Redefine innovation

The first step of your innovation journey

The word "Innovation" has fallen within the buzzword list: "Innovation here, innovation there, innovation everywhere", fireworks! If you think this is harmless, it's probably because you are neglecting the importance of words, or you no longer believe in some of them. In both cases, you are missing value and follow the wrong horse. A company that does not properly define words or abuses them (number of uses * wrong meaning), cannot access its maximum potential.

We acknowledge that a company with a clear strategy known by each and every employee has a better chance of success. We know that only having "one-quarter of the managers that could list three of the company’s five strategic priorities" is a big issue, a giant waste. It's the exact same principle for "words definition", but it goes even deeper. More than holding our capacity to work together, buzzwords alter also our capability to express our full potential. Every journey should start with a bit of linguistic.

The problem is simple. We are entering a world of exponential complexity, plagued by unexpected events (COVID), a world of interdependence (not resilient), with the climate change no longer on the horizon, but knocking on our doors. If innovation won't solve everything, it will certainly play a major role to tackle the biggest challenges of human history*. We cannot afford to lose this word at the altar of entertainment and mediocrity. There is nothing worse than losing a word. Words are the remedy for violence. They are the stepping stone of human civilizations.

The objective of this article is to convince you to reflect and define collectively what innovation means for you. If you are already in an innovation journey, or about to transform, you have to start defining what is "innovation". Define before using any innovation framework or methodology. I will try to demonstrate why a common agreement over a word is the only first step to start with and I will briefly give you some tips to do an efficient "definition workshop". Obviously, you can replace the word "innovation" in this paper by any other word that got lost in the buzzword list and it would work. You should at least redefine collectively the words that are cardinal to your success.

Note: I am not a linguist. The analytical framework I will use for the demonstration is the result of the combination of, my interest in words with my experience of "the definition of the objects" importance in innovation management.

At a glance:

• When words lose meaning, people lose the possibility to think
• Anything you do around buzzwords without recalibrated them will be an amazing loss of energy, money, trust, and purpose.
• When you define, you align and make navigation in unknowns territories possible
• Words are the "alpha and omega" to maximize the potential of a company. They allow to reveal and exploit a unicity

Don't neglect linguistic

Words have plasticity, they fluctuate to a certain extent, can even die by the lack of use or by the loss of meaning. Words value is dual, their inherent ambiguity, and in the opposite, the capability to transport sense, to create consensus.

The ambiguity comes from the fact that in practice words are defined by an individual perception (Projection) of it, this personal stamp is often hard to explicit, it's not linear, neither continue. Words beauty is that they open misunderstanding spaces, they force communication (or reaction, when we lack them), resolving these misapprehensions unleash value and potential. This ambiguity property constitutes a potential for personal extension, for self-growth. On the opposite, the capability to have a common agreement on a word (Core) is capital to create consensus. The consensus is required to exploit any potential; follow a strategy or tackle hard challenges. In essence, a company's role is to reveal the potentials and exploit them. Linguistic is therefore the foundation to maximize a company.

There is a pitfall. This plasticity property makes the stay in the buzzwords list dangerous. A word there will inevitably lose its meaning. Overuse a word incorrectly (next to the Core) is like washing your t-shirt's claims into bleach water, you extract and kill the vector of information. When words lose meaning, people lose the possibility to think, George Orwell in the book 1984 called this "Newspeak". As a result, any activity that requires cumulative brainpower needs to start with a definition.

Polysemy matters

This is a desert rose. I like these crystals because they can be used to visually explain what polysemy means and how important it is to define words and objects.

If we would have to define this object, we would say: "here is an object that seems to have a Core that "strangely" aggregates some flat shapes".

To visualize it, I did a representation of a shape into a section of a plane. Now, let's say that a plane is an individuality, a perspective, it's the Jean-Michel's plane. We project, reduce an entire person into a plane (I know, it's a violent idea, computer scientists love to do that). Now, if I ask Jean-Michel (JM), "what is your definition of Innovation?" the brownish part on the plan enlightens.

