For many, it seems, execution or final delivery of the innovation is simply not given enough attention inside many organizations and that needs to certainly change and not just left to chance or delegated out as the less important stage.

For me, clarifying and committing resources on the innovation delivery part is a critical task to get right. I’ve discussed that elsewhere, but if your final delivery is wrong then all your preparation and effort simply ‘goes out the window.’

It is like a restaurant kitchen- correct delivery of the item makes or breaks all the hard work beforehand and if the final garnish or sauces are wrongly executed, the meal itself fails and leaves the customer dissatisfied, irrespective of the original efforts put in.

To avoid this in innovation delivery you must have a full ‘convergence’ where you have aligned within your innovation process the organization, knowledge, technology, resources, concept and performance to bring this all into your go-to-market plans.

As you consider what is  involved for effective innovation delivery you might want to reflect upon the following within your sauce:

1. Mapping and planning this delivery completely- execution planning needs dedicated focus, a robust plan that has clear objectives but not overly complicated or excessive in detail.
2. Building and editing based on changing insights- keeping fluid and agile to changes and adapting the plans where necessary but crucially keeping everyone in the ‘loop’ so all news, good and bad, gets ‘aired’ and seen.
3. Project management and planning- adapting a disciplined approach to tackling the execution part: setting milestones, tracking changes, informing and pushing for commitments to be delivered upon.
4. Aligning and influencing multiple ‘vested’ interests- nothing beats communication, seeking opinion and knowing where you can accomodate or not. Be clear on what is important, what can be ‘worked around’ but draw all ‘voices’ into the process but take responsibility and decide- don’t let issues ‘hang’.
5. Collaborating with external stakeholders- knowing and valuing their place within the execution process is important to always have in mind. Engage with them constantly.
6. Ensure you have diversity in the team to promote and challenge constantly, seek to encourage and  engage in this often consuming participation as it will ‘alert’ you far earlier to problems than pressing on regardless, not wanting to listen to those signals.

A Go-2-Market plan covers the who, what, where and when and must include:

• Clarifying the needs and wants of customers in this launch- know these early.
• Attributes of success, a winning proposition articulated and constantly reviewed.
• Ensuring innovation delivery is tightly linked across the whole innovation process
• Scope, timeline and approach to market strategy is well thought through and updated.
• Definition of risks, economic, competitive and internal positions that are honest.
• Alignment capabilities and techniques and knowing the gaps to bridge realistically
• Definition and clarity of the relevant value to the different parties and the final customer
• Differentiation that is being provided by the new innovation that is clearly spelt out in a clear Value Proposition that keeps being referred too and evaluated.
• Outline of the appropriate proof-of-innovation delivery concept (based on research, concept work, piloting, customer engagement etc)
• Plan to acknowledge and cultivate the critical relationships involved and make sure all parties are kept in the loop, compromises only made to resolve impasse.
• Have clear ways to measure the results, impact and success of any delivery.
• Provision of feedback and enhancement opportunities/ needs to all relevant parties, even back to the front end of idea creation to provide improved clarity and definition that helps
• The clear accountability clarification of who does what well stated and well managed.

Achieving correct, effective innovation delivery does provide the chances of achieving greater commercialised success than simply allowing implementation to just happen as an afterthought.

The value of providing the appropriate resources to the final delivery end of innovation are sometimes the critical difference between why certain companies are just so much better at ‘delivering’ their innovation.

They ruthlessly execution to a well-thought-through plan that has learnt its secret sauce and constantly refined it.

The post Preparing the secret sauce for innovation delivery. first appeared on Building Your Innovation & Ecosystem Intelligence.

Why does innovation present such a stark choice, often fraught with difficulties for many, yet so simple and successful for the few? Innovation delivery is one of those differentiation points.

Let me suggest here nine points needing your consideration when it comes to thinking through the innovation back end delivery part.

Execution as I have outlined in a previous post is the final rugged frontier– the tough one to truly master as it is so variable in its makeup. Just consider:
Point one: the key to successful innovation is not idea generation or putting all your creative efforts into the front end of innovation, ideas are always plentiful; it is turning this myriad of ideas into market or customer changing outcomes that successfully deliver based on understanding the customer’s needs.

Point two: There are no silver bullets for execution that is simply a fact. For any established business it is striving to perform above known standards. The ability to sustain leadership in the market is not just about the new product but about the execution and delivery of this. Executing well you have to be ruthless as the market is unrelenting, so you must make designated people accountable to meeting or exceeding standards. Normally innovation delivery needs a highly engaged executive involvement. The innovation delivery part cannot be devolved; it has to be well orchestrated.

Point three: Innovation is always swimming in uncertain waters. As uncertainty rises, the value of a well-thought-out strategy actually drops. There are constantly arising critical unknowns and sometimes all you are left with as your innovation emerges is actually a starting point, a launching point that needs rapid understanding and interpretation to build quickly upon, to yet fully capitalise upon in suddenly hitting a ‘rich vein’ of untapped need.

Point four : So you really do have to be ready to adapt, be agile, be ready to experiment, explore and learn, hence why execution is actually the harder end of the innovation process to get right. Everything hangs off a hypothesis, a set of assumptions, a ‘germ’ of an idea and needs to be proven in its delivery. When innovation is at the heart of your strategy, you need to zero in to the best possible execution strategy and constantly review this as successful delivery provides the validation. What you learn has to be feed back fast into the organization so you need to make sure the listening and responding parts are switched on to ‘receive’ this new information.

Point five: Often the lack of a clear formalised decision making process for commercialization and going-to-market is not present. Corporate leadership often leaves this to lower levels to execute, yet those ‘responsible’ struggle due to a lack of fact-based safety nets, managing the levels of uncertainly that innovation has and the often reluctant to seek out leadership engagement to resolve conflicts.

Point six: Far too often senior executives are engaged elsewhere and those left in charge of the execution process lack the courage to make often tough and game changing decisions. This often damages optimal innovation delivery as teams often adopt safety first principles.

Point seven: The ability to move an idea to implementation- with increasing agility– is what will distinguish the successful organization from the less successful. The ability to execute well remains a critical gap of performance. Innovation requires a deeply imbedded set of capabilities. Innovation is high maintenance but also offers high reward.

Point eight: The increasing complexity within markets, the global pressures of consistent breakthrough or disruptive innovation happening consistently all around us is making successful innovation harder.  The increased emphasis on new business models are causing escalating problems as well, changing approaches to market or challenging core offerings that were previously accepted. Complexity at the innovation delivery stage calls also has no different a need for a higher level of getting organized, keeping discipline and executing effectively. Staying alert to the rapid changes occuring daily.

Point nine: Innovation delivery requires having the right capacity in place, at the right time, to drive execution through to its identified end points. Innovation delivery is where many decisions are often muddled through. Market ‘alertness’ and fast reaction times is becoming more crucial than ever. This needs building into your delivery part- adaptive alertness.

The relationship between innovation efforts and their success lies increasingly in understanding the “go-to-market phase- executing the innovation delivery based on understanding clearly the customer and market needs.

Innovation should not be a mystery but it is hard to go from end to end without a real recognition that focused effort on the back end delivery part is a relevant, extremely important part of the innovation process.

That more detailed focus for achieving the return expected from all the total efforts that go into it from that original idea so often pays off and makes a real lasting difference.

The post Mission Critical for Innovation – Final Delivery first appeared on Building Your Innovation & Ecosystem Intelligence.