Innovation: Where creativity and strategy create success

Innovation in itself is a simple concept — it is the creation of something new — which is perhaps why it is such a widely used term these days. But as with many things, the mere use of innovation in your business or career is not going to guarantee you success; true innovation must be different or disruptive in order to add value.

So what is innovation?

I would define it as a process and behaviour.

When followed, it leads to ‘out of the box’ thinking that results in the creation of new and disruptive solutions that solve problems in a completely different or revolutionary way. It is the source of new opportunities and has the power to create new markets.

An innovation is also a new product or service that yields a remarkable result that can disrupt the marketplace because of its differences.

I am hence in complete agreement with Louis V. Gerstner who states that:

“In almost every industry, globalisation is leading to overcapacity, which is leading to commoditisation and/or price deflation. Success, therefore, will go to the fittest — not necessarily to the biggest.

Innovation in process — how things get done in an enterprise — will be as important as innovation in the products a company sell.”

(Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance, HarperBusiness, 2002)

Mindset plays a large part

As with many other concepts in business, if you think of yourself as an innovator then you are more likely to be open to new ideas. Successful innovation is a process as well as a solution and acknowledging that you need to use innovation throughout your business will certainly set you on the right path.

Many people talk about the effects of the left or right brain on our personality and by extension on the way we work. The idea is that everyone is one or the other: left brain being more logical as the seat of language and/or mathematics and the right brain being more creative. Those who are left handed are said to work more on the right hand side of their brains, hence the idea that left handers are more creative and right handers more logical.

As outlined in a recent article by the Guardian, studies including a new two-year study by the University of Utah, published in the journal Plos One, are now emerging that show that it is not as clear cut as this. Our brains are actually processing information across both sides of our brain with some tasks — such as language or music — split across the hemispheres. If you are creative, think outside the box and bring together new ways to solve your business problems then you need to decide how you are going to put those into practice. If you are the logical one then you will be able to execute new and exciting ideas but can you create them?

True innovators have both. They are able to create a vision of how their business will change and disrupt the marketplace in the long term and the ability to get there with shrewd business planning and execution. Whether or not the left/right brain exists what it represents is key. Having insight into how you work and whether you are able to bring innovation to your work yourself gives you the ability to plan for it; whether you do it yourself or build these skills into your business model through attracting innovators to you.

When it comes to innovation and its place alongside positive disruption I see creativity as a key building block in the process. Businesses that lead the way in innovation don’t put it in a silo. Having a team for innovation which sits by itself is a bit like having an IT Department like the one in The IT Crowd; banished to the basement, alone, with no links to other departments it is unlikely to be doing any useful work and more likely to be just a box ticked in a nod to fulfilling another business ‘trend’ for your company.

But just as we touched upon with our left brain/right brain perspective innovation cannot be the sole driver. In order to capitalise on truly disruptive and different ideas that are thrown up by integrating innovation into your business model you must have a 50:50 relationship between innovation and operational agility. For a creative idea to have meaningful value to what you are doing you must have the skills and structure within your business to make it a reality.

In this blog, I have talked about innovation in the context of entrepreneurship or running a successful business, but it can be just as easily be applied to one’s career or life experiences. I shall definitely be sharing more on this in blogs to come. If you’re interested to learn more, you can subscribe to my RSS feed and find me on Twitter and LinkedIn.