This brown part is JM's holistic definition of the word "innovation". It involves JM's knowledge, experience, emotions, sensations, set of beliefs, cultural biases, etc. It's not the dictionary definition. It's JM's definition of "innovation". You have as many different shapes as individuals in your team.

If you remember your geometry lessons, you know that the intersection of two section plans makes a segment, not a desert rose. The intersection of two flat shapes in different planes may even never cross. Let's take two-persons JM and Jenny (here in green), if they discuss "innovation", they will have a hard time understanding each other. They don't have a single way to understand each other. It's like two-person talking different languages. In that case, you lose the additional value of teamwork, the extra to the sum of all individuals. To be able to discuss something, you need at least a point of contact in your shapes. If you don't have it, you need energy, willingness, and brain plasticity to make your projection move to create an intersection. It requires time, and we are stingy of time today, especially for such a little thing like word definition.

The good thing is that we have dictionaries. For most things (not for all, the Asian perception of "void" is inconceivable for Occidentals, it's not a simple opposition to the whole), dictionaries are bridges between languages and individual projections. Dictionaries have a "universal" objective, they are the metronome that allows the orchestra to stay synchronized. Dictionaries are the access roads to others, to complexity.

The dictionary definitions are in general commonly accepted to be a universal reference at an instant 't'. I never found myself challenging the French Petit Robert... This universally accepted status gives to dictionaries' definitions the access to another dimension. It's not a plane (2D), it's a volume (3D). To convince you, what is the result of the sum of circles with the same radius (universally accepted) in 7.55 billion different plans (we all are different) that all only share a point, the center of the circle? A sphere. We will call it our definition's Core.

The property of this Core is to give more volume to the definition of a word by providing access roads for individual definitions. JM and Jenny may not intersect together, but they both (should) intersect the Core. Having at least a point of connection (was it the universally accepted one) allows communication. Jenny can bring JM in her definition projection and vice et versa. The energy required for this exercise is limited because no one has to change his paradigm, just his perspective.

When Jenny and JM discuss their perception it's where magic append, it's exactly what your goal is when you do cross-functional workshops or ideation exercises. Ensure that people listen and exchange points of view to extend the entire team's capacity to perceive a fuzzy object or a hard to define problem. The value is in differences, breaches, misconceptions, ambiguity, and originality. To extract this value, you must have access to it, you must define it.

I'm not going to open the "Inclusion & Diversity" chapter, you can easily imagine that it plays an important role. The more different we are, the greater the chances of not understanding each other. But higher the value is when you connect differences (Yoda). It's the cost of new ideas.

If you look to hire people for their brainpower. Make sure they have high brain plasticity, a good mindset, the right values, and the capacity to deal with complexity. They don't need more. The pace of knowledge's obsolescence (50% of knowledge in life science is renewed every 4 years) is such that it will soon destroy know-how, but that's another story.

The harm of Buzzwords

Buzzwords are often used to hide the lack of something, to give body to absence, they are here to advertise. How many of you heard that your corporation is the "most innovative"? If you think twice, it's anyway an impossible statement that only engages whoever believes it. It can only be political. Using buzzwords is almost an obedience exercise. It's accepting what is not true or cannot be. It could be used as an amazing indicator of conformism. 

Using a word with a group of people without the right Core definition, and repeat this over and over has the effect to drift the Core from its universal meaning. People start to operate like digital twins. They still have an idea of what a true "innovation" is, but they start to doubt about it. This false Core becomes cultural and people tend to differentiate the use of the word by context, or simply stop using it by integrity. Why should they? It's a buzzword, a word without meaning. A word embedded with an intention that is away from the original sense.

