Gating Innovation

How scaled organizations balance control, autonomy and risk

Nearly every organization wants to be more innovative and produce their industry’s Next Big Thing — something better, cheaper, faster and maybe even disruptive. Here are the critical ingredients enterprise organizations often use to innovate internally:

• a small semi-autonomous group of talented people;
• a thesis that allows for focused innovation;
• a lean process that puts the team in close proximity with customers and allows them to develop powerful insights;
• and an empowered “safe to fail” culture with sponsorship from the C-suite.

When discussing these particulars of team, process and culture, the conversation can quickly become nuanced and organization-specific. From skunk works to R&D labs and innovation colonies, there’s no “one size fits all” form of internal innovation, and the sustainability of any pipeline design must fit with an organization’s culture. One of the most important variables that a leader can control is when, where and how an innovation pipeline is gated.

A gate (also commonly called a stage, phase or innovation gate) is exactly what it sounds like–an intentional barrier that the innovating team must pass, to push forward on a given concept…