The other day, I was having some cookies with my daughters and as it so happens, I had a moment of reckoning.

We have an arrangement whereby we each twist one end of an Oreo off and exchange for the portions that we want: they want the ends with the icing and I get the cookie part only sans all that sugar. It’s a symbiotic relationship. The girls take the ends with the icing and stack them onto other ends with icing from their inventory, thereby doubling the sweet treat.

It is easy to imagine that this playful experimentation could precisely be the type of setting that spawned the Double Stuff Oreo line extension that has proved so popular; and one which also may have led to Cakesters and a myriad of brand spin-offs. Once the mold was broken and the sacred Oreo product formula was in play, anything was possible. Now the original Oreo is but one skew among many in the Kraft Food’s Oreo line-up.

The main take-away for me was the un-prompted ease with which this innovative risk-taking took place – granted, it wasn’t a corporate setting, but still there was no fear; just possibilities. This is exactly the kind of environment that people inside and outside your organization need to discover and develop great opportunities for you. Ideas often start life as lumps of clay that need to be shaped, pulled, crimped and manipulated in order to make something more out of them. This takes people who are comfortable taking the risk of trying something new…maybe even zany, without the fear of personal ridicule or professional reprisals – in fact, this risk-taking needs to be encouraged. That is the edge…the line that must be crossed. It’s the price to discover what is on the other side.

Risk-taking becomes easier when your innovation participants see others practicing it – it takes a giant barrier away and says: it’s okay to fail!!

Create the environment that enables fast and frequent failure, whilst capturing the value that boils up from the process. Provide the transparency that tracks the idea’s progress and recognize the efforts so that others are inclined to follow suit.

As things go, there is a certain status that comes with size. Scale it seems is the street cred that makes the good..great; the known...ubiquitous; the powerful...mighty. And because folks immersed in innovation are  as susceptible as any to this seek out this revered status, the temptations is to think and go big. Which is fine when it comes  to process branding, increasing idea generation volumes and attracting a greater number of participants. It is less desirable when it comes to turning ideas into innovations.

Innovation communities that work on evolving an idea need not be enormous; in fact, rather than trying to big at everything, things often work-out best when smaller more specialized groups “break-off” to work on ideas that interest them – besides making the process more manageable, it is a key driver for self-motivation and bringing the right expertise to a given idea.

This approach forms small social networks around a specific vision and/or goal - as such, they don't necessarily need to be big; just purposeful and with the right players. The potential of many smaller groups working on many more focused initiatives creates an “ant farm” efficiency that can’t be matched by any centralized mechanism. Direction, motivation and management are shared and understood by the team and overseen by each idea’s champion; task and deliverables are handled by their respective experts or offered out for ownership rather than being delegated - and the output consistent with a format established beforehand that calls for certain requisite knowledge , data and information in order to aide accelerated decision-making when the idea is ready for Prime Time.

This more organic, agile and holistic approach enables participants to work on ideas and tasks that they know they can contribute to in a meaningful and rewarding capacity. As a result, it creates better developed ideas and accelerates an idea’s evolutionary trajectory.

Now imagine a whole bunch of these self-managing posses working away at innovations for your organizations; individually they appear small, but together, they are acting big.

Like many other people out there, I have been spending some time in chat rooms, forums and LinkedIn groups regarding innovation.

There are thought-provoking concepts and theories regarding this or that; many opinions, tack-tics and strategies, book recommendations – myriad advice-givers and a good helping of product hawkers; but it would seem  precious few doers. Of the non-doers, much chatting, theorizing and endless consensus building are taking place in lieu of practice; to insure the age-old pattern of risk mitigation is being preserved. The safety of the road well-travelled versus the unknown of the unbeaten path.

As we know, everything has a cost - when comes to innovation, leaving your comfort zone is the ante.   But happy thing occurs at the start of that journey and the potential of an ROI already shows signs of life – you begin discovering gems in and around your organization that you didn’t know you had. Moreover, you discover that you can be more agile than first thought; and that people respond well when the organization responds well to them. There are also many different opportunities to contribute to an Idea & Innovation process, so long as provisions for activities, tasks and deliverables have been planned to accommodate these roles. But in order for this agility to spawn and the engagement to infect all those within range, the process that you put into place has to be organic.   That means letting people do what interests them. And of equal importance, the process has to be your own.

