Innovation and Change

Re-wiring your internal navigation system

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 20:15:00 GMT

Navigating uncertainty and ambiguity is going to be the most difficult for those who have had the most experience successfully navigating the Old Economy. This is not because we lack the aptitude or attitude, but because our internal navigation system is so attuned to expect certainty and predictability that we are now hardwired to be confused, conflicted and bewildered by uncertainty.

Consider the implications of a life where 90% of the time, success was linked to avoiding and sidestepping challenges, barriers or problems as quickly as possible while incurring the least amount of errors. This has been the business and educational orientation for those who are currently in professional management positions and have spent their whole career being rewarded for hitting the numbers and reducing waste in the pursuit of profit via perfection. Let’s call that way of orienting, Optimization.

By way of contrast, consider the implications of a life in the New Economy where 90% of the time, you experience problems, surprises and challenges and success is linked to your ability to deal head-on with those challenges by scrambling, adapting and innovating on the fly. Let’s call that way of orienting, Transformation.

To thrive in uncertainty, volatility and ambiguity one needs to shift from a focus on Optimization to Transformation. This means that success is going to be a function of our ability to shift back and forth from being a disciplined operator to an intuitive explorer and back again, depending on the circumstance, to credit Scott Anthony, the author of “The Silver Lining: An Innovation Playbook for Uncertain Times”.

Half the battle is accepting that big change, such as the change that every professional manager is going to have to master, is usually accompanied by a starvation of resources, pressure and a perspective change. The good news is that the other half of the battle, the starvation of resources along with the implications of pressure, are usually enough to prompt us to rewire our internal navigation system.

Surprises as Signposts

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 20:10:00 GMT

One of the most common disempowering assumptions that I see being “unconsciously” played out in change and decision making scenarios in business is the player’s attitude towards challenges and surprises. By surprises, I mean situations that were not predicted or expected and which therefore surprise us and throw us off when they pop.

Research by Saras D. Sarasvathy at the U of Washington stresses that the entrepreneurially inclined understand that surprises are to be expected rather than avoided and that they assume that a unique and sustainable competitive advantage can be created by learning to navigate them as fast as possible. Central to being able to navigate surprises and challenges is our attitude towards them. By contrasting the schooling and orientation of the professional manager MBA with the orientation of an entrepreneur, Sarasvathy was able to isolate some of the fundamental assumptions that shape the way entrepreneurs think and behave.

The professional manager assumes that if you are managing right, ie. living right, then you can safely expect no problems or challenges. This orientation seeks perfection and accomplishes the approximation of perfection through control. Surprises and challenges such as variances with the plan are judged as failure, to be avoided, and if you do have to deal with them, be quick about getting back on strategy.

The entrepreneurs attitude and interpretation is very different. They do not seek to predict the future, they seek to create it through their orientation to it and they allow strategy and plans to emerge from the circumstances. Rather than work to avoid challenges and surprises, they seek out environments that are uncertain and unpredictable because they tip the playing field in favour of the surprise seeker.

So next time you find yourself judging challenges and surprises as bad, trigger yourself to adopt them as helpful navigation sign posts pointing the way to emergent and intuitive opportunity.

Benefiting from Ambiguity

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 20:07:00 GMT

Who would have guessed that ambiguity would positively change our social, environmental and economic climate for the better. With scarce resources such as time and money, the big question being asked is “How do you minimize the downside of ambiguity while maximizing the upside?” The paradoxical answer is “Invest in yourself with a view to realizing a return for others”.

Let’s split that answer into 2 parts to expose the underlying benefit:

Investing in yourself:

The average return from an investment in yourself, IF you consistently gain one insight per week and act upon it daily, is compounded over the remaining years of your life. The chances of exponential returns start to approximate 100% after only a few months due to this compounding
Compared to the average, pre-financial meltdown ROI of 25% on your own business, 10% on real estate, 6% and less for insured products; the math paints a very clear picture. Statistically speaking, the biggest ROI comes from choosing to improve yourself daily and sticking with it.

With a view to realizing a return for others:

In a digital age where transparency is the new norm and social media is enabling the drive to interdependence and cooperative business models, it is not wise to concern yourself only with What’s in it for Me
A What’s in it for Us orientation provides you with the opportunity to tap into the synergy of the AND, while aligning yourself with the new and growing natural momentum within the market place

In an environment rife with ambiguity, the winning strategy is going to continue to be the split focus on results for self and others only because the demographics, social, political, environmental and economic climate are not going to tolerate anything but a win/win. Welcome to the golden age of ambiguity.

