Innovation: Decentralized & Internally Networked

How do you structure an organization to optimize innovation?  What are the most effective innovation pathways and processes?  Who is responsible for innovation?

Does any of that matter???

I recently participated in a conference on driving corporate innovation, and all of those business considerations - and a few more - were presented and discussed and analyzed.  I think they miss the point.

Innovative organizations today no longer try to structure and schedule innovation.  Instead, they respect the emergence of the individual within the organization, and they create a culture and environment that supports individual actions.  According to Gartner, the "Managed Anarchy Model" yields significantly more great ideas over time than does the Conventional Model; natural selection rather than management selection.

Individual behavior and corporate culture are facing increasing dissonance.  Gen Y has become famous for not following the established corporate rules, for being tethered to technology, for lack of loyalty to corporate employers.  But Gen Yers are also actively involved in social issues; they want to follow their instincts and passions and creatively change the world.  Aren't those great innovation characteristics?  Corporations need to tap into that individual drive.

With the prevalence of social technologies outside the corporate walls, individuals have learned to find like-minded people outside the usual channels.  They share ideas, pull information and insight from diverse groups, and create new partnerships as needed.

Individuals want to bring these characteristics into the workplace.  They want to self-select ideas and communities for collaboration within corporate walls.  Internal social platforms enable them to do so.  They help organizations become social businesses, from the inside out. 


Internal social technologies allow companies to decentralize innovation.  Social technologies facilitate innovation.  They drill holes in the silos.  They enable fresh conversations and exchanges of ideas.  And they are fluid.
 
IBM is at the forefront of using internal social technologies to drive innovation.  Conversations and ideas are sparked by over 17,000 internal blogs, 1 million daily page views of internal wikis and internal information storing websites, employee profiles on IBM Connections, and 15,000,000 downloads of employee-generated videos/podcasts.

50 IBM innovation jams have occurred over the past 10 years.  Back in 2006, IBM brought folks together in a jam to discuss more than 50 research projects in the company.  Projects voted into the top 10 became incubator businesses funded with $100M.

IBM Smarter Planet sprang from grass-roots, community discussions.

Smaller organizations with more limited technologies can benefit as well.  I worked with a medium-sized retail establishment that wanted to add social media to its marketing.  We started, however, by implementing a simple, free internal social platform and creating a cross-functional, cross-department core social media team.  Over the past 6 months, the cross-talk and new perspectives have dramatically accelerated innovation - from tactical improvements to the creation of an organization-wide "green" effort.

Internal social technology helps define innovation as a cultural norm and drive innovation into everyone's job. Employees behaving like individuals are the primary source of  innovation.  Let's not box them in.

Has internal social technology changed innovation for you?

Related posts of interest:
The Objective of Social Media is Lifestyle
Social Media and Innovation in IBM
IBM's Social Business Transformation

Build It and They Might NOT Come: Internal Social Networks, Employee Engagement and Culture Change

Not everyone agrees that an open, transparent culture -- the type we identify with social media -- is best.  Not everyone wants to add "marketing" or "customer service" to his or her responsibilities.  "I want to work with technology, not people" is a not-uncommon, although usually unspoken, thought.  Other people simply prefer structure and limited responsibility.  And those traits can add to the efficiency and productivity of many companies.

Not everyone want to focus on making the company successful either.  Many employees are trying to establish themselves and further their own reputations and careers; the organization is a short-term alliance.  Ideal?  Not at all.  But reality.

So if, as I believe (see for instance http://bit.ly/oYbtHT), success with social media first requires comfort and cultural support internally, are these organizations doomed in the new social world order?

A few years ago, I helped a mid-sized professional services company implement an internal social platform as the first step in executing a social media strategy.  Employees clamored to be among the first on the site.  We offered tips and training; a few people started posting; two executives participated actively, and within a couple of months - NOTHING.

Leadership faultered.  While many executives were lurkers on the site, only the original two enthusiasts had posted.

The professional value was not clear.  Performance reviews did not recognize those who shared.  In a business where knowledge and relationships are power, employees felt the new platform might enable others to snap up their information without giving credit.  The efficiency of the social platform for exchanging information, pointing out new ideas, and adding value to an initiative was overlooked.

