In my last post, “Want to Suppress Innovation in your Company or Group?”, I reviewed some key behaviors and actions you want to avoid if you desire a culture rich with innovation and innovative ideas. Now, let’s examine the positive side of this important topic. What are the key foundations, behaviors, and activities that promote a culture of innovation and innovative ideas? To answer this, I spent some time examining the works of authors and researchers who have given this great thought — John Naisbett, Megatrends; Naisbett and Patricia Auburdene, Megetrends, 2000; Tom Peters, Search of Excellence; Rosabeth Moss Kantor, The Changer Masters; and Warner Burke, Organization Development — and then reflected on my experiences and lessons learned to arrive at this list. Below, is the resulting list the describes the specific climate (climate is the manifestation or outward signs of the real culture), leadership behaviors, and activities that I believe will serve you best in creating and fostering a true culture of innovation and quite importantly, result in having true employee engagement.

Burke (Organization Development, p. 30) summed up his review of materials related to this by setting forth three foundational characteristics that effective organizations share and I want to use these as the framework for my overall list. I will present these three overarching categories and then explore what that culture (the accepted and shared norms for solving problems and interacting with internally and externally) might feels like and looks like to you as a leader. 

I. Effective organizations are less hierarchical in structure and they “network” more to get work done and to communicate.

  • You don’t feel the need to say “Because I’m your boss” and instead say, “We’re doing this together” more often.
  • As a leader, you coach, teach, and mentor, rather than just direct and evaluate.
  • You desire centralization where absolutely necessary, but generally promote cross-functional working groups that integrate all the ways your company interacts with your outside environment.
  • You promote and plan for the sharing of ideas across groups, encouraging people and giving them opportunities to network, observe other groups and activities, and share best practices.
  • You share ownership, risk-taking, success, and failure of projects with those involved as much as possible.
  • You ensure that data, market conditions, business plans, and certainly strategies are communicated throughout the organization at all times.

II. They involve organizational members in decisions they are expected to make.

  • You find a way to engage every member of the organization in strategic thinking, planning, and feedback before going off and having the “senior executive team” spend five months creating THE STRATEGIC  PLAN.
  • When you are finalizing THE STRATEGIC PLAN implementation, you include special cross-functional teams to provide feedback and champion implementation across the company.
  • Anyone leading teams in your company knows they are to engage their team when      evaluating challenges, creating solutions, defining goals and how these goals will be measured — it is expected not just desired.
  • You foster others to clearly define their goals and measurement of success but then allow flexibility in the way groups and individuals achieve those results.
  • You set aside resources (time and money) to make available for projects beyond the normal course of your business plans and groups know that great ideas will be given resources.

III. These organizations are, in general, more people oriented.

  • If you have committed to “core values” for your business (whether spoken or unspoken, whether on posters or just in an email), then “walk the walk” in all situations and never waiver. Do not make decisions that are not aligned with your business’ core values. Trust is hard earned once lost.
  • You actually listen (meaning, you hear and affirm that you hear) what people have to say, whether you are talking to a senior executive or a summer intern. Important: Leaders greatly influence the culture of any organization and this ONE thing can make a huge difference in setting an example, setting expectations, and showing everyone how to behave.
  • You give and encourage giving clear and frequent recognition to those doing good work in a variety of settings, not just focused on the “sales club” (revenue generators) or management team.
  • Believe and act according to the truth that “everyone person in your company is an equal in terms of deserving respect, compassion, and a chance to have opportunity and a high quality of life – real work-life balance”, regardless of their level of income, their position, or current performance. Be fair, compassionate, and consistent with people and mentor this to other leaders.
  • Set clear expectations of people up front, ensure every manager is transparent to others of their own expectations for themselves, and be accountable.

I believe that the combination of these characteristics will yield innovation from engaged employees and also attract and keep the best talent. In their book, Megatrends, 2000, Naisbett and Auburdene observe that the best of the bright of people will gravitate to those corporations that foster personal growth. I would amend this slightly. I believe the best at the brightest people will gravitate towards those corporations that engage people honestly and often, that include and value their thinking in assessing challenges and developing solutions, allow autonomy in execution, and treat them as valuable human beings and not “cogs” to satisfy only the “mo’ money” mentality.

Leaders who have no engaged and enthusiastic followers are not leaders. They are just manipulating authority to achieve short-term results.