2010 Forecast of Trends to watch for

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 20:03:00 GMT

It is customary at the beginning of a new year to forecast trends for the upcoming year and beyond. Not ones to miss out on such opportunities, we would like to share with you our forecast for trends to watch for in the coming year and point out some of the more obvious, if not easy, solutions.

Uncertainty and ambiguity will prevail.
Solution: get better at navigating uncertainty and ambiguity by investing where you will be assured the greatest return, in yourself. Learning and practicing new navigation skills with a view to realizing a return for both yourself and others will provide, in our opinion, the greatest ROI of any that might be offered in the equity markets, real estate or venture markets.
Business Model innovation will start to play a lead role in driving emergent growth strategies, displacing product and service-based innovation.
Solution: Educate yourself on business models by referencing Clayton Christensen’s work on Disruptive Innovation, Roger Martin’s work on Integrative Thinking, Blue Ocean Strategy by Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne or check out one of our new webinars on Unlocking Business Genius.™
Collaboration will become more the norm than the exception. The above 2 trends will drive the need to collaborate more effectively with other suppliers, employees, customers and competitors to offset the perception of scarce resources and mounting pressure.
Solution: Trust your ability to navigate ambiguity, trust yourself to collaborate with right fit people and business and learn to trust the natural momentum in the marketplace that defines this New Economy

The Paradox with Passion

Thu, 31 Dec 2009 14:55:00 GMT

The general consensus with passion is that you can move mountains when you connect with your passion.

Simple, yes? But not easy.

Most of us have had experience connecting with our passion – with mixed reviews. I recall working with a CEO of a mid-size company who expressed a genuine desire to connect with his passion but had struggled mightily with what he perceived as the destructive potential of his passion. The paradox was, he was connecting with his passion – it just didn’t look like what he had expected and so he dismissed his experience as undesirable. Therein lies the paradox.

To lever the paradox, you must embrace these basic assumptions:

Passion is just passion, it is neither good or bad. Our tendency to focus on our weaknesses, rather than our strengths, informs the frame of reference we use for good or bad and in this case, passion. We frame creative passion as a strength and destructive passion as a weakness and the fact is that both have massive potential to propel and sustain us.
Passion is not to be controlled but rather, to be embraced. I have heard those from Asia use the expression “learn to ride the dragons back, rather than tame it” to demonstrate, metaphorically, how to give up control and join with such a big force.

There is a huge amount of passion at play within this economy and learning to ride the ebb and flow of passion, rather than control it, will provide you with the key you seek to successfully navigating the new economy.

Are you asking the right questions?

Thu, 17 Dec 2009 21:28:00 GMT

What if the underlying fundamentals of this new economy have changed so much that no one can accurately predict the future? If this is the case, then asking the questions “what does the future hold for us?”and “where will we be 2 years from now?” are no longer the right questions.

Similarly, if you are using a map of Sao Polo Brazil to navigate Toronto Canada, you would conclude that your circumstance is impossible to successfully navigate, and you would be right. If you were then given a map of Toronto Canada, you would probably realize the mistake and get on with it. The problem facing so many old economy leaders is that they have habitually gotten used to the world looking a certain way and they are going about forecasting, predicting, leading and directing based on the old map.

I have heard it said that the quality of one’s life is directly related to the quality of the questions that we ask ourselves. In light of this, the question we should be asking is: What type of environment am I attempting to navigate? Is it:

a. Simple?, ie. linear and predictable (old map) - so I can navigate based on my past experience, or is it
b. Complicated?, ie. limited set of possibilities (old map), the terrain of the experts - so I should rely on economists, forecasters and old economy experts, or is it
c. Complex?, ie nonlinear and unpredictable (new map) so I should seek out those who understand how to navigate this new environment or is it
d. Chaotic?, ie. truly uncertain with no range of possible outcomes (new map) and taking any action in any direction is the best immediate solution

This new economy has all the characteristics of a “Complex” environment and given that, the way to navigate requires an entirely different orientation, which starts with the questions we ask ourselves. The most informative question these days is “What type of environment am I attempting to navigate?” This should help you understand whether or not you have the right map and where to go to get a more appropriate one.

Help your Customer Find Their Voice

Thu, 17 Dec 2009 21:25:00 GMT

Everyone is looking to expand their product and service line these days. The conventional approach has been to seek to understand the “voice of your customer” by asking your customers what they want. The problem with that tact is that they do not know, because their world has changed as much or more than your world has and they are too close to their problem to provide relevant insight.

