Principle 8: Learning, innovation and continual improvement (Item 5)

Continual improvement and innovation depends on continual learning.

Why this is important

When you implement new ideas, you must change all the old structures that the new will impact (eg, reward and recognition systems; performance management system; technology; standard operating procedures; standards systems; communications systems; company structure; performance indicators; resources; job descriptions; performance agreements; organization values; audit systems).

Things do not just happen. It is often astounding to the person with the new idea that to them is so logical, exciting and will solve the problems of the world that everyone does not immediately jump on it and do it. The innovator often dismisses those who reject the wonderful idea as stupid, lazy or negative. Wrong!

Implementing innovative ideas

We are now going to move on to the issue of implementing those ideas – turning them into new products, services or new processes. We are going to offer two models for implementing innovations.

James Carlopio from the Australian Graduate School of Management proposed the first model. Carlopio takes the perspective of how people will be affected by and react to the proposed change. An issue most often omitted entirely or dealt with only superficially by those planning the change. Failure to consider how people will react to the change is the number one reason for project implementation failure.

The second model is from Goldratt who looks at other issues often overlooked.

A five-step implementation process

Carlopio gives a five-step process and extensive checklist for implementing anything.

• Knowledge and awareness – creating awareness, R & D, information gathering, identification of needs, initial planning.
• Matching and selection – solutions/ innovations are matched to problems, initial sorting.
• Decision – innovation(s) is/are chosen to implement.
• Implementation – rollout: putting the innovation or new technology to use.
• Confirmation – modification, testing, evaluation, the `innovation' becomes normal.

The fourth step – implementation – is not a simple "just do it" step. The implementation step, itself, consists of five parts, all of which must be done – though not necessarily in a linear order. However, you will not be successful with the last two until the first three have been fulfilled.

We give detail of the implementation steps below. Notice that the implementation steps mirror the generalised five-step process above.

Do not rush through them. Each one is important.

This is a very useful checklist. It shows that there is a fair amount of work needed to implement a good idea. Regardless of how good it is, it will not work unless this work is done.

Knowledge and awareness.

• People have to be comfortable about the new thing
• You have to fill the rumour gap – that gap in information in which rumour thrives
• You must deal with emotions and the ghosts of the past (This is very important. You must counter the "here comes another one" syndrome. You must acknowledge past failures and say how this implementation will be different. If jobs are at stake because of the innovation – acknowledge it. You cannot expect people to be enthusiastic about losing their jobs or being lied to about it. You are attempting to deal with "It wasn't what was done, it was how it was done".)
• You must answer the fundamental question "What's in it for me?" WIIFM.
• People want to know the 5-Ws ("what, when, why, how, who")
• You must provide education and training about the innovation (what it means, where it fits in, how it will work, how people will use it) so you need: course content, types of training and education, sources of training

Facilitating structures

• You must have in place (or modify) all those systems that will allow the implementation to work. Because the implementation of the innovation is, by definition, new, it will run up against all the previously installed systems. You will need to modify these where necessary so the innovation can coexist (and does not run counter to) existing systems. You may even need very new systems. Depend on it, if there is nothing to support the new wonderful idea, or if people get punished for using it, or if your company is set up to keep looking after the old ways, the new way will fail.
• Facilitating structures that you must consider include: reward and recognition systems; performance management system; technology; standard operating procedures; standards systems; communications systems; company structure; performance indicators; resources; job descriptions; performance agreements; peer pressure; company values; personal values; audit systems.
• You will also need these facilitating structures: detailed implementation plan; cultural analysis; innovation analysis; innovator analysis; union agreement; change agreement; working groups; discussion groups; committees.
• You are working to counter the fallacy of supporting (or rewarding) the old way while hoping for the new way.

Persuasion, decision, commitment

• Cost justification: economic evaluation; cost benefit analysis; evaluation of tangible and intangible benefits; determining costs.
• Determining the costs of unintended side-effects.
• Decision-making: rational and non-rational methods.
• Obtaining commitment from senior managers – overcoming resistance. You need a senior person to sponsor the innovation, to demand compliance with the new way, to talk it up, to obtain resources, to coordinate and to not tolerate use of the old.

Roll-out

• Training.
• Conversion: slow migration from old to new, or run parallel systems, or quick switch from old to new.
• Project termination – know when rollout of the new is finished and the maintenance phase commences.
• Plan the evolution of the new – how to milk the most possible from the new way and modify and improve it.

