The resources provide the lungs that give oxygen; they need to constantly be nurtured, too breathe and pump new life into the existing.

For innovation the same applies, we need to consistently build our innovative resources, they give delivery of the healthy living cells to promote and sustain us in new value potential.

The problem is we often are not very good at maintaining our resources and innovation activity. We just simply do not sustain our efforts, we tend to allow them to drift along or become lopsided from one individual team’s efforts, while the others simply ‘wallow’
Equally, organizations rarely set about designing the right conditions, working towards the innovation environment that ‘delivers’ a particular state of being, so as to allow something positive to happen, it is just expected to happen. Do we even bother to check for the real pulse of our innovation efforts?

My belief is if we do not have a constant working and reworking of these conditions we can’t honestly expect our organization to build the capacity, capability and competency we need for innovation to take hold, embed and becomes the long-term driver of the growth our organizations need and desire. We need to design a more sustaining effort

How do you develop the capacity to be exceptionally good every day? It is this constant focus on building the capabilities that matter, yet often we are not aware of those that significantly contribute, against those that are necessary to have or simply those that we need around to maintain what we have achieved.

Combining capability with capacity and competence becomes essential.

It is the combination effect of skills, organization abilities, processes and learning that combines to get things done. They individually and collectively impact performance.

Are organizations clear on what makes-up their core competencies? Do they constantly evaluate these within a consistent evolving set of changing market conditions or are they rather static, inwardly driven and not outwardly aware?

I have been working on for some time –actually it seems for ever- on a framework that separates the static needs of working innovation with the more dynamic ones that make the difference and provide the abilities to turn every-day activity into more distinctive, breakthrough, radical or disruptive innovation outcomes.

This work-in-progress I keep building upon,can be explored on a dedicated web site of www.innovationfitnessdynamics.com.

We do need to plan a capability maturing pathway so as to move our capabilities and competencies through from often a current ad-hoc state.

We need to turn these into a more formalized and predictive, planned out state, which brings a more integrated approach so as to extract any synergies but allows for a decent level of autonomy to grow individuals, yet build teams that constantly ‘form’ and reform to tackle the challenges the innovation opportunity presents to bring those to successful fruition in better ways.

Organizations seem not to learn from common mistakes
The amount of inconsistency in innovation (fits and starts) ,the turning off and on holds the building of our capabilities and competencies to innovate continuously back.

We do need to have a consistent, well-thought through plan for innovation development within organizations that is a resource development plan that has its distinct budgets, plans and dedicated group that is accountable to deliver on these plans, updated like all others within the normal planning cycles of the organization.

Innovation needs to be central within the new business core

When are we going to recognize that innovation should be a real core of our organization’s makeup? I wrote a three part series about “moving innovation into our core” (here, here and here)

I concluded with the emphasis on technology within all our organizations that we are in need of a radical newly designed Enterprise-wide innovation process. One that is embracing and adapting constantly to all we have been learning about how innovation works and what technology, digital, networks, relationships and social streaming brings that all need to be fully integrated within this redesign.

Innovation requires increasing agility, flexibility and allowing creativity to flourish on a constant, evolving basis. Today, innovation often stays outside the mainstream system and operational structures, often to it’s and the organizations detriment. as it is seen as something that does not fit the ‘norm’. This is today’s innovation problem

Innovation needs to be fluid, open, responsive; sometimes reliant on the instinct, hunch or powerful insight that is never ‘predictable’ but suddenly emerges from a collision of events, or random thoughts that lead to a new insight, a game changing one. It is really hard to turn this ‘randomness’ or serendipity into a system but certainly not impossible.

How are we going to design our innovation capabilities, competencies or capacity unless we fully recognize the dramatic changes in business that are now underway and what this needs to be addressed, to allow for a more responsive, fluid, agile and adaptive culture, to flourish and respond so as to generate the better innovation of the future we need.

Recognizing differences
There are real differences when it comes to building innovation understanding and equipping your organization to perform at improved levels. There are different traits, actions and activities to think through.

Here are some of the needs:

* We need to build far more serendipity into what we do, also random connections, as well as purposeful discovery, by seeking out increasing connections and engaging in networks of learning and mutual exchange.

Places where we are turning curiosity into reality and building our innovative mental abilities for growth, development and accomplishment, opening up and being receptive and then translating this into new innovation.

* We need to embed into our new innovation core new routines and thinking. It is determining the changes needed by those new combinations of fusion by seeking out the chemistry from all the connections and exchanges, pushing for creative collisions, positive tensions and dynamics to engage fully in innovation, so the culture, climate and environment are vibrant, challenging and exciting.

* We need to constantly seeking the new space from knowledge exploitation and exploration, redefining the organization edges, enlarging and enhancing our understanding, pushing constantly out, constantly evaluating, discovering and aligning growth options and then seeking out those outcomes that potentially offer the right return on innovation

* We need to place learning into the centre, to allow our capability building, new competencies to grow and evolve. We focus on the constant need to provide the mechanisms so as to improved performance and capacities by focusing on both our mental and physical abilities to our position and function to explore and exploit. Each contributes to our ability to receive, hold and absorb new knowledge. We measure these by the increased volume and quality outcomes

* We need new structures, attitudes, investment and motivation to change, to focus on innovation building that needs instilling and coming from the top, not just as a commitment that must happen but integrated and aligned into the strategic thinking and planning, worked through a clear pathway of change to achieve a different, core innovation capability..