Rather than asking them for their answer to your problem, why not partner with them and share with them your perspective on what job you believe that they are trying to get done. From that new perspective you can explore all kinds of new improvement options, point out their blind-spots and provide them with very valid feedback as to how their value proposition is being perceived by the market. To successfully get a job done, it is typical to find that your customer’s are trying to reduce or eliminate one of the following common performance barriers:

Not enough wealth and/or well being
Not enough time
Not enough skill
Not enough information

Hilti Tools, a large manufacturer of tools to the trades and contractors, conducted a review of what they perceived their contractor customers wanted and were surprised to discover that beyond the typical need for great quality, their customer base needed to overcome fundamental barriers like not enough time, skill and/or information regarding all kinds of tools, that worked every time, not just the tools that Hilti historically made. Hilti shifted their business model to accommodate that need and reversed their financial spiral to reap substantial rewards.

Your perspective is subjective and possibly incorrect, but it provides your clients with an opportunity to step back and consider alternatives that they are too close to accurately assess. By helping your customer find their voice you become an invaluable resource to them as both a supplier and a strategic partner.

In the dark? Get a light!

Thu, 17 Dec 2009 21:22:00 GMT

Imagine that you are visiting a friend’s house in the country for the first time. The house is set about a mile back from the road, you arrive early and no one is there yet. The door is unlocked, so you let yourself in. You are surprised to find how comfortable the decor is as you browse and familiarize yourself with the layout. Then, the power goes out.

Pitch black! What would you do?

Would you remain motionless until someone showed up to help you navigate your way?
Would you fumble around to find a source of light?
Would you make your way back outside and wait there?

Navigating our current economy is very similar to finding yourself lost within an unfamiliar house in a power-outage. In a house, you can be pretty certain it has rooms, doors, windows an inside and an outside. What you are not at all clear about in an unfamiliar house/economy is the content within the house, the furniture, the layout and where you might locate matches, flashlight or any other source of light to light your way. Stated differently, you understand the context, but the content is not very clear.

The darkness that is our current economic reality is going to be here for a time. The context is going to look similar, but the content is going to change at unprecedented rates and no one is going to show-up to navigate for you and there are no sidelines to wait on.

The encouraging thing is that we all have the ability to adjust and adapt to the darkness, if we remember a couple of simple rules, like:

Too much analysis leads to paralysis – you gotta move, probe, test, experiment
Take action, any action in any direction is better than staying still
Fear is just feedback, feel it and do it anyway
If you cannot find a light, be the light and look to others for their light

Sparking employee engagement

Sun, 15 Nov 2009 17:30:00 GMT

Technology, interconnectedness, a shift in the global power base and the total upheaval in the central financial markets have converged over the last few years to create choppy and uncertain waters that are going to be here for the next few years. The rate, volatility and nature of current day change is now so disruptive that Leaders and Managers must engage employees in roles and responsibilities that were previously the domain of Leadership and Management.

To successfully navigate this new norm, organizations need to enable all of their people to act as look-outs, early-warning beacons and most importantly stewards of strategy charged with adapting to serve the well-being of customers, suppliers and themselves.

To accomplish this, business (Leaders and Managers) must translate strategy, budgets, plans, metrics into a language that is simple, clear and relevant enough that employees can understand it, extrapolate it and take remedial action when necessary. To get started down this path, I suggest that you start to:

1.   Educate employees on the fundamental mechanics of business and strategy
2.   Translate the resulting goals, standards and metrics in terms of behaviour by reporting in terms of
       return on effort and tracking qualitative metrics, in addition to quantitative
3.   Link budgets and plans to assumptions and have employees, with managers, review the accuracy of
       assumptions on a routine basis
4.   Encourage and reward employees learning about and levering their strengths

These simple initiatives have the potential, if nurtured and protected, to spark engagement and commitment from all levels within the organization. If leadership and management provide the context within which employees can stretch, learn and adapt you will be amazed at how much easier life becomes.

Engage their auto-pilot

Sun, 15 Nov 2009 17:29:00 GMT

That 99% of “Leaders and Managers” world-wide were caught flat footed by the current economic crisis is no longer news. We all get that the old way no longer works. Management’s role has historically been concerned with “doing things right” and Leadership role has been concerned with “doing the right thing”. In each case, roles and responsibilities were about “doing” and if leaders and managers were doing their job, the assumption has been that everything and everyone will be ok. That assumption needs to change.

