Instinctual
Intense
Iterating between abstract and concrete thinking
Learns through experiences
Likes originality, seeks novelty
Loyal
Motivated by change, open to new experiences
Networks, relates well to others
Observes
Opportunistic mindset, recognizes opportunities
Opportunity focused
Passionate (x2)
Patient
Persistent (x4)
Persuasive
Playful
Pragmatic
Proactive
Prudent
Rapidly recognizes patterns
Resilient
Resourceful
Respects other innovators
Seeks understanding
Self-confident
Socially intelligent
Stamina
Takes initiative
Takes risks
Team-oriented
Thinks big picture
Thrives in uncertainty
Tough
Tweaks solutions constantly
Unattached exploration
Visionary
Wants to get things right
Willing to Destroy

And the sources:

Image Credit: Pixabay

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Human-Centered Innovation

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Leading with Empathy and Purpose

Human-Centered Innovation

GUEST POST from Art Inteligencia

We are living in an era of accelerated disruption, where agility, adaptability, and authenticity are vital. Organizations that thrive are those that place human beings — their needs, values, and experiences — at the center of their innovation efforts. Human-centered innovation is not a one-time initiative; it’s a leadership philosophy and cultural mindset. It combines empathy, purpose, and co-creation to solve the right problems and deliver sustainable impact.

The Mindset Shift: From Product-First to People-First

Historically, innovation has often been driven by technical feasibility and operational efficiency. While important, these elements alone rarely produce breakthrough outcomes. Human-centered innovation flips the script — starting not with the solution, but with the people experiencing the problem. This mindset demands curiosity, humility, and a deep commitment to designing with — not just for — stakeholders.

Case Study 1: Mayo Clinic’s Center for Innovation

Challenge:

Mayo Clinic wanted to elevate the patient experience and align care delivery more closely with patient needs and expectations.

Approach:

They established the Center for Innovation to embed human-centered design principles into their healthcare system. Teams of clinicians, designers, and technologists collaborated directly with patients to map pain points and ideate solutions. The focus wasn’t just on what could be improved, but what should be improved from the patient’s perspective.

Outcome:

Through co-creation, Mayo Clinic redesigned waiting areas, streamlined appointment systems, and introduced more transparent communication tools. These changes improved patient satisfaction, reduced stress, and fostered stronger doctor-patient relationships — while also enhancing care team productivity and morale.

Principles of Human-Centered Innovation

Empathy-Driven Discovery: Immerse yourself in users’ contexts through ethnographic research, journey mapping, and storytelling.
Inclusive Co-Creation: Involve diverse stakeholders — especially those directly impacted — throughout the innovation process.
Rapid Iteration: Prototype early, test frequently, and learn fast to ensure solutions are viable, feasible, and desirable.
Systemic Thinking: Understand the interdependencies within the ecosystem to design scalable, sustainable solutions.
Purpose-Led Transformation: Align innovation efforts with the organization’s mission and societal impact goals.

Case Study 2: IBM’s Enterprise Design Thinking

Challenge:

IBM needed to reinvigorate its innovation practices to better align product development with evolving customer expectations.

Approach:

They launched Enterprise Design Thinking — a framework designed to embed empathy and agility across the enterprise. Cross-functional teams, including sponsor users, collaborated in iterative cycles of alignment, ideation, and feedback. Tools like Hills (clear problem statements) and Playbacks (structured feedback loops) ensured consistent engagement and learning.

Outcome:

Projects accelerated dramatically, reducing time-to-market by over 50%. User satisfaction scores rose as products better reflected actual needs. Internally, the initiative boosted employee engagement, cross-team collaboration, and a shared innovation language across the organization.

Embedding Human-Centered Change

Innovation isn’t just about ideas — it’s about people driving meaningful change. Leaders must create the conditions for empathy and experimentation to flourish. This means fostering psychological safety, celebrating curiosity, and removing friction from collaboration. Human-centered innovation becomes sustainable when it’s woven into leadership behaviors, reward systems, and strategic priorities.

Ultimately, innovation rooted in human need unlocks greater loyalty, differentiation, and relevance. It ensures we are solving the right problems — not just building faster solutions. And in a world demanding more inclusive, equitable, and regenerative approaches, human-centered design isn’t just an advantage. It’s a responsibility.

Image credit: Pexels

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Importance of Measuring Your Organization’s Innovation Maturity

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Importance of Measuring Your Organization’s Innovation Maturity

by Braden Kelley

Is our organization a productive place for creating innovation? How does our organization’s innovation capability compare to that of other organizations?

Almost every organization wants to know the answers to these two questions.

The only way to get better at innovation, is to first define what innovation means. Your organization must have a common language of innovation before you can measure a baseline of innovation maturity and begin elevating both your innovation capacity and capabilities.

