Evolutionary Change over Revolutionary Chaos Part II

Innovation and Change – The Challenge for Enterprises

Changing the way you do things is a massive challenge for humans. We are creatures of habit and from a young age our biology teaches us to do those things that work and we get rewarded for. Referred to as reinforcement learning, we learn what to do and how to do it by receiving positive feedback.

Why is such natural human behaviour a blocker to change, this illustration goes to why.

 

Led vs. Managed; different activities need different approaches

These two diagrams, which can be laid over each other, go to the route cause. You need to foster good management because this makes you efficient. Management focuses as a group on a process of making what you currently do more efficient rather than thinking ‘is what we currently do still providing best value to our customers’. When you have a formula that is commercially successful then you need to provide a programme of efficiency gains e.g. zero defects, total quality management etc. These are valuable and we have provided many such programmes. However it will not create a business that will survive. Just delivering the same thing cheaper and faster may not be the answer, especially in a globalized economy where delivering something 10% cheaper from one economic area still can’t compete with one that can inherently deliver something 50% cheaper.

You also need to provide develop a service that is more effective (answering current customer needs) than you currently provide. 

Effective business must evolve in tandem with the changing customer environment, delivering value to changing needs. That means innovation, because “doing what you have always done just gives you what you always got”. The bias of the organisation is that it is designed to “do what you’ve always done”, that is why innovation needs to be led.

Effectiveness comes from innovation.

The leadership challenge is to lead an evolution to more effective working without destabilizing what is already established. This is challenging because:

• Status quo is safe, it is how we got here
• Our business is profitable and successful, why change what isn’t broken
• If we change this will disrupt the company and is unfamiliar ground for the Executive
• Innovation and new visions are hard, risky and do not play to strengths
• True innovation is challenging because innovation is a ‘led’ not a ‘managed’ process

The answer to change lies in the development of a culture that supports innovation. Here are three fundamental aspects of cultural change;

• Push and Pull – To create pull companies need to create small increments of success based around innovation and new approaches (what good looks like). They then need to provide a wider ‘toolbox’ of approaches, the ‘Pull’, training and corporate learning, that encourages and provides approaches which others can adopt when seeking to emulate these successes.
• Accepting failure as a pathway to success – In achieving the ‘pull’ illustrated above there will be failure. When you are doing something new companies and CxOs must accept that this does not follow the ‘normal’ budgeted approach. Doing what you have always done is easy; doing something that is different (innovation) is hard. Measuring success by applauding loudly those who have always done what you always did will positively reinforce NOT changing anything, therefore reinforces stagnation and reducing company performance.
• Leading by doing rather than talking – One of the keys aspects of success, the leadership, must constantly communicate the vision of innovation and why the company must do it. The Executive must walk the talk by making their success significantly dependent upon innovation. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) must be attached in a clear and meaningful way to risk taking. Leaders must adopt an approach of incremental inspect and adapt. Leaders must understand, rather than monstrous programmes of grand design and cost, change succeeds by starting small and evolving success. These approaches inspect and adapt to feedback or value delivered to client / customer

About Radtac

Radtac Ltd has been established for over 15 years and has delivered programmes for clients such as British Airways, Nokia, Rolls Royce, Hiscox, William Hill.

Radtac’s vision and values are ……..

Vision :

Radtac believe in challenging the status quo and in the innate ability of people to rise to the challenges of their organisation.

Values :

Radtac do this by helping our clients achieve sustainable continuous improvement and by unlocking their human potential using our great people and unparalleled practical industry experience.

By doing this we have come to value….

• Evolution over revolution
• Collaborative partnerships over supplier relationships
• Pragmatic transformation over fundamentalist dogma
• Transformational leadership over transactional management
• Realising innate potential over hiring new staff
• Simplicity over complexity

Michael Short

Radtac COO