Advancing Innovation

PART IIIThe Second Element: Enabling Innovation—Innovation Processes and Channels

If you always do what you always did, you will always get what you always got.

—Albert Einstein

How can I not acknowledge Albert Einstein in a book discussing innovation? This is one of my favorite quotes of his, and it applies to the second element in the Innovation Elixir. There are multiple ways for you to enable innovation in your company. This section of the book examines five specific channels or mechanisms you can consider and implement to collect, evaluate, and harvest innovation value. If you simply talk about innovation without changing the way you do things, you “will get what you always got.” Setting up these processes and channels is important.

Simply put, how are you going to get your employees and other stakeholders to innovate? You don’t just show up for work one day and say, “Okay, we are now going to be an innovative company. Ready, set, innovate!” You’re a leader, right? So this is where you need to lead.

Set up your organization for success by putting in multiple innovation channels. A channel is simply a way in which you will solicit, collect, evaluate, design, implement, and monitor innovation activity. Why do you need multiple innovation channels? Because businesses, industries, companies, employees, and leadership are different. They are in different stages of business maturity and deal with different turbulences.

Think of a product life-cycle curve. Companies have a different ...