Learning Diary of High-tech

Management

Instructor Name:

Dr. Faheem ul Islam

Sohaib Azeem (191610042)

Submitted by:
Table of Contents
High-tech Innovation Management.............................................................................................................3
The Life cycle Phenomenon.........................................................................................................................4
Technology and Markets.............................................................................................................................5
Successful innovation process.....................................................................................................................5
Entrepreneurship and Intrapreneurship......................................................................................................8
Entrepreneurship.....................................................................................................................................8
Entrepreneurial Process......................................................................................................................8
Intrapreneurship......................................................................................................................................9
Similarities between Intrapreneurs and Entrapreneurs............................................................................10
Four Models of Corporate Entrepreneurship............................................................................................10
A CULTURE OF DISCIPLINE.........................................................................................................................11
Strategic Leadership..................................................................................................................................12
Stanford study on High-Tech Leadership Skills..........................................................................................13
Forward Thinking...................................................................................................................................13
Patient...................................................................................................................................................13
Flexible..................................................................................................................................................13
Open to Feedback..................................................................................................................................13
Bold.......................................................................................................................................................13
Willing to delegate.................................................................................................................................13
Goal oriented.........................................................................................................................................14
Immersed in the industry......................................................................................................................14
A collaborator........................................................................................................................................14
A strong recruiter..................................................................................................................................14
An evangelist.........................................................................................................................................14
Organizational Culture...............................................................................................................................14
Culture and core values.........................................................................................................................15
Developing creative work environment................................................................................................16
Find out what inspires your employees.............................................................................................16
Plan regular team outings..................................................................................................................17
Encourage personal expression.........................................................................................................17
Respond positively to failure.............................................................................................................17
 Regularly celebrate success...............................................................................................................17
Check-in with your team....................................................................................................................17
Create learning opportunities............................................................................................................17
Use an open office plan.....................................................................................................................18
Seek employee input.........................................................................................................................18
Characteristics of Innovative Companies...................................................................................................18
1. Unique and Relevant Strategy...........................................................................................................18
2. Innovation Is a Means to Achieve Strategic Goals.............................................................................18
3. Innovators Are Leaders......................................................................................................................19
4. Innovators Implement.......................................................................................................................19
5. Failure Is an Option............................................................................................................................19
6. Environment of Trust.........................................................................................................................19
7. Autonomy..........................................................................................................................................20
 High-tech Innovation Management
Innovation management is a combination of the management of innovation processes, and change
management. It refers to product, business process, marketing and organizational innovation.
Innovation management is the subject of ISO 56000 (formerly 50500) series standards being developed
by ISO TC 279.

Innovation management includes a set of tools that allow managers plus workers or users to cooperate
with a common understanding of processes and goals. Innovation management allows the organization
to respond to external or internal opportunities, and use its creativity to introduce new ideas, processes
or products. It is not relegated to R&D; it involves workers or users at every level in contributing
creatively to an organization's product or service development and marketing.

By utilizing innovation management tools, management can trigger and deploy the creative capabilities
of the work force for the continuous development of an organization. Common tools include
brainstorming, prototyping, product lifecycle management, idea management, design thinking, TRIZ,
Phase–gate model, project management, product line planning and portfolio management. The process
can be viewed as an evolutionary integration of organization, technology and market by iterating series
of activities: search, select, implement and capture.

The product lifecycle of products or services is getting shorter because of increased competition and
quicker time-to-market, forcing organizations to reduce their time-to-market. Innovation managers
must therefore decrease development time, without sacrificing quality or meeting the needs of the
market.

High technology (high tech) is technology that is at the cutting edge: the most advanced technology
available. It can be defined as either the most complex or the newest technology on the market. The
opposite of high tech is low technology, referring to simple, often traditional or mechanical technology;
for example, a slide rule is a low-tech calculating device.

A widely used classification of high-technological manufacturing industries is provided by the OECD. It is

based on the intensity of research and development activities used in these industries within OECD
countries, resulting in four distinct categories.

Startups working on high technologies (or developing new high technologies) are sometimes referred to
as deep tech; the term may also refer to disruptive technologies based on scientific discoveries in
several branches.
High-tech, as opposed to high-touch, may refer to self-service experiences that do not require human
interaction.