Confirmation and routinisation

• Individual level measurements: What are people's attitudes to the new? Are people doing it or using it? Is everyone doing it or using it who should be?
• Group level measurements: Is there conflict between the needs of different groups? Are there unintended side effects (good and bad)? Does the information-flow work? Do the supporting structures provide the necessary support? Are the process customers satisfied? Does it reduce (or increase) your customer's costs? Does it provide value to the employees?
• Company level measurements: Is the innovation effective? Does it deliver the benefits promised? Does it provide value to the company, its customers and other stakeholders? Are the costs what were estimated? Is it always available when needed (up-time/down-time)?
• Societal level measurements: How does this effect the community and society? Are there societal benefits? Are there any bad (or good) side effects?
• Review: Is it still what you want to do? What have you learned during implementation? How can you use that knowledge?

Quite an extensive checklist. It is quite clear that all or most points on the list are essential. It is also clear that most companies do not bother with these points at all. This would explain why the vast majority of companies report that their innovations fail – even if they were good ideas that should have worked. Many bosses continue to think when they have a good idea (or approve one), it is instantly implemented everywhere.

If you want your innovation to be successful, you must work at it and do most of the points on James Carlopio's checklist.

How to cause the change [1]

Goldratt approaches this issue in a very different way from Carlopio. In doing so, he fills in some important gaps.

In Its Not Luck and The Goal, Goldratt suggests that these questions are the critical and fundamental for leaders of companies:

• What to change ^[2]
• What to change to
• How to cause the change

Many people in almost every company have many innovative, bright ideas. Which ideas are the `right' ones — the ones that will solve the current and future problems? Most innovative solutions address only symptoms and fail to address the causes - the underlying problems. As Goldratt says, how do you know what you need to change? Then, when you have found the underlying problem, how do know what you need to change to? And when you know that, how do you go about causing the change to happen?

We believe that the process of innovation can learn a lot from the tools Goldratt presents to address these three core issues. The process is extremely rigorous and significantly helps the innovation process. Its main draw back is the rigour – which is off-putting to many. However, if you are serious about innovation you will need to be rigorous, otherwise you are probably wasting your time and money on half baked ideas or solutions to the wrong problems. If the idea is worthwhile, its is worth your while to treat it seriously and analyse it properly. The details of the techniques are well beyond the scope of this site. We refer you to Goldratt's work and the book by Lisa Scheinkopf.

In overview:

• Create the Current Reality Tree to identify the core problem. The Current Reality Tree answers the question "What to Change?" by listing the Undesirable Effects (UDEs), and describing the causalities that exist between them and identifying a core problem that is keeping the Undesirable Effects in existence. This was shown in detail above as a tool for `Idea Generation'.
• Create an evaporating cloud to identify a systemic conflict in your assumptions that is perpetuating the core problem. Brainstorm solutions to the core problem and select the initial elements of a solution. This was discussed in Principle 5 (`Improved Decisions') where we established that every problem is a conflict between assumptions. We should be able to articulate every core problem as a conflict – the core conflict. The `evaporating cloud' technique will help verbalise the assumptions that are maintaining the conflict.
• To answer the question "What to change to", create a `Future Reality Tree' to develop a robust solution to the core problem. Use the starting point found in the `Evaporating Cloud' – the initial solution – as your `injection'. The process calls for you to list the positives and all negatives of the injection. Eliminate all the Undesirable Effects and block all undesirable side-effects that you can think of. The process also calls for you to do a Negative Branch Reservation Analysis whereby you look for and find solutions to everything you and your team can think of that can go wrong. You should test the Negative Branches to destruction. It is far better to find solutions to problems during this stage than when you are in production. When you begin this analysis, your initial solution may seem as impossible as getting pigs to fly. The beauty is that this process provides a way to get them to fly.
• Create a Prerequisite Tree to determine the necessary conditions (immediate objectives) for implementing the injections (objectives) and the sequence in which they should be accomplished to overcome all the obstacles you can think of. This is the first step in answering the question "How to cause the change". Obstacles can include all the enemies shown below as well as `hiring freeze, no staff, no money, no advertising'.
• Create Transition Trees to define the detailed specific action plans to accomplish the intermediate objectives and injections of the Prerequisite Tree.

Now, that sounds complicated and long. It does not have to be. If you know the answer, don't follow all the steps. But the full process is there, when you need it, for an important innovation. It is rigorous and it certainly gives focus on real problems, real solutions and problems that you need to overcome along the way.

The rigour involved – that few companies or bosses have the patience to follow – is another clear indication of the work needed to have innovations implemented successfully.

Footnotes

^[1] This section is based on the work of Goldratt. (see our recommended reading list)

^[2] The tools used to answer "What to change?" has been dealt with in Idea generation. The summary is presented here.