These 10 Factors will derail your Innovation Program

DANGER:

Idea Management – Simplified.

Identify the top 5% of ideas that will drive 95% of new business results.

Collaborate with your employees, customers, and suppliers to collect, prioritize,

and take action on new ideas company-wide.

A strong and successful innovation program (and the ideas that fuel it) needs structure.

It would be foolish to assume otherwise.

Your innovation program needs to be optimized for peak efficiency and effectiveness.

New ideas are great, but hold little value if not taken seriously, and useless if they don’t fit your organization.

These are 10 of the most common mistakes that will turn your well-intended innovation program

into a black-hole of disappointment.

Absence of clear Goals• Are you looking to solve a specific problem, or just jumping at any

new idea that looks profitable?

• Setting attainable and concise goals for your innovation program is a crucial but often overlooked part of your improvement efforts.

Shortage of fresh Approaches • If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it, right? Wrong.

• A shortage of new perspectives, ideas, and approaches from often unheard parties shackles your innovation program.

Failure to Validate• A new idea or project might sound like a game-changer, but who else

thinks so?

• A lack of validation for a problem by those affected by it (employees, customers) leaves you working on an idea that no one wants.

Inaccurate Projections• Even if you’ve successfully identified a new problem or opportunity,

the return on your investment needs to be worth the effort.

• The importance of measuring the resources, time, and people necessary to complete a project vs. its benefits to the bottom-line can't be overstated.

Poor Strategic Planning• When a new project is approved, your innovation program should

have a designated path for it to take.

• With a set series of steps, an allotted schedule, and continuous monitoring, projects are pushed onward or killed.

Insufficient Leadership• Whether executives, management, the innovation team, or front-line

employees, it’s up to someone to ensure the innovation program is pumping out new projects and those projects are moving forward.

• Assign responsibilities and hold people accountable.

Breakdowns in Communication• From the individuals in charge of the innovation program to the

employees affected by the projects and changes they’re producing, everyone needs to know what’s expected of them.

• Poor knowledge sharing and a lack of updates only causes confusion.

Lack of Motivation• Innovation is exciting! Everyone wants to improve, but the flair of a

new idea can wear off quickly.

• Maintaining morale for everyone involved in your innovation program is crucial to the success of a new idea’s life-cycle.

Improper/No Testing• A successful innovation program thrives through building case-studies

and employing test groups before full-scale implementation.

• Just like any experiment, start small and improve a project gradually to limit the effects of potentially damaging issues.

Failure to Learn• From research and testing to implementation and monitoring, there

are countless opportunities to improve a project or your program.

• Even (and especially) when things fail, seize the opportunity to find out what went wrong, and what you can do better next time.

Is your company actually ready to Innovate?

Answer the following Questions + 9 more to make the most of your innovation efforts with our FREE E-Book.

• Is your culture set up for innovation?• Are your strategic goals and vision transparent throughout your organization?• Are your organizational objectivesconflicting with innovation fundamentals?

Download our FREE E-Book Here.