The Life cycle Phenomenon

The market is small and production processes are not specialized, so manufacturing is inefficient. Some
industries never progress beyond emergence, but those that do generally experience rapid growth as
the new technology diffuses across a set of consumers. The growth in the industry manifests itself in the
form of increasing sales, an increasing number of firms, and declining price, particularly when price is
adjusted for quality improvements. Quite salient is the entry by all types of firms, including
entrepreneurial start-ups and entrants diversifying from related industries. In addition, high levels of
product innovation characterize this stage, although the relative rate of process innovation increases
over time.

The transition to the shakeout stage occurs because of the establishment of production efficiencies and
the standardization of product designs, a process that leads to a dominant model. On the demand side,
as users become more familiar with the industry’s products, their preferences stabilize, and product
variety decreases. Thus, this stage is characterized by an increasing emphasis on process innovation
relative to product innovation, and an increasing share of the innovation stems from large, established
firms that focus on efficient mass production. The competitive pressures unleashed in consequence of
economies of scale, and specialized manufacturing processes that increase efficiency, result in a rapid
decline in the number of firms. The rate of change in sales and price begins to decline towards the end
of this stage, though output generally increases, and prices continue to fall, particularly when adjusted
for quality.

During the mature phase of the industry, growth slows, and the technological and competitive
environments are relatively stable. This stage is characterized by a stable number of firms. Although
entry and exit of firms occur and are positively correlated, these rates are lower than they are in the
other stages of the industry life cycle. Similarly, although some product and process innovation takes
place, most of the innovations are incremental. The industry exhibits stable prices, level sales growth,
and a well-established infrastructure supporting its activities.

Finally, industries in periods of stability may either transition into decline or spiral back into emergence
as the result of disruptions by discontinuous technological change. This cycle may repeat multiple times
as waves of discontinuous technological change invade an industry over time.
Technology and Markets

Successful innovation process

Touted as the ‘most significant category innovation since toilet paper first appeared in roll form in 1890’
(Kimberly Clark, 2001), dispersible (flushable) moist toilet tissue on a roll was introduced in the United
States by Kimberly Clark in 2001. According to a corporate press release, Cottonelle Fresh roll wipes was
a breakthrough product that ‘delivers the cleaning and freshening of pre-moistened wipes with the
convenience and disposability of toilet paper’ (Kimberly Clark, 2001). Internal market research seemed
to indicate that there was a clear customer need for a new product to supplement dry toilet paper.
Surveys and focus groups revealed that over 60 % of adult consumers had experimented with a moist
cleaning method (e.g., using baby wipes, wetting a washcloth, sprinkling water on dry toilet paper) and
one out of four used a moist cleaning method daily. Kimberly Clark made the obvious connection that a
majority of US consumers found dry toilet paper to be limited for their real needs. Convinced that there
was a huge market opportunity for a more convenient product that addressed this consumer need for a
cleaner and more refreshing bathroom tissue, Kimberly Clark obtained more than 30 patents on a new
product and dispenser and invested over $100 million in R&D and manufacturing to bring their
Cottonelle Fresh roll wipes to market. Backed by over $40 million in marketing programs, sales were
expected to reach $150 million in the first year and $500 million after six years. Perhaps more
important, a significant increase in the $4.8 billion US toilet paper market was anticipated because this
innovation was a supplement, not a substitute, for existing products. Procter & Gamble also believed
that there was a market opportunity for moist bathroom wipes; they quickly followed by introducing a
similar product, Charmin Fresh Mates, later that year.

But, consumers were unimpressed with these new products. Sales were well below forecasts: Procter &
Gamble abandoned its product after only two years and Kimberly Clark’s product is confined to a
regional market where executives say that sales are so small that they are financially insignificant.
Despite their market research, did Kimberley Clark (and Procter & Gamble) really understand their
customers’ needs in this situation? The Fresh Roll wipes product was designed to be conveniently
dispensed via a refillable plastic container that clipped to the standard toilet paper holder. Careful
attention was paid to developing a dispenser that blended in with the consumer’s bathroom. Both
companies, however, underestimated the role of consumer embarrassment associated with toileting
(e.g., Associated Press, 2003). Although many consumers already used some sort of makeshift wet
cleaning method in the bathroom, they didn’t like others knowing about it. The extra dispenser attached
to the holder was right out in the open, possibly causing guests to wonder if something was wrong with
household members because they were using these ‘alternative’ wipes. Although numerous mistakes
were made in this case (e.g., Nelson, 2002), it seems clear that Kimberly Clark and Procter & Gamble did
not completely understand their customers’ needs.