* We need to determine the abilities to deliver in effective, focused, efficient and aligned ways. Knowing what is important, seeking out the actions to support and deliver the part needed to achieve the desired goals. Adjusting as we go, as we learn, ramping up what is working, dampening down what is clearly not.

* We need to build innovation by working it continuously,  on making our environment into this more evolving and dynamic one, where the climate and culture of innovation thrive and grows from this constant feeding and attention.

In summary
The more we focus specifically on what makes up our innovation competencies, capabilities and capacities, delivering the dynamic ones that give innovation impact,  the more we are able to comprehend what is important, produce added value and transform from what we have known into what we can see differently, opens us up more into the world of innovation possibilities..

It is developing the skill, knowledge and ability (or capability, capacity and competence) for innovation to deliver on its promise to sustain, grow and provide new value-adding outcomes that take the organization forward and it can no longer be haphazard but systematic and purposeful.

The post Delivering the innovation core: building capability, capacity and competency. first appeared on Building Your Innovation & Ecosystem Intelligence.

What do you actually want to achieve that takes you closer to your aspirations, not just immediate goals?

Can the way you conduct innovation today meet that strategic challenge? Does it ‘advance’ on your current position?

There are a host of reasons ‘renewal’ might be needed. Today, when markets are especially tough, looking long and hard at what you have and jettisoning what you don’t need becomes essential to reposition yourself as leaner and more flexible.

There are many pressing needs why you have to ‘shape up’. Don’t ignore the need for renewal.

Meeting competition in today’s market or positioning for the ‘forces’ swirling around global competition as it constantly changes the fortune for many does not simply arrive announced.

You need to be prepared, to be alert, and to be agile and fit. We have to create the right environment and now is the time to question many of the ‘established’ approaches.

We need to challenge them with fresher, more up-to-date thinking based on the multiple changes taking place around us constantly as much in our markets is certainly becoming more ‘fluid’, so renewal needs to be thought through irrespective.
Renewal needs some thinking through; here are some important referencing points:

• If you have placed innovation at the heart of generating any new growth, it becomes important to determine that all your energy gets focused, really focused on those areas that offer growth through new activities (products, services etc). Innovation needs to become a core capability.
• This cannot be simply determined or approached in any half-hearted way. It means ensuring that you achieve an absolute alignment of innovation to the strategy and don’t simply brush over existing weaknesses or vague possibilities, sweep them away.
• Be laser-focused on what and which innovation generates growth that meets your stated strategic needs and drive that through the pipeline.

• You must also make that important first step of a ‘hard’ assessment that evaluates your current position, question even the sacred cows. Build this understanding not just on internal observation but on external evaluations- talk to customers, to trusted contacts.
• Separate opinions and facts, highlight potential weaknesses, and look to rapidly address these. Achieve as clear a picture as you can, then set about the aspects that need renewal.

• Managing through innovation change needs a clear, dedicated focus in clarifying plans, thinking through new systems and practices. You need to commit to training and constant support, providing feedback and managing the inherent stress this can cause.
• You need to provide the building blocks of commitment and shared identification. It takes time and recognizing that this also requires a ‘sustaining innovation engine’ that needs well resourcing and built into your thinking.

• Innovation regeneration needs setting new visions, new directions and goals, providing essential resource and support to promote new culture and capabilities needed.
• You need to construct the appropriate action plans, track results, update and re-adjust from fresh knowledge and learning so these begin to restore a growing sense of identity and corporate value and building the communication plans to cascade these throughout the organization.
• Let everyone feel, hear and see the changes- to wake up and ‘smell the roses’.

• Plan any cultural or structural shifts so as to provide the learning platforms for investing in new competencies and skills that place a ‘premium’ on acquiring this new knowledge as essential to learn and needed to be adopted as new approaches.
• Use the practice of open consistent communications and a networking approach that identifies, informs and promotes the emerging vision of why we need to do innovation differently. Why we need to renew.

• Focus your energies on those crucial aspects of the business that constantly assesses, realigns, restructures and redeploys around the three critical aspects of knowing and leveraging your core business through your innovation offerings:
• a) making the customer the centre of your thinking b) fixing your products and service quality and responding at the new innovation speed expected, c) building increasing agility, flexibility and anticipation that is required to meet the new market needs. The customers’ needs become the centre of your renewal efforts.

• Seek out those pockets of resistance that are constantly just below the surface or even deep seated, address the critical issues through a change resistance grid and resolve the obstacles through a variety of methods and techniques with a real sense of urgency.
• Address this clearly and squarely so any renewal can begin to gain the momentum it requires.

• Crafting the story in a clear, logical way will gain that greater identification and commitment.
• Explaining that our future is not waiting for others, but we have to place our innovation destiny in our own hands by renewing ourselves on our terms so at least the majority of people begin to recognize renewal as necessary to meet the future.

There is always a need for making the case for renewal and charting the path towards the solutions is no different than any other corporate initiative. Making change is hard, really hard.

Calling for ‘renewal’ sometimes makes it even more difficult to gain the required identification when many are comfortable in the present ‘ways’.

The rewards come through an organization that emerges from today’s ‘uncertainly’ equipped to be more resistant, flexible and agile.

It has a greater chance to seize emerging opportunities quicker, at tomorrow’s new innovation speed.

Renewal is not an easy journey, but becoming more and more critical to do on a regular basis.

The post Making the first crucial steps towards innovation renewal first appeared on Building Your Innovation & Ecosystem Intelligence.