How to Include Employees in Rapid Innovation Projects

The process of innovation can be difficult. The internal journey of an idea all the way through to the manufacturing line is a long and complicated process. It doesn’t come as a shock that most concepts end up in the archives of failed dreams.

Innovation remains as one of the most important ways for a business to survive and compete. If we don’t innovate, we remain the same as our competitors grow. Despite this, innovation cycles are shorter than ever before, and dumping resources and talent into projects doesn’t guarantee success. So that begs the question… what does?

Creating a Culture of Innovation

Innovation cannot happen without your employees. Who in the business spends the most time talking to customers? Who experiences the processes of the day-to-day? Who, more than anyone, is impacted by change in the workplace? Your employees… and yet we rarely see them involved.

You need to create an environment that enables creativity, imagination, and innovation. Only then will employees feel comfortable to sharing their ideas. Even with this culture, ideas from employees don’t stem from nothing, so we need to think of ways to generate them passively and have systems in place to capture these ideas and act upon them. The company responsible for inventing post-it notes, 3M, gave employees time in their schedules dedicated to creative thinking.

To achieve this level of creativity, we need a couple of things, an innovative culture, the right resources and support, and effective communication where we actively seek the opinions of employees.

Innovation Processes and Systems

Once you have the culture, what’s next? Where do the ideas go? You can’t expect employees to brainstorm when their ideas are lost in the chaos of the day-to-day. There needs to be structure, a rallying call for contribution that has a clear and defined outcome, in the form of alignment, reward, and process.

Any suggestion that innovation is an open book can swirl your team into panic. They’ll start to doubt themselves. “Will it offend someone? Is it aligned with the objectives of the business? Is it even a good idea? How can I present it and get my voice heard?”

Make your intentions clear and include why it’s worth their time. Commit to a specific number of rapid innovation projects a year. If you’re not going to make that promise, employees will wonder why should bother.

If someone at the bottom of the organisation chart can think of a great idea that will generate some business, then they need to get something out of it. Recognition, a sense of contribution, personal development… Celebrate the successes, acknowledge the achievements, and provide incentives for participation.

Involve Them in the Process

Once you’ve kick-started an idea, involve the person that generated it. Talk to them about it, not just at the start but throughout the whole process. Hold meetings, show them what’s going on. Demonstrate that their innovation is valuable to the company.

By involving them these ideas become apart of their careers and potential success, rather than the accomplishment of someone else. It gives employees a reason to be a part of the innovative culture in the first place. Communicate the importance of the project, how it fits into the company’s overall strategy, what we expect the outcome to be. ?

They need to be part of the process – for better or worse. Which leads me to the next point…

Embrace Failure

Sometimes, things won’t work. You need to embrace that and talk about it – involving employees in the process also means telling them when an idea must be archived. It’s just as worthwhile as generating ideas in the first place, because it’s how we learn and become better.

Failure shouldn’t be looked down upon. In fact, the innovation pipeline thrives on failure. It feeds itself on lessons learned, ensuring you can adapt and evolve the idea. Build an environment that celebrates failure of innovation, framing it not as a waste of time but as a valuable contribution to one’s personal development.

Following this guidance, you’ll be able to create a culture that promotes the regular creation and circulation of ideas in your business. From developing this culture, to enhancing leadership skills and embedding continuous improvement in your business, we have several programmes that can assist you. To find out more about our short courses that help contribute to your continuous improvement movement, click here. Also, please give us a call for more assistance, we’re always happy to help!

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