Unfortunately, this example is not unique. New product failure rates of up to 90 % are commonly cited
in the popular and academic press, and these suggest that successful innovation is the exception rather
than the rule (e.g., Power, 1992; 1993; Stevens and Burley, 1997; Brand Strategy, 2003). The road to
riches is littered with many stories of new product failure (e.g., Schnaars, 1989; Gershman, 1990;
Kirchner, 1995; McMath and Forbes, 1998; Franklin, 2003). Not surprisingly, many pundits take these
failures to mean that it is impossible to truly understand customer needs. Headlines such as ‘Ignore Your
Customer’ (Martin, 1995), ‘Shoot First, Do Market Research Later’ (Elliot, 1998), and statements like ‘The
public does not know what is possible, we do’ (Morita, 1986) fuel this viewpoint. At the same time,
however, a consistent finding from benchmarking studies on the factors related to successful innovation
is that understanding customer needs is a fundamental, although challenging, activity (e.g., Montoya-
Weiss and Calantone, 1994; Cooper, 1999; Henard and Szymanski, 2001). There are just as many, if not
more, examples in which firms used various traditional (e.g., customer surveys, focus groups) and
nontraditional (e.g., ethnography, contextual inquiry, empathic design) research approaches to gain
insight into their customers’ needs, and to develop highly successful new products (e.g., Urban and
Hauser, 1993; Leonard-Barton, 1995; Burchill and Shen, 1995; Otto and Wood, 2001; Shillito, 2001;
Sanders, 2002; Squires and Byrne, 2002; Crawford and Di Benedetto, 2003; Ulrich and Eppinger, 2004).
Thus, there is persuasive evidence that it is indeed possible to understand customer needs and that this
insight can be used in the innovation process. Rather than ignoring customers, it is more prudent only to
ignore customers’ specific ideas on how to fulfill their needs – it is the company’s job to develop new
products!
FIGURE 3.1 The innovation space.

Conceptually, understanding customer needs leads to products that are desirable, feasible, and salable
(to the mass market). Note that ‘product categories’ are often defined by firms and not by customers
(e.g., the SLR camera category, the digital camera category, the disposable camera category); thus
product categories typically relate to feasible combinations of attributes that are salable (and hopefully
desirable). As suggested by Figure 3.1, ideas, concepts, and new products can be classified based on
their location in the desirable-feasible-salable space. Thus, highly successful innovations are desirable,
feasible, and salable. Casual observations indicate that many existing products fall primarily in the
feasible and salable region (e.g., Fresh Rollwipes), and that fresh looks at already established categories
can lead to more desirable new products (e.g., consider the efforts of Oxo in the kitchen tools market
and its greatly acclaimed Good Grips peeler, salad spinner, and angled measuring cup). Gizmos and
gadgets such as the Segway Human Transporter are mainly in the feasible and desirable overlap (e.g.,
Waters and Field, 2003), but are not really salable to the mass market. Many innovations that are mainly
technology-driven reside only in the feasible region for a number of years, for example directional sound
systems for use in automobiles, advertising, and special office-based applications (Schwartz, 2004),
brain-computer interfaces that allow the direct bi-directional interfaces between the brain, nervous
system and computer (Cyberkinetics, 2004), and Michelin’s Tweel, a single piece airless tire with ‘spokes’
that never go flat (Mayersohn, 2005). Astute business analysts note that most firms are still product-
driven rather than customer-driven (i.e., firms first determine what is feasible for them to develop; they
then fashion marketing strategies to sell the products and services that can deliver; only later finding out
that their offerings may not really be desirable).
Entrepreneurship and Intrapreneurship
Entrepreneurship
Entrepreneurship is defined as ‘The activity of setting up a business or businesses, taking on financial
risks in the hope of profit.’