My first book Stoking Your Innovation Bonfire, was created to help organizations create a common language of innovation and to understand how to overcome the barriers to innovation.

The Innovation Maturity Assessment

One of the free tools I created for purchasers of Stoking Your Innovation Bonfire, and for the global innovation community, was an innovation maturity assessment with available instant scoring at http://innovation.help.

My 50 question innovation audit measures each individual’s view of the organization’s innovation maturity across a number of different areas, including: culture, process, funding, collaboration, communications, etc.

When multiple individuals at the same organization complete the questionnaire, it is then possible to form an organizational view of the organization’s level of innovation maturity.

Each of the 50 questions is scored from 0-4 using this scale of question agreement:

0 – None
1 – A Little
2 – Partially
3 – Often
4 – Fully

To generate an innovation maturity score that is translated to the innovation maturity model as follows:

000-100 = Level 1 – Reactive
101-130 = Level 2 – Structured
131-150 = Level 3 – In Control
151-180 = Level 4 – Internalized
181-200 = Level 5 – Continuously Improving

Innovation Maturity Model

Image adapted from the book Innovation Tournaments by Christian Terwiesch and Karl Ulrich

Innovation Maturity is Organization-Specific

The best way to understand the innovation maturity of your organization is to have a cross-functional group of individuals across your organization fill out the assessment and then collate and analyze the submissions. This allows us to make sense of the responses and to make recommendations of how the organization could evolve itself for the better. I do offer this as a service at http://innovation.help.

What Do the Numbers Say About the Average Level of Innovation Maturity?

To date, the innovation maturity assessment web application at http://innovation.help has gathered about 400 seemingly valid responses across a range of industries, geographies, organizations and job roles.

The average innovation maturity score to date is 102.91.

This places the current mean innovation maturity score at the border between Level 1 (Reactive) and Level 2 (Structured). This is not surprising.
Looking across the fifty (50) questions, the five HIGHEST scoring questions/statements are:

We are constantly looking to improve as an organization (3.12)
I know how to submit an innovation idea (2.83)
Innovation is part of my job (2.81)
It is okay to fail once in a while (2.74)
Innovation is one of our core values (2.71)

The scores indicate that the typical level of agreement with the statements is “often” but not “always.”

Looking across the fifty (50) questions, the five LOWEST scoring questions/statements are:

Six sigma is well understood and widely distributed in our organization (1.74)
We have a web site for submitting innovation ideas (1.77)
There is more than one funding source available for innovation ideas (1.79)
We have a process for killing innovation projects (1.82)
We are considered the partner of first resort for innovation ideas (1.83)

The scores indicate that the typical level of agreement with the statements is “partially.”

What does this tell us about the state of innovation maturity in the average organization?

The numbers gathered so far indicate that the state of innovation maturity in the average organization is low, nearly falling into the lowest level. This means that on average, our organizations are focused on growth, but often innovate defensively, in response to external shocks. Many organizations rely on individual, heroic action, lacking formal processes and coordinated approaches to innovation. But, organizations are trending towards greater prioritization of innovation by senior management, an introduction of dedicated resources and a more formal approach.

The highest scoring questions tell us that our organizations are still in the process of embedding a continuous improvement mindset. We also see signs that many people view innovation as a part of their job, regardless of whether they fill an innovation role. Often, people know how to submit an innovation idea. And, we can infer that an increasing number of organizations are becoming more comfortable with the notion of productive failure, and communicating the importance of innovation across the organization.

Finally, the lowest scoring questions show us that process improvement methodologies like six sigma haven’t penetrated as many organizations as one might think. This means that many organizations lack the experience of having already spread a shared improvement methodology across the organization, making the spread of an innovation language and methodologies a little more difficult. We also see an interesting disconnect around idea submission in the high and low scoring questions that seems to indicate that many organizations are using off-line idea submission. Zombie projects appear to be a problem for the average organization, along with getting innovation ideas funded as they emerge. And, many organizations struggle to engage partners across their value and supply chains in their innovation efforts.

Conclusion

While it is interesting to look at how your organization might compare to a broader average, it is often less actionable than creating that deeper understanding and analysis of the situation within your unique organization.

But no matter where your organization might lie now on the continuum of innovation maturity, it is important to see how many variables must be managed and influenced to build enhanced innovation capabilities. It is also important to understand the areas where your organization faces unique challenges compared to others – even in comparing different sites and/or functions within the same organization.

Creating a baseline and taking periodic measurements is crucial if you are serious about making progress in your level of innovation maturity. Make your own measurement and learn how to measure your organization’s innovation maturity more deeply at http://innovation.help.

No matter what level of innovation maturity your organization possesses today, by building a common language of innovation and by consciously working to improve across your greatest areas of opportunity, you can always increase your ability to achieve your innovation vision, strategy and goals.

Keep innovating!

This article originally appeared on the Edison365 Blog

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