The dominant culture of the company was one of controlled sharing on a need-to-know basis.  Not exactly social media nirvana.  We decided to embrace and respect the corporate DNA nonetheless.

We found success by using the social networking platform to enhance and evolve the existing culture, not change it.

We limited use of the platform to one team with 5 selected characteristics:

• Team members came from several different departments
• Team members were geographically dispersed
• Each person brought a different perspective and knowledge to the project that was important for a successful outcome
• The team leader was enthusiastic about the new way of working
• Benefits were clear   

Team members experienced real-time value from using the social networking platform.  Communication and collaboration were easier; the number of major revisions dropped; edits and modifications could be made, disseminated, and enacted more quickly; work hours and end-to-end project time declined.  

Sharing more openly paradoxically also made team members feel that they had more control of their work process and product.  At the completion of the project, team members were already using the internal social network for other work activities.

Work team by work team, node by node, the use of the internal social platform spread.  The objective was not to change the culture, but to help employees succeed more fully within the existing norms.  Two years later, the cultural changes are manifest.      

Internal Social Networs - Behavioral Change Before ROI

Intranets are everywhere, and companies are rapidly adding social networking features - wikis, blogs, tagging... Yet satisfaction with these tools is stunningly low.  Prescient Digital reports that only 23% of executives rate 2.0 tools as good or very good, and 38% rate them as poor or very poor.  (http://ww.prescientdigital.com/articles/intranet-articles/intranet-2-0-becomes-mainstream)

Technically, a LOT of good tools are out there.  So what's going on???

•  Tools increase efficiency

• Tools improve productivity

• Tools make it easier for employees to find information and the experts they need

• Tools alone don't work

Prescient points out, "Those organizations that don't have intranet 2.0 tools are not getting executive approval to proceed as they don't have a proper plan or business case that convinces senior management of the need."  Is the failure to achieve the promised savings the reason behind the dissatisfaction of those who do have intranet 2.0 tools?

Maybe in a few cases.  But overall it's not execution or the lack of a plan or business case that is the problem.  The problem is the core need to justify internal networks with business cases.  ROI is critical, and I have written about it many times (see, for instance, http://bit.ly/internalROI), but the anticipated ROI will not be realized if the social network does not reflect fundamental shifts in organizational and interpersonal behavior.

The objective of social media is lifestyle, not initiatives (http://bit.ly/kYsQ6u).  And lifestyle within the corporate walls needs to change before internal or external social media strategies have lasting and measurable value.

When Starbuck's introduced MyStarbucksIdea.com, the driver was CEO Howard Shultz's belief that the company needed to reconnect with its customers.  Look at the site (really, even for non-coffee drinkers, it is a great site).  Yes, Starbuck's is engaging its customers.  It is also engaging its baristas, those rarely listened-to front-line employees who see it all, who talk to and listen to customers, who execute the policies and operational procedures and know what works and what doesn't.  Effective social media ignores hierarchy and organizational silos.  The results probably do drive greater employee efficiency, but that is a by-product of the new social lifestyle. 

One of my favorite corporate activities was the "feel good" campaign by Canadian credit union Servus.  Servus gave 20,000 people $10 CDN and asked them to create a "Feel Good Ripple" by giving the money to someone else.  Buy flowers for the grocery store cashier; buy coffee for the person behind you in line at the drive-thru; give $10 for a lunch to a homeless shelter.  (http://www.springwise.com/financial_services/feelgoodripple/)

To have a positive impact, internal social network initiatives similarly have to change the interpersonal dynamic.  

• Reward employees for sharing what went wrong so that others can learn.  
• Reward people for helping others when it didn't affect their own jobs.  
• Have people track how much time the intranet saved them, and allow them to donate that time to help someone else. 

Internal social networks work when they help corporate lifestyle and culture to change.

What has your organization done to make the intranet a lifestyle change agent? 

Is Social Media Killing Innovation?