Traditionally entrepreneurship has been defined as the process of designing, launching and running a
new business. Entrepreneurs start businesses, offering either products or services, or both. They are
innovative and creative and happy to break the norm.

An entrepreneur is a person who is typically more comfortable with taking risk. They have given up the
‘Security’ of a job to startup a company to employ staff. They have to be comfortable as a leader and as
a manager of people.

The level of risk that an entrepreneur takes is very much dependent on the individual. But where an
entrepreneur is comfortable with taking higher levels of risk, a small business can become a much larger
organization.

An entrepreneur is the person who brings the product or service into reality. Sometimes being the
inventor, whilst other times starting a new business to provide an existing product or service, but in a
better way.

Entrepreneurial Process

Discovery: An entrepreneurial process begins with the idea generation, wherein the entrepreneur
identifies and evaluates the business opportunities. The identification and the evaluation of
opportunities is a difficult task; an entrepreneur seeks inputs from all the persons including employees,
consumers, channel partners, technical people, etc. to reach to an optimum business opportunity. Once
the opportunity has been decided upon, the next step is to evaluate it.

An entrepreneur can evaluate the efficiency of an opportunity by continuously asking certain questions
to himself, such as, whether the opportunity is worth investing in, is it sufficiently attractive, are the
proposed solutions feasible, is there any competitive advantage, what are the risk associated with it.
Above all, an entrepreneur must analyze his personal skills and hobbies, whether these coincides with
the entrepreneurial goals or not.

Developing a Business Plan: Once the opportunity is identified, an entrepreneur needs to create a
comprehensive business plan. A business plan is critical to the success of any new venture since it acts as
a benchmark and the evaluation criteria to see if the organization is moving towards its set goals.

An entrepreneur must dedicate his sufficient time towards its creation, the major components of a
business plan are mission and vision statement, goals and objectives, capital requirement, a description
of products and services, etc.

Resourcing: The third step in the entrepreneurial process is resourcing, wherein the entrepreneur
identifies the sources from where the finance and the human resource can be arranged. Here, the
entrepreneur finds the investors for its new venture and the personnel to carry out the business
activities.

Managing the company: Once the funds are raised and the employees are hired, the next step is to
initiate the business operations to achieve the set goals. First of all, an entrepreneur must decide the
management structure or the hierarchy that is required to solve the operational problems when they
arise.

Harvesting: The final step in the entrepreneurial process is harvesting wherein, an entrepreneur decides
on the future prospects of the business, i.e. its growth and development. Here, the actual growth is
compared against the planned growth and then the decision regarding the stability or the expansion of
business operations is undertaken accordingly, by an entrepreneur.

The entrepreneurial process is to be followed, again and again, whenever any new venture is taken up
by an entrepreneur, therefore, it’s an ever ending process.

Intrapreneurship
The act of behaving like an entrepreneur while working within a large organization.

Effectively, an intrapreneur is nothing but an entrepreneur within the boundaries of an organization.

Intrapreneurship is where an individual integrates risk-taking within his corporate management

approach.

Intrapreneur however is a term found in the Oxford Dictionary, and is defined as ‘A manager within a
company who promotes innovative product development and marketing.’
Intrapreneur however is a term found in the Oxford Dictionary, and is defined as ‘A manager within a
company who promotes innovative product development and marketing.’

Similarities between Intrapreneurs and Entrapreneurs

According to this article there are similarities between these two types:

1) Innovative Thinking

Innovative thinking is key as intrapreneurs and entrepreneurs aim to make their companies ahead of the
game. They need to look out for new opportunities, technologies, and methods to grow.

2) Doing for Innovation

Both entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs have to have the confidence of achieving success and the
willingness to fail. They take the leap and act on the ideas in their head.

3) Always Learning

To be ahead of the game, intrapreneurs and entrepreneurs need to continuously pick up new
information and new skills. Those skills may be business-related, product/service related, or skills like
creative thinking or marketing.

4) Flexibility

Things just don’t always go the way as expected or planned. If intrapreneurs and entrepreneurs are not
flexible with workload or schedules, their ventures may fail even before it gets off the ground. They
need to think on their feet and go with the flow.

