Continuous innovation is, undoubtedly, a fundamental pillar of growth and survival in changing and unpredictable markets. Entrepreneurship and innovation are closely linked andOr we could conceive accelerated growth, permanence in the market, opening of new lines of business or survival without innovation. Continuous innovation, not just sporadic, is an entrepreneur’s imperative.
Innovation does not happen, it is built; It is not coincidental, it is provoked. Even though there may be some “aha moments” in everyday life, where the creative talent in all of us awakens, continuous innovation is the result of adopting specific disciplines, embracing a particular way of thinking, and fostering an open culture.
Before sharing the elements to build the competence of continuous innovation, I am interested in clarifying the difference between creativity and innovation.
Creativity is the human ability to generate ideas; On the other hand, innovation is the ability to put them into practice. Creativity is divergent thinking, innovation is the execution of that thinking. While creativity remains in the world of ideas and in the mind itself, innovation comes to life. In such a way that we are all creative, but not all innovative.
We must definitely encourage creative thinking as an essential prelude to innovation. The gift of creativity exists in every human being, it is a faculty given by design, and like any attribute, it can develop or atrophy.
4 actions to promote continuous innovation
So, starting from promoting thinking in order to turn it into innovation, I share with you four actions that, from my consulting experience, must be implemented to develop a culture of continuous innovation within a company.
1) Develop a culture of questioning
The source of innovation is creativity, and the key to creativity is thinking differently. Many times we miss opportunities for growth and improvement because we are in love with our first version, our business model or our way of doing things, and we are not willing to question them.
Questioning begins by emotionally detaching ourselves from our ideas, from our ancestral formulas of success, and avoiding at all costs canonizing our methods.
Everything is questioned, but not everything necessarily needs to be changed. There will be things that must remain the same because it is still strategic, however, that decision comes after putting everything back to trial. It will always be valid to continue with the current way of doing things, if it arises as a response to an evaluation process and not only as a reactive act of inertia.
It all starts with being open to questioning, to seeing with other eyes. So encourage the culture of questioning everything and continually question everything.
2) Decreases cortisol, increases acetylcholine
The most important enemy to creative thinking is cortisol, a chemical known to be the result of stress. Cortisol blocks our brain and hinders creative and disruptive thinking. Cortisol puts us on alert and only invites us to flee or fight.
Excess pressure, working at a fast pace, walking around dead line in dead line and oversaturation on the to-do list, causes the brain to only seek to execute reactively to get ahead of each situation and does not allow creativity, much less innovation.
To encourage thinking differently, you need the power of pause and creating a space without external threats. A moment where the team commits not to be distracted by external pressures, not to answer calls, or answer emails. A space that can range from 90 minutes to complete retreats of 2-3 days. A quiet moment that allows the entire team to generate the chemical that encourages creative thinking: acetylcholine.
When we produce acetylcholine, ideas flow, there is no threat, divergent thinking is triggered and creativity flourishes.
So learn to stop for a moment, isolate yourself with your team so that acetylcholine is produced and develop the discipline of continually holding meetings with controlled cortisol, in order to encourage the generation of creative solutions and have a hotbed of new possibilities.
3) Create a psycho-emotionally safe place
A vital principle of the culture of innovation is understanding that ideas are questioned, but people are respected. An idea can be destroyed, but a person must always be dignified.
Psychological security occurs when you are certain that whatever you express will not be a reason for ridicule, rejection, or contempt. The famous Brainstorming process can only be successful if team members are certain that their opinions will always be valued and that their person and dignity will never be at risk.
What happens when we don’t feel in a safe space? We just stay silent, we feel intimidated, the cortisol kicks in, we get blocked and we are not willing to talk. There is no point in isolating ourselves to hold a creative session if the space can be threatening to someone on the team.
So, make sure you build a safe space to encourage divergent thinking, and in this you, as a leader, must go ahead: do not judge, do not minimize, do not belittle, do not mock and do not make fun of the comments expressed. On the contrary, celebrate diversity, listen with absolute attention and respect, do not allow the team to impulsively discredit any idea, give voice to those who do not commonly speak, encourage crazy ideas, seek to build on the ideas of others and leave aside the judgments.
5) Be a fan of execution
All of the above serves to encourage creative thinking, but it will never become innovation if it is not executed. So, unquestionably those ideas must now come to life, we must dare to execute them. We cannot put ideas on a pedestal, we must put them into action.
We must understand that there are no “perfect ideas”, but there are adequate processes to perfect ideas, and every improvement process begins with execution. This is where the famous phrase “done is better than perfect” comes from.
So, after evaluating the viability and feasibility of the ideas that arise in your continuous collective creativity sessions, decide to execute.
There are some tips that I would like to give you for this point:
- Start small. Even if the idea seems perfect, execute it with controlled risk.
- Measure, provide feedback and improve. Seek to measure implementation, have analysis and evaluation sessions and improve frequently.
- Fail fast to succeed more often. We must understand that to find success not everything will work out the first time. Let us understand that failure is an inseparable part of successful innovation.
- Believe in intuition. Sometimes we do not have all the elements to objectively decide on an idea, however, there is intuitive intelligence that makes us see opportunities. This intelligence has been formed with experience, vision and personal journey. Believe in it and, when you consider necessary, obey it.
I am sure that within each team and each venture there are already ideas that can generate exponential growth, you just need to let them come out and start putting them into action. Continuous innovation is within everyone’s reach and it is our responsibility to promote it in our organization.
Alejandro Nava Ortega Industrial and Systems Engineer, expert in productivity and organizational transformation, with more than 20 years of experience in consulting. Writer, podcaster, speaker and learning facilitator.