I can cite a utility client of ours that is transforming their business operationally, financially and culturally – all because they had the conviction to listen and the courage to act in a truly innovative manner; by first engaging in process innovation – when they first did this, it naturally gave birth to the innovation process that was right for them; the second part of it occurred most naturally. Which is the central point of this piece. It is good to get education, solicit opinions and to compare notes – but if you’re going to really be innovative, it has to come from your organization’s gut. None other will fit as well, respond as meaningfully and accommodate the needs of your future better than the process that was born from your organization going through this transformational experience. It’s a process – like puberty; you can tell, forewarn, plan and educate a kid to be prepared. But until they go thru it for themselves, they can never discover who they are or draw from the benefits of the process to guide their future.

Last week-end, I went shopping and decided to buy an iPad. There are many outlets within the mall I was at where I could purchase this device; but since there was an Apple Store nearby, I decided on it.

It appears that I wasn’t the only person with the same idea…because when I got there, the place was jammed. But here is the silver lining: despite being crowded, there was room to move about, there were three tables dedicated to the “consumer touch” experience with ten devices at each table (each loaded with a bevy of apps) and better yet, a representative to greet and help me no more than 30-seconds after entering the store. She was pleasant, knowledgeable about her products and efficient in her delivery of service; she answered everyone one of my questions to my satisfaction (and I have a tendency to ask a lot).

This totally satisfying shopping experience is a testament of a company’s passion for what it does; right down to the clever way in which the sales person rang-up my iPad sale (accompanied by a tag-on purchase of iPhone and iPod ear buds) on her handy iPod and reached under one of the three experiential counters to instantly retrieve my receipt – I never even had to move. In this case, passion brought about excellence that was manifested across the retail value chain; in the form of:

• Innovative products
• Innovative displays
• Innovative “consumer touch” experience
• Innovative customer service
• Innovative transaction processes

Now I’m not one of these Apple fanatics that wears the brand on my sleeve; in fact, the first Apple product that I ever bought was an iPod for my wife two years ago. I don’t  need the product for street cred or to feel satisfied – I bought the iPad so my kids could experience another technology that promises to be relevant into their adult years.

The point here is that the experience was so good that it was noticeable. That’s hard to do with today’s picky customer. But Apple pulled it off because they have passion for everything Apple. Passion to innovate across the organizational spectrum is key to drive performance to new heights – it must permeate your very culture so that it’s a feeling, rather than a thing. And you can get started on that today, if you dare position the organization to accept that challenge and respond as promised.

When you look at the origins of innovations, one thing quickly becomes clear: it happens anywhere and everywhere,

Take the innovative art of Bjork; it hails from Iceland.

The Ski-Doo snowmobile; it’s from Quebec.

Apple electronic devices; California.

Red Bull from Austria.

Creative spark and visionary execution can happen anywhere...providing they are enabled. The ingredients for this alchemy are made up of ideas, timing, expertise, capital and distribution; and most importantly, the passion and collaboration of willing participants. As this mix is hard to assemble and even harder to keep together for any length of time, the need for an ad hoc platform to leverage opportunities is a must if your innovation process is going to be effective. Conversations leads to ideas, ideas engender to concepts, concepts evolve into actions and actions lead to outcomes. These are all driven by altering and converging participants motivated by a passion for the piece that they want to play within this realm. Few activities self-motivates people more  than working on something that is of interest to them, to prove a point they want to make or to showcase what they know. So in order to have an innovation process that delivers sustainable results, it has to be organic enough for the various and necessary role-players to collaborate on their terms; while purposefully contributing to the overall innovation mission.

Innovation is an opportunistic pursuit; it can only spawn value if the conditions and resources are aligned. As cycle times decrease and demands increase, the need for an agile innovation process will be paramount. Ideas, timing and talent must have a common place to converge so that innovation can occur anytime and anyplace.