5) No giving up

Both will face more failures than successes. In order to achieve success, intrapreneurs and
entrepreneurs need to be persistent

Four Models of Corporate Entrepreneurship

Two dimensions under the direct control of management differentiate how companies approach
corporate entrepreneurship. The first is organizational ownership: Who within the company has primary
ownership for the creation of new businesses? (Note: This responsibility can be focused in a designated
group, or it can be diffused across the organization.) The second is resource authority: Are projects
funded from a dedicated corporate pool of money or in an ad hoc manner, perhaps through business-
unit budgets? Together the two dimensions generate a matrix with four dominant models: opportunist,
enabler, advocate and producer.
A CULTURE OF DISCIPLINE
Culture of Discipline is a concept developed in the book Good to Great. Disciplined people who engage
in disciplined thought and who take disciplined action—operating with freedom within a framework of
responsibilities—this is the cornerstone of a culture that creates greatness. In a culture of discipline,
people do not have jobs; they have responsibilities. When you blend a culture of discipline with an ethic
of entrepreneurship, you get a magical alchemy resulting in superior performance.

Excerpts from Good to Great

Few successful start-ups become great companies, in large part because they respond to growth and
success in the wrong way. Entrepreneurial success is fueled by creativity, imagination, bold moves into
uncharted waters, and visionary zeal. As a company grows and becomes more complex, it begins to trip
over its own success—too many new people, too many new customers, too many new orders, too many
new products. What was once great fun becomes an unwieldy ball of disorganized stuff. Lack of
planning, lack of accounting, lack of systems, and lack of hiring constraints create friction. Problems
surface—with customers, with cash flow, with schedules.
Strategic Leadership

Strategic leadership refers to a manager’s potential to express a strategic vision for the organization, or
a part of the organization, and to motivate and persuade others to acquire that vision. Strategic
leadership can also be defined as utilizing strategy in the management of employees. It is the potential
to influence organizational members and to execute organizational change. Strategic leaders create
organizational structure, allocate resources and express strategic vision. Strategic leaders work in an
ambiguous environment on very difficult issues that influence and are influenced by occasions and
organizations external to their own.

The main objective of strategic leadership is strategic productivity. Another aim of strategic leadership is
to develop an environment in which employees forecast the organization’s needs in context of their own
job. Strategic leaders encourage the employees in an organization to follow their own ideas. Strategic
leaders make greater use of reward and incentive system for encouraging productive and quality
employees to show much better performance for their organization. Functional strategic leadership is
about inventiveness, perception, and planning to assist an individual in realizing his objectives and goals.

Strategic leadership requires the potential to foresee and comprehend the work environment. It
requires objectivity and potential to look at the broader picture.

A few main traits / characteristics / features / qualities of effective strategic leaders that do lead to
superior performance are as follows:

Loyalty- Powerful and effective leaders demonstrate their loyalty to their vision by their words
and actions.

Keeping them updated- Efficient and effective leaders keep themselves updated about what is
happening within their organization. They have various formal and informal sources of information in
the organization.

Judicious use of power- Strategic leaders makes a very wise use of their power. They must play
the power game skillfully and try to develop consent for their ideas rather than forcing their ideas upon
others. They must push their ideas gradually.

Have wider perspective/outlook- Strategic leaders just don’t have skills in their narrow specialty
but they have a little knowledge about a lot of things.

Motivation- Strategic leaders must have a zeal for work that goes beyond money and power and
also they should have an inclination to achieve goals with energy and determination.

Compassion- Strategic leaders must understand the views and feelings of their subordinates,
and make decisions after considering them.

Self-control- Strategic leaders must have the potential to control distracting/disturbing moods
and desires, i.e., they must think before acting.

Social skills- Strategic leaders must be friendly and social.

 Self-awareness- Strategic leaders must have the potential to understand their own moods and
emotions, as well as their impact on others.

Readiness to delegate and authorize- Effective leaders are proficient at delegation. They are
well aware of the fact that delegation will avoid overloading of responsibilities on the leaders. They also
recognize the fact that authorizing the subordinates to make decisions will motivate them a lot.

Articulacy- Strong leaders are articulate enough to communicate the vision (vision of where the
organization should head) to the organizational members in terms that boost those members.

Constancy/ Reliability- Strategic leaders constantly convey their vision until it becomes a
component of organizational culture.

