Principle 8: Learning, innovation and continual improvement (Item 1)
Continual improvement and innovation depends on continual learning.
You must create an environment of continual learning, continual improvement
and innovation. (Eg, employees are prepared to try new ideas, experiment,
innovate and take reasonable risks. People are encouraged to take initiatives
and be pro-active.)
This is probably the single most important Principle for long term
sustainability of the company. If you do not continually improve (by
constantly saying "what we do is not good enough, we can and must
do it better"), you have little chance of long term sustainability.
If you do not continually innovate (adapt; generate new concepts; provide
new products and services; do things differently), you have little chance
of long term sustainability.
If your company does not do both these things, it will be overwhelmed,
crushed and become just another case history.
Continual improvement and innovation are therefore both critical to
a company's long term success. Principle 8 goes on to say that continual
improvement and innovation will happen only when
there is continual learning. If you do not continually learn (from others;
from what you do and have done; from your mistakes; from your successes;
from your customers; from your competitors; from your employees; from
technology), you have little chance of long term sustainability.
This means that continual learning is vital.
If you stand still in the current world, you will probably not survive
for long. Just to keep up, requires an almost headlong rush. The rush
is to constantly improve — in terms of both products and services
that customers will value (Principle 3); and processes that are more
efficient (ie, cost less) and effective (ie, better meet your Goals
and objectives).
Principle 8 says that you will have to be innovative in that rush for
improvement. You should not be satisfied with the status quo. It then
goes on to say that your ability to do well in the rush of constant
improvement and innovation depends on your ability to continuously learn
— to grow your knowledge and make use of it.
We need to see innovation not as a fad but as an essential area of
attention. Innovation brings a vitality that comes from finding new
ideas and using them to develop and grow. Without innovation, systems
- even `perfect' systems - become drab, uninteresting and eventually
irrelevant.
Continuous improvement, whether it is through continual incremental
improvement, innovation, breakthrough or invention, means that you are
changing the status quo in order to reach your Goal. Continuous improvement
is crucial for all companies in today's marketplace.
Effective companies know that innovation is more than spontaneity or
serendipity. Innovation is purposeful. It must be treated as the essential
internal business attribute of the company. This used to be called Research
and Development and was often restricted to a Department with that name.
The new thinking takes it much further and has it as the province of
everybody.
We will deal first with innovation and continual improvement and then
turn to learning. However, there is a considerable degree of interconnectedness
and overlap.
Innovation is a natural act. In nature we call it evolution —
the gradual unfolding of new forms through constant interaction of organisms
— all of which exhibit variation in all their characteristics —
with their environment. "Nature is a tinkerer ... Anything that
works is co-opted banged into shape by (myriad) natural experiments."
(Hoffmann) Major shifts - new species and extinction - are excited by
major shifts in the environment. `Major shifts' do not simply mean climatic
change or some cataclysmic event - but also perhaps the arrival of a
new form, a competitor, or the chance establishment of a more viable
strain.
The history of all species is one of adaptation — adapting to
new conditions. Those that adapt best do best. Every adaptation and
it relationship with its environment is always very thoroughly tested.
Iteration over billions of years - an infinity of failed experiments
- has led to intelligent humans and the world in which we find ourselves.
In Nature, iterations that fail are not `learnings'. However, all viable
forms discovered through the process are taken up, and these emerging
forms continually change the nature of the experiment.
Viability is always the goal.
This natural iteration - the chance establishment and improvement of
viability and resilience - has its parallels and differences in the
man-made world. Intelligent, curious, learning man short-circuits these
myriad iterations.
From synthetic chemistry, Hoffmann presents images of the chemist as
the architect/discoverer. The chemist brings discipline and thinking
to the iteration process: fast tracking - reducing the iterations; setting
up conditions in which viability can be established and improved.
By inducing and designing, he exploits and guides the iterations. He
applies learning; selectively experiments; reduces the iterations; finds
viability that suits and exploits this knowledge to define the next
experiment.
Think of the tens of thousands of iterations that Thomas Edison tried
in his "experiments" while searching for filament material
that would produce the best light.
The central notion is of `imperfect fit' — that things
`fit' well rather than `perfectly'. This allows trial and failure, and
trial and refinement — often followed by breakthrough and new theory.
`Imperfect fit' is used to draw attention to the fact that we live
in a dynamic world — always searching to improve viability
— whether the search is conscious or by design.
Our nature is to seek comfort: we seek to impose order and to repeat
pleasurable experience. Yet we also seek the novelty that only diversity
can deliver.
We have these two ideas in tension—between what we are used to
and what is new; between satisfaction with what we know and dissatisfaction
with the old.
Novel stuff that appeals is drawn into our current way and is improved.
We are driven to experiment, to understand concepts and the relationships
between them. But we are averse to failure. Novel stuff that does not
appeal, we call a `mistake' (and are so presented with the opportunity
to learn). Each step gives a platform that allows us to reach a little
further.
The more extensive the diversity of alternatives, the richer the mix
of relationships. The greater our skill and our `feel' for the desired
result; the more likely we are to arrive at viable innovation.
A poet has an idea or emotion to present in appealing form. `Appealing'
will cause certain rules to be applied. These might be the rules of
meter, rhyme and logic - but any set will guide some form of iteration
as the poet searches hundreds or thousands of combinations for the right
solution. The tension between discipline and aesthetic will drive the
iterations. The quality of the iterations themselves will be regulated
by the poet's ability to exploit the diversity of language and style
— and of course commitment to stay with the process. This process
can and often does lead to ideas that surprise the poet. In the world
of purposeful innovation, we would call this `surprise' a `discovery'
— or `invention'.
Footnotes
This comes from material prepared
by Chris Russell.
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