The following example is a case study among many highlighting why outside innovations can have such a hard time gaining traction.

When I was a sophomore at college, I had an idea for a portable toothbrush.  The value proposition was to enable consumers to connect a toothpaste tube to the shaft of this new toothbrush, fill it with product and when desired slide the shaft forward thereby pushing the toothpaste through the bristles. With a handy (and presumably sanitary)  cap over the bristles, users could now have the convenience of brushing on-the-go without the hassle. I thought the idea was good, so I approached my Marketing 350 teacher about it – he happened to contemporaneously be in product marketing (for a different brand category) at the Canadian division of J&J® and arranged for me to meet with his boss, the group product manager. So far so good. The latter was intrigued by my idea’s potential and arranged for me to meet with the production manager for Reach Toothbrushes™ in another part of the country – we were making good progress. I  went to the plant and met with the production manager – he was very focused on producing the Reach toothbrushes that were currently coming-off the line; innovative products were “not part of what he did”. The feedback loop broke-down with this individual, no take-up or recovery structure was in place and the idea faded into the sunset. There was no follow-up mechanism to support the process. Two week ago, while in New York city, I came across product called Colgate Wisp™ – the concept was the same but with a few elegant twists on the execution: the brush was smaller, there was a toothpick at the end of the handle and the toothpaste at the centre of the bristles was a dissolvable gel.

Now through the right input, my original idea had evolved and definitely had been improved – the only problem is that this was done some 20-years later, and worse...BY A DIRECT COMPETITOR (Colgate®). This missed opportunity is not one individual’s fault: there was no Open Innovation structure in place to capitalize on the idea; what we all needed was a mechanism that was agile enough to circumvent the rigid process of product delivery; without interrupting the model that was delivering current value. Had this Open Innovation environment been available and the collaboration and workflow components flexible enough to align with opportunity, J&J could have capitalized on the particular opportunity long ago and potentially become category leader. In the absence of this, the outcome was a lot of money and brand equity left on the table. And a customer that never returned to submit another idea.

Now the question is: in this day and age, how often does your organization still fall prey to the same circumstance?

*The brands mentioned are trademarked to their respective owners.

Ask anyone about their organization and they’ll tell you that they’re different – fair enough and true enough.

This raises an interesting question: if being different is so important that it bears mentioning, why then should any company want to emulate the innovation processes of an other? You can’t have it both ways – it doesn’t work. Using another organization’s innovation process is like having everyone in your group borrow the wrong size boots from another group before setting off on a major hike – with the wrong fit, there’s going to be pain. The kind of lasting pain that might turn everyone in your group off from hiking for a long time; or ever again.

If you rely on someone else’s model, sooner-or-latter the differences will start working against you. The point here is that to do innovation right, you have to figure it out for yourself – the process that will best work for:

• your people
• your culture
• your operations
• your innovation goals
• your budget cycles
• your decision-making mechanisms

A holistic innovation structure should take into account and leverage existing processes while giving you the flexibility to periodically invent/re-invent new paths, activities and participants for workflow and collaboration optimization. Add to this the novelty that ideas coming in are “innovative” and as such often don’t always fit into the neat little boxes that currently drive your existing process channels – so in order for your innovation process to be effective, it can’t treat these new ideas in a “business as usual” manner. The critical first step represents the process innovation that will spawn a growing and purposeful innovation process; one that can deliver the desired outcomes across the operational, financial and cultural matrix.

To get there, you can utilize pieces and practices from others – there are plenty of goodies to tap into. But to emulate someone else’s incarnation of an innovation process would not be doing your effort justice. The act of process innovation is at once educational, liberating, opportunistic and organic. It does require time, attention, care and commitment – plus two essential elements that need to be present for the others to follow: leadership and vision. Because in the end, your process has to fit who you are as an organization and where you want to get to.

Innovation processes are different animals from your typical corporate engagement program – they’re part technology and part people – the sum of which make a whole process. So think of the uniqueness of your positioning in the market, your company’s operations and the people-driven culture that makes you…you. And ask yourself if you should use somebody else’s innovation process or whether it’s worth it to create your own. 