Stanford study on High-Tech Leadership Skills

Forward Thinking
Forward-thinking leaders are people driven by their strong vision and business mission. ... Being
courageous enough to take bold decisions and calculated risks is what allows successful leaders to
achieve more than the competition. Without the courage to take the leap when needed, no great results
can be achieved.

Patient
While patience is an essential leadership attribute, it also demands skills more often associated with
management. Our ability to lead patiently requires us to manage the situations in which we find
ourselves. Understand the situation and establish the facts. A patient leader understands the situation.

Flexible
Flexible leaders are those who can modify their style or approach to leadership in response to uncertain
or unpredictable circumstances. In addition, flexible leaders can adapt to changes as they come. They
can revise their plans to incorporate new innovations and overcome challenges, while still achieving
their goals.

Open to Feedback
One key characteristic of a good leader is that they are able to reach organizational goals by motivating
others. Giving constructive feedback helps individuals grow by learning how they can improve and by
reinforcing the activities they are doing well.

Bold
Bold leaders are no different. Being a bold leader does not mean being bold without a clear vision,
direction or purpose. Bold leaders channel their bold ideas, opinions, and actions to motivate, inspire,
and guide others toward a greater good. Today, more than ever, this type of leadership is in high
demand.

Willing to delegate
As a leader, delegating is important because you can't—and shouldn't—do everything yourself.
Delegating empowers your team, builds trust, and assists with professional development. And for
leaders, it helps you learn how to identify who is best suited to tackle tasks or projects.
Goal oriented
Goal-oriented leadership involves setting clear and specific goals where it is known, based on
established experience that they know can be achieved. ... Examples of goal-oriented leaders include
sales managers, teachers, sports coaches, or mentors who set a series of challenges to encourage
learning and development.

Immersed in the industry

Board of directors found values in recruiting CEO’s from either outside the company or outside the
industry.

Today in industries of rapid change there is increasing value from CEO’s who are immersed in their own
particular industry. Given the rise of autonomous responsibility of the CEO’s who are immersed in their
own particular industry.

A collaborator
Collaborative leadership is all about breaking down walls and silos and building close cross-functional
relationships based on trust and communication. ... It takes strong relationship skills and a great deal of
influence to be able to lead a horizontal team. This is the true hallmark of a collaborative leader.

A strong recruiter
As it becomes more challenging for CEO’s to stay abreast of rapid changes and growing opportunities
and as business units gain autonomy it becomes more critical to be capable of hiring strong managers.

An evangelist
In a business climate characterized by rapid changes there is great difficulty in predicting the future.
With competing visions of the future floating around, corporations needs a persuasive and aggressive to
extol the corporate vision and to help usher in favorable changes in the competitive landscape.

Organizational Culture
Organizational culture is the collection of values, expectations, and practices that guide and inform the
actions of all team members. Think of it as the collection of traits that make your company what it is. A
great culture exemplifies positive traits that lead to improved performance, while a dysfunctional
company culture brings out qualities that can hinder even the most successful organizations.
Culture and core values
Having clear company values helps you ensure that all your employees are working towards the same
goals. Your core values support the company's vision and shape its culture. That's why every single
business decision should be aligned with these values.

Your core company values shape your company culture and impact your business strategy. They help
you create a purpose, improve team cohesion, and create a sense of commitment in the workplace.

Examples of Common Company Values

 1. Integrity
2. Boldness
3. Honesty
4. Fairness
5. Trustworthiness
6. Accountability
7. Learning
8. Customer Experience
9. Passion
10. Balance
11. Fun
12. Discipline
13. Humility
14. Ownership
15. Result oriented
16. Constant Improvement
17. Leadership
18. Hard work
19. Diversity
20. Employee Development
21. Innovation
22. Quality
23. Teamwork
24. Simplicity
25. Collaboration and Partnership
26. Idealism
27. Courage
28. Unselfishness
29. Self-Discipline
30. Self-Respect

Developing creative work environment

A positive, fun and creative work environment is one of the greatest assets employers have to offer their
employees. Cultivating a creative and open atmosphere at work helps employees maintain a work-life
balance where they enjoy coming to work and collaborating with their team. Learning how you can
make your work environment more creative gives you the opportunity to set the tone for an
empowering company culture.

