Innovation can occur organically, or it can be the result of a lot of hard work, huge teams, and a lot of management. Although not every company needs a professional innovation management system, every organization that ever used one acquired valuable knowledge. Experience obtained through the use of innovation management is crucial in assisting you to avoid making the same mistakes as others. Here is a list of most typical ones:
-
Unawareness of the innovation culture
The fundamental factor that enables a company to be innovative is its innovation culture. The most common mistake that organizations make when attempting to engage in innovation is rejecting innovation culture as a manner of operating on a daily basis. Because it is not very tangible, many businesses struggle to build it.
- Innovation management software will create innovations for you
Innovation management software is useless unless you use it. It performs a wide range of activities, but only when partnered with devoted and motivated innovators from across your business. It certainly helps to establish a disciplined strategy to gather ideas for future breakthroughs, assess them, record, analyze, and share them internally and publicly, but it is the brains of your creative group that make the difference. Without it, there would be no innovation to manage whatsoever.
- Employees are immediately adapted to the innovation management systems
The majority of innovation management boils down to transparency. However, this is not a feature of the system that workers from all cultures regard equally. Because innovation is a process, you should keep in mind that adjusting to new systems is also a part of it. If there are indicators that your employees are even slightly unsatisfied with the implementation of new systems, this does not indicate that it should be abandoned, but rather that adjustments should be made openly and gradually.
- Leaders are the ones who put together innovation teams
It is imperative that all team members are enthusiastic about the subject and willing to try new techniques. As a result, such activities should be carried out freely and voluntarily. Nothing boosts productivity and creativity like bringing together individuals who are enthusiastic about a certain subject of innovation. Leaders are responsible for channeling employees’ efforts and creative potential in favor of the company’s existing strategy.
- Only innovation department deals with innovation
This would not be a misconception if the innovation department included the entire company. Isolating the innovation department creates a barrier between the customer and the innovation team and it should not exist. This is also a reason why crowdsourcing initiatives demonstrate their effectiveness. While innovation management is responsible for ensuring that the company’s innovation goals are met, it also necessitates cross-functional cooperation.
- Innovation is a secondary revenue source
Treating innovation like a side hustle may not get you very far. On the contrary, in order to be consistent and engaged, you must invest a major fraction of your employees’ working hours to allow them to focus on innovation. This is also a manner of managing innovation – a good management does not overstretch its employees. To pursue your innovation ambitions, you must commit more than half of your working time to it, and anything else is unsustainable.
Unlike typical initiatives that use known information, innovation is a business of uncertainty. The way to ensure you are doing the right thing and that you’re doing it right is to stop making the same mistakes as others do. Hopefully, this list of typical blunders will help you identify probable errors in your own behavior.
