Today’s complex business environment presents several challenges for organizations. From the fast-changing pace of business to competing priorities to the globalization of products and team structures, there is much to contend with. Organizations must be able to adapt well to these mounting pressures if they hope to remain relevant and achieve sustainability.
Organizations must create a culture of innovation if they hope to succeed.
Innovation is a crucial puzzle piece to an organization’s ability to thrive and be competitive in the marketplace. According to Gary Oster, Associate Professor at Regent University and author of The Light Prize: Perspectives on Christian Innovation, “virtually everything is and should be open for innovation.” This suggests that every aspect of business – service offerings, processes, products and even business models must be innovated. Given the weightiness of innovation, it is imperative that it’s well-defined and accurately applied to business dealings and decision-making.
The definitions of innovation vary across the fields of academia, business and philosophy. However, according to researcher Fred Gault, a general definition of innovation broadly accepted in the business sector is “the implementation of a new or significantly improved product (good or service), or process, a new marketing method, or a new organizational method in business practices, workplace organization or external relations.”
Interestingly enough, several well-known, household names define innovation by describing what it is not. Albert Einstein argued that “innovation is not the product of logical thought, although the result is tied to logical structure.” Moreover, Steve Jobs once said that innovation “is not about money…[but] about the people you have, how you’re led, and how much you get it.”
At its core, innovation is reimagining what is, in order to create what could be.
Sounds a lot like creativity, right? The terms creativity and innovation are often used interchangeably. However, while the two are complementary, they are distinctively different. More importantly, both are necessary – interdependent even – and should be present in the make-up of an organization. In their article, Creativity and Innovation in Organizations: A Managerial Approach, Ionescu and Bolcas, faculty members of Business and Administration at the University of Bucharest, describe the relationship between creativity and innovation saying, “creativity is the capacity of human resources to identify new solutions for current problems, whereas innovation is the process whereby an idea is transformed into utility and is launched on the market.” In other words, creativity is the ability to generate new and fresh ideas. According to Oster, it’s essentially “unfettered play.”
Innovation, then, takes creativity a step further and puts into action that which has been identified and makes it tangible and usable. As innovation builds off creativity, the two must work in tandem.
So what about innovative leaders? What do they look like?
Consider these three key characteristics of an innovative leader:
- Risk-Taker. Willingness to take risks. Innovative leaders are not afraid to take risks. Such boldness and courage readily assumes that some risky decisions will fail. Innovative leaders are not only aware of potential failures; they embrace them as learning opportunities. An aversion to risk and innovation are like oil and water – they do not mix. Instead, as Scott Berkun, author of The Myths of Innovation, points out, innovation “asks for faith in something unknown over something known to be safe or even pleasant.” Fear of failure is the Achilles heel of innovation. Organizational leaders that are willing to take risks also encourage and support others throughout the organization to do the same.
- Collaborator. Genuinely collaborative. Innovative leaders are genuinely curious and inquisitive which leads them to better concepts or products. More importantly, it leads them to rely on a certain measure of inclusivity that allows collaborative groups to build on individual ideas. In his book, The Myths of Innovation, Berkun refers to the idea that innovation begins and ends with one person as the “myth of lone inventors.” Innovative leaders seek out opportunities to engage others in idea generation in efforts of landing on the best possible solution to a challenge or issue.
- Influencer. Innovative leaders have an uncanny ability to influence others, bringing about contagious creative expression. In their article, Strategic Leadership and Executive Innovation Influence: An International Multi-cluster Comparative Study, researchers, Elenkov, Judge, and Wright maintain that “by virtue of their prominent position within the firm, strategic leaders are more capable of seeing environmental trends that affect the organization’s future and providing more effective communication to the rest of the organization, and this leads to higher levels of organizational innovation.” Such leaders motivate and move others to act through their actions.
- Forward-Thinking. Planner. Visionary. Plan for the future. Innovative leaders are always looking ahead. They’re intentional about developing a pipeline of innovative talent that they can tap into when the need for additional or new leadership inevitably arises. They implement systems and processes that allow for leader development and couple them with consistent actions by leadership to be taken seriously. In other words, innovative leaders model the way and behave in the manner they would like others who come after them to emulate.
In today’s business environment, innovation is the lifeline of an organization. Take these characteristics to heart before it’s too late.
