What isn't management's role in innovation?
Executive management's role is to ensure that it institutionalizes the expectation that managers will lead the continuous improvement of their teamsAND that time is allotted for them to lead improvement initiatives. Innovation should be an expectation of all workers and an accountability of all managers.
Based upon my experience, managers are not systematically held accountable for continuous improvement of their teams. Further, most believe innovativeness and creativity are characteristics of a select few, and that it need only occur at the highest levels of the organization. Innovation snobbery is not serving us for a variety of reasons. Innovation must occur at all levels.
Adaptive Innovation - For Cost Reduction and Increased Productivity Levels 1 - 3 of an organization are concerned with current operations, and their innovation focus should be value adding adaptations to current processes. Some models call this adaptive innovation.
Strategic Innovation - For Sustainability and Competitive Advantage Levels 4+ should be concerned with strategic innovation - new markets, new products, new business models.
Outsourcing Innovation is a Mistake:
When innovation snobbery results in our thinking that innovation must be separated from the mission-delivering part of the organization and it is "outsourced" to an elite group, organizations must bear the cost of integrating the innovation back into the line organization, and this integration is often met with resistance. Further, it robs the mission-delivering part of the organization from the "psychological kick" of the opportunity to be creative, leading to disengagement.
Innovation's Link to Accountability:
We have got to reduce accountability conflicts of interest. As long as employees are held accountable for their output, why would they take a risk on innovation which could lead to reduced output? If instead, they were held accountable for using appropriate judgment and discretion, they could be rewarded for taking on chance on something, even if it "failed". Nearly all current performance management models are stacked against innovation. It's safer to continue the status quo.
In Summary, To Foster Innovation Organizations Must:
In source innovation, i.e. expect it from the mission-delivering organization, at all levels.Institutionalize the idea of managers? being accountable for the continuous improvement of their team.Institutionalize the idea of managers being accountable for the output of their team.Relieve employees of output accountability, but expect full commitment and their best advice to their managers.