Research will support the fact that up to 95% of what we “do”, we “do” unconsciously. Some of our most fundamental assumptions about business are that leaders and managers do not suffer the tendency towards unconscious rational, but employees sure do and that is why we need to control and contain them. If you have an honest discussion with any successful leader/manager they will tell you that they are on auto-pilot most of the time and that the ability to successfully navigate on auto-pilot is not isolated to the executive suite, it can be taught.

The most cost effective un-tapped resource in your organization is the minds of your employees. Helping them engage their auto-pilot is easier than it seems. Here are some tips:

Make it the responsibility of every employee to:
•   conduct themselves with an understanding of small m management and small l leadership relative to
     thinking and doing
•   understand, interpret and adapt the strategy of the organization to meet the needs of the client
•   make decisions up to a certain dollar level on strategic issues such as service recovery failure, client
     (internal and external) service and goodwill generation
•   engage in 2 way communication concerning the performance of the organization relative to metrics,
     plans and budgets

By encouraging everyone to engage in the role/responsibility of thinking AND doing the right things right, over time you build habits of thought and behaviour that evolve to be both linear and non-linear – which is the foundation for learning to navigate on auto-pilot.

Translate Intuition into a Plan

Sun, 15 Nov 2009 17:29:00 GMT

Most entrepreneurs are very intuitive out of necessity. Translating to others the link between what they intuitively see, how they anticipate and adapt is difficult without pointing to a track to run on. Assumption Based Planning lays the track and provides the context for helping others learn how to lay the track, adapt it and read it.

It can be as simple as the name suggests. Using a simple P = C + A formula, you identify the Assumptions that you are basing your Choices on for Performance targets, budgets and plans. Having identified the assumptions you write them in a format that allows you, at a later date, to reflect on the accuracy of your assumptions and choices. Having had the chance to reflect on the accuracy of your assumptions, you have two options:

1.   Change your Assumptions and leave your original plan in tack, knowing that you will likely miss your
       Performance target but you will start to track and understand the previously unconscious causal pattern
       between cause and effect, lead and lag indicators, assumptions, choices and performance
2.   Change your Performance expectations relative to targets, budgets and plans so that you have a
       rolling forecast rather than a static forecast and you have a link to the logic for the new Choices you are
       making in your rolling forecast

The format that you use can be as simple as a summary financial statement with itemized Revenue and Expenses linked to assumptions or you can use a format that is more easily adaptable and collaborative such as a Strategy Map, Business Model and/or Causal Scorecards.

Navigating uncertainty and volatility requires that you tap your intuition, you adapt and accommodate change and you clearly communicate what you intuit in a tangible language so that others can understand, extrapolate from and engage their skills in alignment with you. It’s simple, profound and can be the foundational building blocks you need to translate an intuitive management style into a culture of innovation.

The Trouble with Results

Fri, 09 Oct 2009 17:17:00 GMT

Results. It goes without saying that every business regardless of size needs ultimately to achieve results. In challenging times such as these, very likely you are more aware of your results than ever before. Being results focused is essential. What could possibly be wrong about having a focus on results?

A focus on results will inevitably bing people’s buttons around not being good enough and feeling like failures. When we don’t achieve our desired results, especially after tremendous effort has been exerted, we feel blamed and blame others. The emotional temperature rises and people either withdraw and avoid or yell and attack, both of which are unproductive.

The solution is to consistently reframe the situation as a problem solving exercise to lift it from the realm of the personal using this simple formula; performance = choices + assumptions or P = C + A. The only reason you got those specific results is because you made choices based on assumptions that are no longer valid. Change your assumptions, make different choices and you get different results.

It doesn’t matter that results aren’t “right”. What matters is that you reframe really quickly and try something different. The quicker you can apply the P = C + A formula – Did I get the result I need? No? What choices did I make to get this result? Based on which assumptions? What assumption would I need to have to make different choices to get the results I need? – the sooner you will get the results you want and the sooner you will achieve success.

The Power of Reflection

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 02:42:00 GMT

Researchers in the fields of education, adult education and business have been writing about the power of reflection as a methodology for personal, organisational and institutional growth for more than three decades. And yet, despite this wealth of information, it appears that reflective practice hasn’t really made it past the academics and into daily use, certainly in business anyway.

I have been wondering why reflective practice hasn’t been widely adopted given how effective it is and I think the answer may lie in part with a perception that it is time consuming and unstructured. It’s true that effective reflective practice requires some time and leverages dialogue but it’s highly intuitive and with practice becomes quite effortless.