There usually is only one right answer.

Innovation is a process that spawns newness in the forms of products, services, efficiencies and a host of other improvements; but the process also creates instances for opportunities. As a process, rigor is essential for proper functioning and flexibility vital for sustainability. The latter is key, as the process itself requires periodic improvement and demands alternate courses of action; sometimes, that kind of change can even lead you onto a completely different track.

To use a contemporary success story as an example, let’s walk through an abridged journey of Steve Jobs’ career:

• Apple (Round 1): Apple l / Apple ll / Apple lll / Lisa / Mac
• NeXT
• Pixar
• Apple (Round 2): iPod, iPhone, iTunes, AppStore, iPad

Each milestone lead to another – without his first gig at Apple SJ could not have created NeXT. His involvement at NeXT (which never enjoyed the commercial success of Apple) introduced him to animation which enabled the step-up to Pixar. And from his experience at Pixar came the impetus for media-rich applications and devices for his second tenure at Apple. Even though the businesses varied, revenue models differed and some endeavors were even flops (Lisa, NeXT), the thread of innovation not only remained a constant, the process itself lead to opportunities that one could not have imagined unless having gone through the process itself. As the a well-quoted idiom reminds us: it’s not the destination but rather the journey.

Every now and again, we like to use simple everyday situations to illustrate how easy Innovation and Idea Management can be.

In the latest installation of this theme, I will share a simple example of collaboration and its ripple effects across a seemingly complex, diverse and siloed environment.

Last Friday evening I was returning home from work by car. The highway was jammed so I decided to take the longer, more pastoral and usually less congested road that runs along Montreal’s lakeshore (Montreal for those who don’t know is an island-city). When the cross-street that I was on hit Lakeshore Road, traffic was bumper-to-bumper; as a result of the single-lane only configuration, this had all the potential of being a worse case scenario than the multi-lane freeway. But a remarkable thing happened on our way to gridlock: the person in front of me who was waiting to merge was let in  by a driver already on Lakeshore Road. That helped our situation and we got moving. A little ways down, another car was waiting to merge onto Lakeshore Road and the car in front of me (the lady who had been let in) now let that person in; and the driver waived “thank you” in appreciation. Everyone in sight followed the example and cars started merging like the teeth meshing on a zipper. However, a couple of Stop signs later, the original car that had let the lady in front of me in had to turn onto another congested road. This time, no one let her in and everyone around us stopped moving again.

So when you look at your organization to see where your process is at a roadblock, find the laggards who don’t play as a team and either honk at them or pull them out of the flow. It only takes one road-hog to slow everyone else down.

There is a healthy debate regarding the benefits of automating the innovation workflow process versus routing ideas manually. From our perspective, both sides are right.

Because we would be loathe to create more ambiguity about this thorny subject, let us outline why a workflow strategy designed around inclusiveness is better than choosing one methodology exclusively.

Ideas are lumps of clay until the communal artist refines it into a masterpiece; and all that takes the right input, in the right amount, by the right participants and at right time. The combination of these is often different for each idea, given that they have:

• Varying benefits
• Differing goals
• More or less complexity
• Faster or slower speed of execution
• More or fewer participants
• Ranges of expertise
• Scope of financial impacts
• Market (Internal/external) timing considerations

Now if one adds subsets to each of these attributes, which could easily multiply the characteristics, features and ultimate needs-sets, how can anyone anticipate the many workflow permutations that will be right for any given (and yet unknown) idea? So when we return to the bi-polar answer of having both routing types, the Fuzzy Front-End is best serviced with human intervention to get the idea off on the right track; within a couple of exchanges, the promising idea already narrows in focus and can then be picked-up by an automated workflow – once we know where we’re going, it makes sense to channel it into a workflow model that is used to delivering that part of the business model.

Because there is a lot of multi and concurrent tasking that occurs at the Front-End, flexibility is your greatest ally to insure that your idea can overcome submission-inertia and build the kind of momentum thru the development chain in order to get the right resources. It doesn’t necessarily guarantee that each idea will be a winner, but it does deliver the promise that each idea will have the same optimized chance for success.