Would social media have helped Thomas Edison?  Or Alexander Graham Bell?  Or Henry Ford?  Or Steve Jobs?  Subjectively, it seems that most disruptive innovations spring from the mind of one individual, or at most from a two-person partnership.  Remember the commonly held and oft cited view regarding the output of committee work?  I think there is little question that social media, when effectively engaged, can and does have a positive impact on improvement.  Product improvement.  Business model improvement.  Service improvement.  Operational improvement.  Many of the by-now “classic” social media cases showcase these benefits.  Starbucks, Ideastorm, even Comcast’s foray into Twitter for customer service – they all use the power of customer engagement and the speed of social media response to uncover and drive improvement.   How do I do better what I already do? But does social media, the ultimate collaborative tool today, really help drive innovation? True innovation requires discontinuous or lateral thinking.   Innovation reframes or redefines the underlying issue.  It’s risky.  And it rarely has immediate mass appeal or acceptance.  Is social media, then, diminishing real innovation, driving business to the mass mediocre and to only incremental improvement? Maybe.  But I think that social media can also enhance the ability to innovate.  v One spark to innovation is the intermingling of previously unrelated ideas – Social media provides an unprecedented opportunity to acquire and mix new perspectives.   Customer views, vendor perspectives, and the ramblings of random people we otherwise wouldn’t encounter potentially create more seeds to cross fertilize.  Internal collaboration tools and social platforms bring together the thoughts and knowledge of colleagues in different locations and with different expertise.  Innovation is about putting ideas and facts together in new ways; the more ideas and facts, the greater the inputs to innovative thinking. v “Edison didn’t invent the light bulb by trying to improve the candle.”  Innovation usually springs from addressing a broad, underlying need, not a short-term complaint or usage issue.  Monitoring and listening can help to reveal fundamental opportunities that few people articulate before seeing the solution. v As the economist E. F. Schumacher said, “Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex…It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction.” At their core, great innovations generally reflect simple ideas – the execution might be complex, but the motivating concept is typically elegantly well-defined.  Social media helps simplify and focus.  Express your idea in 140 characters.  Or blog until you know what you are blogging about. Does opening up the organization to social media and the vast array of unrelated, non-linear thoughts and ideas pay off?  I think so.  Consider the Cuisinart.  No focus group or market research ever identified the need for a Cuisinart.  Carl G. Sontheimer mixed his expertise in business, technology and cooking to develop the Cuisinart.  Almost everyone has heard of the Cuisinart today, but at its introduction in 1973 most people didn’t understand WHAT it was beyond a fancy toy or souped up blender.  It took two years for the home cook to begin to embrace the Cuisinart as a new, and now indispensible, kitchen appliance.  Not an improvement on a blender, but an innovative tool.  Innovation pays off.  Sontheimer sold the Cuisinart company in 1987 for $42 million. Sontheimer’s education, experience, and personal interests gave him insights and the ability to span knowledge silos.  Social media can help others grasp those seemingly unrelated bits that drive innovation… if companies encourage engineers and techies and marketing folks to engage in social media.  If companies acknowledge that wide-ranging ideas are NOT a waste of time, that listening and learning and sharing are the sources of the seeds of innovation.  If social media is integrated into the everyday of business.  How do you make social media part of the everyday at your organization?

Who Me? Social Media? I’m an Engineer!

It’s a cliché that a company is the sum total of the people who work there, and clichés are so often true!  Social media enables companies to give each person a voice, and to demonstrate the superiority of the company by showcasing the employees.  This approach also creates greater employee engagement. 

The Clover Architecture model of social media (http://socialmedia-insideout.blogspot.com/2011/04/clover-architecture-4-leaves-of.html ) is built on the 4 leaves of leadership, governance, culture, technology.  Inherent in each leaf is the idea that social media is integrated throughout your organization.  What does that mean?

v  Executives are actively involved with social media.  They blog (http://socialmedia-insideout.blogspot.com/2011/03/passionate-leadership.html); they deliver podcasts; they participate on internal and external social forums.

v  Central policies and processes define the guidelines, but social media activities are dispersed throughout your organization.  You might want to have a social media guru on-board, but s/he does not function as an approval log-jam.

v Collaboration, sharing, experimentation and transparency are part of the core culture.  The organization rewards process as well as outcome.  Individuals are incented to reach out to colleagues and customers.  Their individual voices and personal brands are valued as representatives of the organization.

v Technology platforms are easy-to-use. 

How do you actually implement these goals?