Find out what inspires your employees

To develop a truly creative work environment, open a line of communication with your team and find
out what inspires them the most. People who thrive in creative work environments often invest their
emotions and self-worth into doing good, worthwhile work, so it’s important to understand their
priorities and passions to motivate them appropriately. Finding out what interests and motivates the
individuals within your company will help you build an overall culture that supports their creativity.
Plan regular team outings
One of the best ways to develop a creative atmosphere in your workplace is to schedule regular team-
building activities. Bonding outside of the office can improve work relationships and provide
opportunities for candid discussion and relaxed communication. Give employees a break from work by
doing creative activities together, such as doing an art project, learning a skill or participating in a fun
community event. Getting away from your regular workspace strengthens relationships within your
team and energizes them to do great work when they return.

Encourage personal expression

Creative employees often do better work and feel more comfortable when they are able to express
themselves through office decor and clothing choices. Even within a highly professional environment,
giving employees more freedom with what they wear to the office or how they set up their desk space
can have a positive impact on their mood. Allowing and even encouraging people to be creative in one
aspect of their life can result in increased creativity and innovation on the job.

Respond positively to failure

You can encourage a creative work environment by allowing your employees to fail and embracing
lessons from those failures, instead of punishing failed outcomes. Responding to failure with a positive
mindset and focusing on learning from those failures can motivate employees to take smart risks
without fear of retribution. When people aren’t afraid to make mistakes, they can push the boundaries
of their creativity and contribute to the growth of your business.

Regularly celebrate success

In addition to accepting and learning from failure, regularly celebrate employee successes. Reward
people who do excellent work, and look for positive qualities in each of your employees. Learn how your
team likes to be appreciated and follow through on celebrating their good work, whether you give out
certificates at a public ceremony or leave a thoughtful private note on someone’s desk. Celebrating
employee success shows that you acknowledge and care about their work.

Check-in with your team

One of the benefits of having a creative work environment is that employees are highly invested in their
work, but this can also be one of the challenges. Creative, engaged employees are usually emotionally
committed to their work and may be more susceptible to burnout and stress. Regularly check in with
your employees about how you can support them and ask what they need to continue doing excellent
work. These conversations acknowledge their emotional investment and demonstrate that their
wellbeing is a priority to the company.

Create learning opportunities

Offer learning opportunities and professional development to inspire your employees to create a culture
of growth and continued learning. In addition to external opportunities like workshops, classes and
conferences, ask your team if anyone is interested in sharing their unique knowledge and skills with
others. Encouraging your staff to share knowledge and learn new skills together promotes creativity and
provides everyone with opportunities to step into a leadership position.
Use an open office plan
To boost collaboration and teamwork, consider arranging your office in an open plan, where coworkers
can talk with one another and discuss ideas. Compared to traditional environments where each person
might work at a secluded desk or cubicle, open office plans don’t have walls separating each employee
and might have people on the same team share a large office space. Open office plans allow employees
to ask coworkers for input and work on projects together without scheduling meetings.

Seek employee input

Any creative work environment should be built on input from the people who work in that environment
every day. Ask employees for input regularly and make adjustments to office norms based on that
feedback. Managers should model positive behavior by opening lines of communication and showing an
earnest interest in what employees have to say.

Characteristics of Innovative Companies

What makes a company innovative? Innovation is nothing more than a tool that enables companies to
achieve unique, strategic goals. It should not simply be a slogan, nor an end unto itself, argues Jeffrey
Baumgartner. To be truly innovative, an organization should have seven essential characteristics.

What makes for an innovative company? An innovation initiative is not enough. Having the word
“innovation” in your company slogan or all over your web site is not enough. Indeed, I would argue that
any kind of focus on innovation as an end is detrimental to innovation. Innovation is nothing more than
a tool that enables companies to achieve unique, strategic goals. Here are seven essential characteristics
of innovative companies. How well does your organization do?

