Principle 8: Learning, innovation and continual improvement (Item 2)
Continual improvement and innovation depends on continual learning.
You must continually innovate (adapt; provide new products and services;
do things differently.
You must seek new ways of doing what you are good at now.
If you do not you will not keep up with you marketplace, you will not
be capable of providing the goods and services at the quality and price
demanded.
You must be constantly adapting and copying new ideas from everywhere
that you can. From competitors, from other industries, from customers,
between processes, from other technologies.
Keep looking outside of your company and your industry for new ideas.
Many of the real breakthrough ideas have come from adapting the practices,
products or service offering from one company or industry into another.
How have other industries reduced their response time? For example,
if response time means getting there quickly, all the following industries
would have much to learn from each other: police, fire, ambulance, taxis,
road side service, couriers, fast food delivery. This is benchmarking
in its broadest sense.
Borrow ideas from others. Externally, the company acquires ideas through
its interaction with its environment and its capability to extract ideas
of value. Thus, your customers, alliances, industry, science, technology
and competitors are all valuable sources of ideas.
If the benchmarking process is not well established; if company begins
to believe it cannot learn from anyone else; if it is not willing to
look outside at what other companies or even other parts of their own
company do; then innovation will not happen. Just stuckness.
Often when people benchmark, they are much more interested in proving
to themselves and everyone else how good they are. We have seen constant
examples of so called `benchmarking tours' whose participants appear
only to want to tell what they are doing, rather than find out what
the place they are visiting is doing. Wrong! Put your ego on hold. You
can learn from these people, regardless of how good you think you are.
Listen and ask questions! Suck their brains dry!
Many writers describe "battle of the market place". It is
a good analogy. In `battle' and the marketplace, the problem is about
positioning, applying force and developing the capability to win. The
military approach says we work on ourselves to be ever more capable
- to improve our viability in the world around us. The battle view leaves
no option but to ensure plans and actions do have external application
and internal bite.
Companies are imperfect. They rely on fallible people and operate systems
that they know need improvement. Without clear knowledge of the future,
they create a vision and then watch the future close in around it. This
`closing in' creates the need for viability. The closing in is rarely
benign. Competition and other enormous forces of change in a turbulent
transforming world bring great uncertainty and insecurity. Globalization,
accelerating change and the shifting nature of competitiveness, all
mean that innovation is now a battle imperative rather than just a good
thing to do.
As in warfare, the contestants have two issues to face; the first is
to keep up with current play and the second is to find ways to increase
their capability more comprehensively than the opposition. The military
analogy is valid across the huge array of business strategy.
There are four levels of continuous improvement and innovation.
- Imitation and improvisation (the lower levels) both imply a continuation
of the current outcome or process — or continuos improvement.
- Innovation and invention (the upper levels) imply novelty —
something new.
 The two lower levels
deal largely with the refinement of what already exists. Risk is low;
time to do them is short; and benefits are commonly low. However, results
can be substantial and important. For example, massive improvements
in the performance of processes, aircraft safety, heart valves. The
innovativeness, enthusiastic volunteering and resourcefulness we described
in Principle 7 (`Enthusiastic People') are essential ingredients to
the solutions we can generate at these levels. But it is at the higher
levels that you search for new.
Innovation sees the introduction of new concepts; the introduction
of new models or substantially different ways.
The point of distinction from the two lower levels is that in the upper
levels you are very dissatisfied with what exists and believe that current
concepts limit you from finding alternatives.
The dominant idea behind distinguishing `innovation and invention'
from `improvising and imitating' is that in the upper levels the concepts
themselves are up for grabs or unknown. There is instability. You prospect,
trial, dismiss and overturn. At the lower levels, you are more accepting
of the concepts and seek to refine.
Invention, whether by purposeful endeavor or by surprise/discovery,
opens new possibilities. Similar ideas fly and cluster to this new knowledge.
New relationships are tried. Some few are viable. Those that are viable,
fire the processes of imitation, improvisation and the lower levels
of the diagram. And you begin again.
Invention presents you with a window on new possibilities and innovation
sees you exploit that condition as established concepts begin to migrate
to it.
Ideas cluster, iterate and sort into higher levels of viability. Each
brings new value, novelty and complexity. Hence, we see the car and
the aircraft different in almost every respect from their original inventions
because of innovation. Often by way of importing an idea or technology
already established in some other field. Importing of ideas or technology
is constrained by awareness of them; receptivity of candidate processes
to change; capability to integrate them; and affect on current operations
and markets. We usually innovate with our feet firmly on the ground.
Invention carries higher risk than innovation because not all inventions
are viable. The risk is high because most inventions that fail to deliver
a valued, viable result. Indeed, some concepts needed for the viability
of the invention may not be known.
The triangle is also intended to present the idea that we spend most
of our energy working in the existing world - the lower levels. This
is our stable foundation. At these levels, there is little risk or cost
of failure. Commonly, improvements are in small increments. Most `experiments'
at these levels have high chances of success because we are dealing
with `knowns'. At the top, the triangle is small - representing the
idea that few of the experiments will deliver viable results.
In pursuing all these levels - particularly the upper ones - we apply
Imagination, Inquiry and Initiative.
In summary, innovation is a natural act that we induce and guide. It
is driven by Imagination (`the readiness to redefine what could be');
Inquiry `curiosity, discovery and learning'); and Initiative (`the readiness
to do'). The notions of Imperfect fit, iteration, viability, and imperfect
knowledge make risk and failure likely. Risk also plays its role in
the external environment where competition; innovations that are more
appealing; our sense of aesthetics and values; all play their role.
Against this relative simplicity, companies deal with people and mess.
You have seen that innovation is natural for humans. But why don't
you see more of it. Roald Hoffmann (Nobel Prize - Chemistry) notes "The
intriguing thing about creation is that it is so intellectual and so
down-to-earth practical. Creation is such hard work".
Hoffmann's personal experience gives a valuable insight — curiosity
and adventure live hand-in-hand with perseverance and knowledge; with
intensity of effort, persistence and an often huge number of iterations.
In a company, the innovation process needs to be nurtured. Although
it is clearly necessary, it has many enemies.
Footnotes
This comes from material prepared
by Chris Russell.
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