IBM helps employees to share their passions, their personal interests, and their professional and technical insights on personal IBM blogs.  (I love that “personal corporate blog” is no longer an oxymoron!)  As IBM notes:

 “…the opinions and interests expressed on IBMers' blogs are their own and don't necessarily represent this company's positions, strategies or views. But that doesn't mean we don't want you to read them! Because they do represent lots of business and technology expertise you can't get from anyone else.”

Then IBM lists the individuals’ blogs.  (Check out the blogs at http://www.ibm.com/blogs/zz/en/ )  The impact?  More engaged employees who are also professionally growing; more engaged customers who create personal contacts and recognize the depth of expertise in IBM employees – and in IBM.

As part of an effort to enhance customer experience, a high tech product company  with whom I worked decided to make their engineers more accessible.  At first, the engineers had mixed reaction – they aren’t social media wonks; they aren’t great communicators; they don’t have time!  On the other hand, they are passionate about their work and the products, and they love sharing their enthusiasm and knowledge.  We created discussion forums, and the key product engineers conducted live-chats at designated times.  The result exceeded the goals.  What happened?

v Engineers felt recognized and appreciated; they were virtually signing their names to their research and product designs and establishing their personal value.  They found that sharing their knowledge was fun.

v Engineers were re-energized; customers and other forum participants had interesting ideas and good questions.  Innovation began to expand beyond the limiting four walls of R&D; new ideas created more new ideas. 

v Customer service and customer satisfaction rose significantly; customers loved having access to the experts.  In addition, capturing the discussion threads and making the answers easily accessible drove down the number of calls to the customer service center.  The number of calls is the primary driver of cost, so customer service costs plummeted. 

Enabling employees to share internally and externally is a win-win.  What approaches have you found most effective?

Herding Cats and Other New Norms

If you are a 21^st century-born organizations, you probably don’t need a social media strategy.  Social media is an integral element of your overall strategy; the two do not have separate lives.

But what about more mature organizations?  A non-profit celebrating its 125^th anniversary this year; a 75-year old global manufacturer; a 110-year old financial services institution with hundreds of billions in assets and ranked among the safest in the world?  What does a social media strategy mean to these organizations?  Why – and how – should they change a successful business model?

Social media is not a discontinuous technology change that demands attention and threatens the “old way” with a single blow.  It’s hard to define.  (Use the words “social media,” and many companies think only Facebook and Twitter.)  It is amorphous.  More than anything, social media reflects social change, not technology change. 

Over time, successful businesses do need to adapt to social change – in the way they operate both internally and externally.   Social media and social networking have evolved to the point that they are changing people’s expectations about how to interact -  person-to-person,  individual-to-business, and business-to-business.  Because, to state the obvious, “businesses” are just amalgamations of people with a common objective.  Once changes in personal interactions take hold, those changes leak into business interactions.

What are the big changes requiring significant shifts in business models?

·        Knowledge is a commodity. Remember when knowledge = power?  Knowledge is not only now available, it is freely shared. 

·        The quantity of available data has exploded beyond our capacity to process it.  Data and automated analyses are like an active volcano, constantly spewing out.  The lone hero with the data who could run statistical programs has a lot of competition, competition that is trumpeting different data and different statistical programs.

·        Engagement is not just the word of the day; individuals want a say; they want to be heard; they increasingly demand to be respected and empowered.

These fundamental changes demand shifts in what is valued in the workplace and how companies function.  Continued success in this century requires that organizations evolve to new norms.

·        The visionary composer is one of the most valuable employees.  The individual who can take all of the data and analyses and create a harmonious future vision, who understands how to integrate all of the information, is more valuable than the expert. 

·        Hierarchies are more porous; command and control is dead.  Corporate hierarchies will not disappear, but the leaders need to be the first among equals, one of the team.  Excellent corporate leaders will manage not demand.

·        The ability to herd cats, not sheep, will drive results.  Increasingly, employees want to control their own time and to have an impact.  Like cats, each wants to be recognized as an individual participating in a shared culture.

Organizations need to build these new norms into their processes.  How they recruit, train and review employees, for instance, needs to change.  The old performance metrics might no longer measure what really matters. 

What new metrics have you used to adapt to social changes?