Too important to be left to chance

In many organizations, innovation and idea management are considered something of a "black art". Since there aren't any "hard edges" around how innovation is accomplished, and since it often seems only "creative" people can generate ideas, many people look at innovation as a black box - they are unsure what happens that generates ideas.

With this fairly common viewpoint, many firms don't have methodologies or processes to generate, capture and evaluate ideas. In fact, in many firms we've worked with, there are no standard approaches to generating and capturing ideas, and no consistent approach to evaluating ideas and launching new products or services. If innovation is so important, why is it so often left to serendipity or chance?

A recent study by Booz-Allen indicated that over 80% of CEOs surveyed felt that innovation was the best path to sustained organic revenue and profit growth. A recent Arthur D Little study on the importance of innovation found that senior executives ranked "enhance innovation ability" as the number one most important "lever" to increase profitability and growth. These studies and others indicate that senior managers and executives are at least THINKING about innovation. The question here is whether or not they are going to IMPLEMENT purposeful innovation methods, processes and systems, and change corporate cultures to reinforce innovation.

For many businesses, innovation is simply too important to be left to chance. We can outsource almost anything - from manufacturing to accounting to sales. We can and have cut costs out of our businesses. Yet none of these actions creates new products and services. A firm simply cannot cut its way to greatness. Innovation offers a clear cut path to developing new revenue streams and models. Right now many executives have experience "right-sizing" operations and taking cost out of the operating model. Will they realize soon enough how important revenue growth and differentiation through innovation can be?