Innovation and You

So what stops us from being innovative? I was observing my 3 year old son as he went about his daily activities and found most of the answers. As small kids, there are no rules defined and exploring means that in the true sense of the world. There are no assumptions apart from the high level ones concerning safety and kids truly revel in this and are at their innovative best. So what happens after that? As we grow older, we become more conscious about ourselves and try our best to "fit" in with the society around us and unfortunately that also means that we become accustomed more and more to play by rules and stop challenging assumptions.

This becomes very more institutionalised in our professional lives where we have clearly defined job responsibilities which are according to our professional qualifications. But is that truly our strength? Have we ever got a chance to explore other areas which are reportedly not our traditional "strengths"? The answer is frankly NO. In fact we are discouraged from doing this at work.

I was reading an article recently about a person had done his doctorate in archaeology and spend a lot of time exploring excavations in Egypt and then one day decided to do something new. He tried his hand at statistics using his knowledge of data analysis and mapping which he used during his days as an archaelogist and today he is employed in a software company using his skills to crunch data and generate new search patterns. That to me is an example of the true potential or strength of the human mind and a strong reason why we should not stereotype people. But how often does this happen and if it does happen, is it just by chance? Is there any institutionalised way of encouraging this within your organisation? Think about this.

So you may ask, what is this go to do with innovation? Innovation to me is a new way of looking at things and trying out ideas. The best way to kickstart innovation is to bring a new set of experts (maybe from different diverse fields) and ask them to approach the problem. You will find that they are able to think with a newly found freedom which their peers working on this problem for ages were lacking.

But this is still only half the story. The picture is truly completed only if the leadership team who are evaluating these innovations are also able to break their shackles and think with the same innocence as that of a child - basically no boundaries and with no pre-defined assumptions. This is truly a challenge especially in the initial days since we are so conditioned with think with our pre-defined assumptions that we will find it easier to shoot down proposals rather than think differently about how to make it work.

But if we fight the temptation to resist and truly think differently, success is only a few steps away and as they say - nothing succeeds like success.

So in summary - don't attempt to stereotype your employees and encourage them to try out different areas and realise their true potential. Also get new set of eyes looking at old problems and encourage new thoughts and ideas. Over a period of time, this will get you truly innovative ideas and you will be surprised at the true potential of your employees once they are truly allowed to break free.