Love Innovation - 6 Quick Principles
If you are not innovating you are not simply standing still you are going backwards. Innovation is the beating heart of any proposition - personal or corporate - and yet we often push it down the “to-do” list to the point where we’ve not had a new idea, let along action it, in months.
During COVID-19 (if you are not being forced to innovate because of a dramatic change in your business) the temptation to tread water is all the greater.
It shouldn’t be so I thought I would quickly list my 6 principles;
(1) Prompt Yourself - sometimes the good ideas just appear magically but more often we have to set our minds to thinking beyond the here and now. So it is vital you set time aside, on a regular basis, to think about innovation. Monthly works and you should plan that into your schedule - picking a day you know that distraction will be at a minimum.
I also have a separate ideas notebook, which means I carry 2 - one for day-to-day actions (iterative ideas) and the other for those bigger ideas that need more thought and work (game changing ideas). A physical notebook is a good prompt. Nothing is more damning that an empty ideas book !
(2) Immerse - with most of us in various stages of ‘lockdown’ we lack the exposure to stimulus. There are less opportunities for serendipitous flashes of brilliance - triggered by something we see on our commute or travels. So ahead of your timetabled innovation session assemble stimulus. And not just from the usual sources - allow yourself to go down some rabbit holes.
(3) Mix It Up ! - in normal times I used to do my best new idea thinking at 35,000 feet. Being detached from the usual environment helped with the creative process. In the absence of that I’ll start my innovation session off at home but in a different location from my usual work space and then continue on a long walk. You have to do what works for you but mixing it up and detaching yourself from the familiar will help you focus.
(4) Have Courage - do not be your own worst enemy. Capture every idea. Discount nothing. Push some boundaries and don’t get hung up on the fact some of your innovations would be impossible to do now.
(5) Get Yourself A Brain’s Trust (1) - (4) you may have been doing with colleagues but even if that is an option having a separate group of people you can bounce your fleshed out ideas on is really helpful. Pushback is good and so are the builds that will come from fresh minds being stimulated by your idea. Even booking in a virtual call with someone you respect to go through 3 - 4 ideas over coffee will help you decide if you have implementation worthy ideas. I’ve got a session planned this week with one of my “brain’s trust”.
(6) Prioritise & Action - you can’t do everything so once you have a list of good ideas you need to place them onto a road map and start to think about allocating resource to make them happen. It’s the implementation of the idea that matters most - not the idea !
“Innovation is seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody thought.”
Dr Albert Szent-Gyorgyi
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Mark Izatt is a brand consultant living in London and founder of Mission Critical, a highly focused and curated weekly briefing for time poor and information hungry decision makers. Mission Critical is a digital product delivered via his Estonian Consultancy business.
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