Why I set my team an annual goal to do something they’re not meant to.
In today’s fast-paced environment where everyone wants something done yesterday, it might seem counterproductive to take a step back and see what non-work related projects your team could take on. However, recently I felt that innovation was becoming lost in the day-to-day activities, back-to-back meetings and pressure of quick turnarounds. Innovation, coupled with a deep understanding of the end user, are the factors driving successful products and customer satisfaction so they should really be given the attention they merit.
As the director of a talented design team I champion high standards and challenges, so I tasked everyone in my team to do at least one ‘skunkworks’ project over a year. Rather than constrain them to the business agenda, they were invited to design a product of their choosing on company time and using company resources. The outcome so far has been really pleasing.
The background
The skunkworks theory is not new, but is not a mainstream technique yet and is certainly something new for us. It provides a small group of talented people the freedom to escape enterprise responsibility and management and focus on innovation, R&D and problem solving. Some ingenious products have come out of similar initiatives at Google, IBM and Apple including the Mac. The original ‘Skonk Works’ during WW2 resulted in the design and production of world-class jet fighter planes by aerospace company Lockheed Martin Corporation. So you could say we have high hopes.
I appreciate that everyone in the team has diverse interests and inspirations and it may have been a long time since they had the opportunity to write their own creative brief — perhaps not since college or higher education. I figure that b providing the time to work on a passion project, the team would be able to do more questioning, analysing and testing to really find solutions and do an outstanding job. This in turn would influence their approach to design for enterprise.
The brief
Over 12 months their brief is to simply “do something they’re not meant to be doing” using the regular tools and tech at their disposal but also encouraging them to explore other resources in the business. These people are designers by nature so most relished this challenge from the outset. The invitation to push the boundaries, go off piste, legitimately ‘play’ at work and BYOD (Bring Your Own Design) was novel and appealing!
Perhaps it will kick start a new product which no one has ever thought about, or introduce a new perspective to an old problem. When we’re given the space and time to think freely, ideas flow. It’s exciting and motivating. It’s about learning, experimenting and appreciating that your boss has absolute trust in you.
The foreseeable benefits for the business are increased moral and productivity, an awareness of the thought process that should go into every project and the practice of testing, failing and improving. Enhancing resilience can only serve to improve a team’s skillset.
Collaboration
The notion of everyone beavering away on their own projects doesn’t mean they are working alone. Far from it. Another justification for skunkworks is the collaboration aspect.
It sounds obvious, but designers are inherently interested in the design of a product, which can sometimes cause tunnel vision when it comes to the bigger picture. Other areas of the business are involved in getting a product to market which is hard to fully appreciate if you rarely see how they function. Everything from coding to promotion has a part to play so the skunkworks projects nudge the designers to seek the knowledge and insight that their cross-departmental colleagues can offer. I insist that my design team really get under the skin of a product user, not just basing it on a paradigm. Talking to the actual end user, the design research team, the marketing/sales team and even the accounts and legal team breaks down siloes and opens their eyes to how success depends on various elements besides design. They discover how to value engineer a product, make the most of a budget, generate ideas for marketing and understand timeframes and pressures that different departments are working to.
We have regular catch ups and I’ve seen some great work coming through. When you trust your team and task them to push the boundaries, the response is overwhelmingly positive. They collaborate through choice, share knowledge, skills and approach day-to-day work with more enthusiasm and understanding of stakeholders. In a nutshell, the time ‘wasted’ on non-work projects is actually a business investment. It might take some on boarding initially but I’d be pleased to have a chat or coffee if you’re interested in finding out more about launching a skunkworks initiative at your organisation. Collaboration and sharing of knowledge are key, after all.
