Innovation is the world that everyone is always talking about. Failure to innovate now can lead to the end of companies – take Blockbuster, for example. How, as individuals, can we foster innovation and creative thinking into everyday practice?
It starts from the top! Leaders today have to be bold thinkers and they play a primary role in fostering innovation within organisations
Here are our tips to foster innovation in your company:
- Your people – invest in people with passion, creativity and who think differently
- Hire for culture – look for individuals who understand your vision and align with your values nad culture
- Question and listen – be open and curious to ideas. Ask lots of questions and listen carefully. Strive to ask the extra question to challenge yourself and your team to dig deep and go further. Constant inquiry and questions form the linguistics of innovation
- Embrace failure and encourage risk – have courage to accelerate through failure and learning to get to the final destination
- Be tolerant, flexible and have patience – it takes time and risk-taking is inevitable with innovation
- Coach your team – connect, coach, mentor and develop. Challenge their thinking, strategy and behaviour and stretch them to create and innovate
- Encourage collaboration – the team around you is a valuable source. The more people you have contributing, the more skills and power you’ll have to generate and develop great ideas
- Start small – “change” and “innovation” seem such lofty concepts. Introducing small changes can make a real difference and act as a stepping stone to building up to bigger ideas
- Implement strategy – innovation is only worthwhile if it can be put into action. Set aside time and resources to develop AND implement ideas worth action