1. Unique and Relevant Strategy

Arguably, the most defining characteristic of a truly innovative company is having a unique and relevant
strategy. We all know what companies like Apple, Facebook and Google do. That’s because they make
their strategies clear and relentless follow them. An innovative smaller player may not be recognized
globally, but its leaders, employees, business partners and customers all will have a clear idea of the
company’s strategy. If a business does not have definable, unique strategy, it will not be innovative.
Bland strategies, such as “to be the best”, do not provide a path to innovation in the same way clearer
strategies, such as “to be on the cutting edge of mobile communications technology,” “to build the
world’s safest cars “or “to deliver anything anywhere” do. If your strategy is vague or fails to
differentiate your company from the competition, you should change this situation as quickly as
possible!

2. Innovation Is a Means to Achieve Strategic Goals

Highly innovative companies do not see innovation as an end, but rather as a means to achieving
strategic goals. Just as a good camera is an essential tool that enables the photographer to take
professional images and the saw is an essential tool for the carpenter, innovation is an essential tool for
visionary companies’ intent on achieving their strategic goals. Indeed, if you look at the web sites of the
world’s most innovative companies, they tend not to trumpet innovation, but rather corporate vision.

3. Innovators Are Leaders

The one thing innovation provides more than anything else is market leadership. When companies use
innovation to achieve strategic goals, they inevitably take the lead in their markets. Unfortunately, this
does not always translate to being the most successful or profitable. Amazon has been an innovator
from the beginning, setting many of the standards for e-commerce. Nevertheless, it took some years for
the company to become profitable. Cord was one of the world’s most innovative car companies,
launching cutting edge innovations such as front wheel drive and pop-up headlights – in the 1920s and
30s. However the company was never very successful financially and went out of business in 1938. On
the other hand, innovators like Apple and Google have been financially successful as a result of their
innovation. In short, innovators are leaders, but not always profitable leaders!

4. Innovators Implement
Most businesses have a lot of creative employees with a lot of ideas. Some of those ideas are even
relevant to companies’ needs. However, one thing that differentiates innovators from wannabe
innovators is that innovators implement ideas. Less innovative companies talk more about ideas than
implementing them!

5. Failure Is an Option
I would argue the most critical element of business culture, for an innovative company, is giving
employees freedom and encouragement to fail. If employees know that they can fail without
endangering their careers, they are more willing to take on risky, innovative projects that offer huge
potential rewards to their companies. On the other hand, if employees believe that being part of a failed
project will have professional consequences, they will avoid risk – and hence innovation – like the
plague. More importantly, if senior managers reward early failure, employees are far more likely to
evaluate projects regularly and kill those projects that are failing — before that failure becomes too
expensive. This frees up resources and budget for new innovative endeavors. However, in businesses
where failure is not an option, employees will often stick with failing projects, investing ever more
resources in hopes that the project will eventually succeed. When it does not, losses are greater and
reputations are ruined. As a result, companies that reward failure often fail less than those that
discourage it.

6. Environment of Trust
The Innovative Company provides its employees with an environment of trust. There is a lot of risk
involved in innovation. Highly creative ideas often initially sound stupid. If employees fear ridicule for
sharing outrageous ideas, they will not share such ideas. Likewise, if employees fear reprimand for
participating in unsuccessful projects, they will not participate (see item 5 above). If employees do not
trust each other, they will be watching their backs all the time. If they fear managers will steal their
ideas and claim them as their own, employees will not share ideas. On the other hand, if employees
know they can take reasonable risks without fear, if they know outrageous ideas are welcome, if they
know that their managers will champion their ideas and credit them for those ideas, these employees
can be creative, implement ideas and drive the company’s innovation. In short, creativity and innovation
thrive when people in an organization trust each other and their organization.

7. Autonomy
Along with trust, individual and team autonomy is a key component of innovation. If you give individuals
and teams clear goals together with the freedom to find their own paths for achieving those goals, you
create fertile ground for innovation. But, if managers watch over their subordinates’ shoulders, micro-
managing their every move, you stifle the creativity and individual thought that is necessary for
innovation. Of course giving employees autonomy means they may make mistakes. They may choose
inefficient routes to achieving goals. But at worst, they will learn from their mistakes and inefficiencies.
At best, they will discover new and better ways of accomplishing objectives. Most importantly, if you
hire intelligent, capable, creative people and give them the freedom to solve problems, they will do so.
And, in so doing, they will help innovation to thrive throughout the company.