Here’s how you do it:

Define a very clear vision of success. What, specifically are you trying to achieve and how will you know when you have achieved it? This focus serves as the vehicle that enables you to reframe every inevitable challenge you will hit as you work to achieve your vision of success from a personal or team failure to a problem to be solved.
Next, enter into a dialogue about times in the past when you or others have tried to achieve something similar; What do we know about this?, Who has done something similar?, What road blocks did you hit? What did you put into place to get through those road blocks?, What other factors influenced progress and success?
Based on that information make a decision about where to begin and then take action. Continue your reflective dialogue by asking if you are getting the results you want. Whether you are or aren’t, your results are the voice of the situation itself participating in this reflective dialogue. If you listen to that voice by framing the results as information and problems to be solved and learn from it, you will move towards success at a much more rapid rate and with significantly less stress and drama.

And there you have it. Reflective practice, as easy as 1, 2, 3.

Return on Training – Achieving the Dream

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 02:39:00 GMT

It’s never easy to determine the ROI on training. But in times like these, when cash is short and companies are slashing unnecessary costs, it becomes more essential than ever to justify investments in training by measuring expected returns against actual results.

We have one client for whom we recently wrapped up a six-month consultative training project. It was a significant investment of time and money, but fortunately the client’s analysis showed that the return exceeded their expectations. In fact, they are confident that the progress they’ve made will continue and even grow in coming years.

This client’s experience illustrates the benefit of measuring Return on Training. So what did they do right, and how can you learn from that?

1. All of the senior people, from the board to each member of the senior management team, agreed on the importance of training were aligned in their belief that training was essential. They truly believe that people are the company’s most important competitive advantage.

2. Prior to contracting trainers, the client spent significant time clarifying, specifically, what they needed the training to accomplish. Those expectations were easily communicated to us as suppliers, enabling us to identify key performance indicators we could monitor throughout the process to ensure we delivered.

3. The overall structure was very robust:

• They committed to a multi-module process rather than one-off training sessions, significantly increasing the likelihood of learning.
• The Director of HR worked very closely with us as we developed specific modules ensuring the content was relevant.
• The senior management team offered input before each module was finalised, strengthening the link to overall organisational strategy.
• Senior management participated in every training event, reinforcing the company’s commitment to the process.
• The organisation was small enough, at just over 100 people, that everyone participated in the training.
• The client used the training to create culturally specific processes and disciplines, which will be used over and over again.
• Internally, we used a methodology that enabled us to learn from the feedback from participants, ensuring the relevancy and effectiveness of the training.

Achieving a Return on Training, whether measured by ROI or in more qualitative ways, does require an investment of time and energy by both the organisation and the trainers. But when this is done properly, training pays for itself again and again as new and more effective ways of working together continue to evolve over time.

Relearn who you really are, Innovative

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 03:22:00 GMT

Innovation, from where I am sitting, is about applying creativity. In school, and in life, we were socialized to believe that we should not be creative. Reward came to those who demonstrated that they were intellectual. Being intellectual was the result of being more disciplined and controlled, making no mistakes, learning to fear failure and blending in. 90% of our entrepreneurial clients assumes that they are not smart enough.

The paradox is that we are all creative creatures and we are all smart enough. As toddlers we know nothing of control, we make mistakes, have no preconceived assumptions about failure and each one of us is wildly unique. Our uniqueness is our smarts, if we can learn to trust it.

To be innovative is to trust who we really are. Telling you to go be who you really are does not help. To be more innovative, you need to apply the discipline of learning, to relearning who you truly are, innovative. Crazy, but true.

Here are some practical how-to’s, to help you relearn how to be who you really are,

Test your assumptions (all of which are now “old-economy” assumptions) through piloting, testing, gaining feedback outside your immediate peer group, adapting and launching in small controllable sample sizes to discover emerging opportunities. This promotes un/relearning.
Pay attention to the insights of those who have had different experience than you have, those who have different skill sets than you and those who are not subject experts. Collaboration will help you with your blind spots.
Learn to embrace the fluidity and new interconnected nature of communication through medium like twitter, facebook, youtube, itunes as they are creating a world that is more interconnected than anything that we have ever experienced before. This is the foundation of interdependence and trust.
Get out of your head and into your body, spend time experiencing what matters most to you, risk being vulnerable, learn something entirely new and do things that scare you a bit. This is being creative.

The paradox is that you have invested a life time of learning how not to be creative. Now, you can use those same processes to relearn who you really are, starting today.