If this rings you a bell. If you see people around you losing hope, or trust in the use of words, do something. This drowns your teammate's energy and you will end paying them for the output you asked not for the full potential they have. The good thing is that it's not to hard to solve. It's almost as simple as opening a dictionary all together and acknowledge that words have been misused. The second point is where you measure and see the true leader. Yes, to me "leader" should also be accepted in the buzzword list. "Leaders" are those who are recognized to act accordingly, not those that have the title or the opportunity to call themselves so.

The main difficulty is when these words are in the company culture, worse, in the company mission and vision. It often means that it has been a long time that words lost their meaning. The recipe is simple, and always the same. Either you have a strong leader that can make the point to the top. Or you need to have a leader that "operates" a subculture within the company and demonstrates the superiority. Obviously, the leader has to be ready to be laid off anytime. Isn't another way to recognize "true leaders"? Inspire and help others maximize potential?

Every word in the buzzword list should be redefined with a dictionary, discussed within a team to recenter the Core. Anything you do around buzzwords without recalibrating them will be an amazing loss of energy, money, trust, and purpose.

To conclude

Redefine the important buzzwords you use. They are your key roots to maximize the potential of your company. Buzzwords are poison, they remove to people the possibility to think. I am not 100% sure, but I think Kant once said something like "In every choice we do, we engage the entire humanity" (Erratum: it's Jean-Paul Sarte commenting Kant's categorical imperative). When you hurt a word it's the humanity you hurt. Redefining important buzzwords in your company is probably the best ROI project you can have. But I am not naive, buzzwords are often the only way to give the illusion that there is no iceberg. No one believed that the Titanic could sink... react.

It's the work of everyone to smartly resists to buzzwords. You will gain meaning in your actions.

Words are like body bones, they have a practical use and form that change over time. I hope the buzzword piece attached to "innovation" will soon disappear. At least I hope this post will contribute a bit. Let me know if I miss-used a word, to help me not repeating the mistake.

I would be curious to do a Machine Learning definition of "innovation" based on millions of personal definitions. We could visualize it in a multi-nodal 3D space, revealing all biases clusters and its evolution over time, word archeology. You can share with me your definition of ''innovation". I am curious to see the differences.

A definition's workshop example:

1. Identify the buzzwords used in all layers (corporate, business, team)
2. Acknowledge the use of buzzword and show your desire to rehabilitate them
3. Organize quick workshops on critical words for your business (How many people confound strategy and tactics? You would be surprised)
4. Stay alert, bad habits are habits (like Toastmasters, you could add a 3 minutes definition moment, just after the traditional safety moment)

A Workshop Example (max 30min):

• Prepare yourself if you will facilitate. Pick a word. Write your holistic definition before looking at some dictionaries ones. Try to identify an example of things that are defined to be the word and not. Ex: If you want to redefine "strategy", find examples that are strategy and others that are tactic and emphasize the differences. Negation is a good way to reduce to Core.
• Block 1h30 in the calendar. Start at 11h30. Everyone should also be available for lunch together.
• Explain why you are here. Emphasize the objective. Rehabilitate a lost word. Identify the desert rose of the team (sum of all Projection), center the Core, agree on the team's definition. Explain that this exercise requires everyone to hold their judgment
• Ask everyone to write on paper his own holistic definition. You must be clear that there no good or bad definitions. The only thing that ends to be sad is that the team members do not know what it means for others and for the team.
• Ask each and everyone to read what's on the paper. Note keywords on a paperboard. Count the number of times each keyword appears. Notice the singularities to emphasize the polysemy of words
• Read some dictionaries' definition loud (3 is enough). Add potential missing keywords with another color. Try to notice what the word is not, and deconstruct the "meaning drift". Go a bit deeper. Reveal multiple aspects of a word. Ex: for innovation, you can propose some frameworks like the 10 types of innovation, etc.
• Let your team discuss over lunch and share perspective around the word

The facilitator should also find a way to measure the impact of the workshop. It's really word and context dependant but remains important.

Now, your team should start to reconsider their innovation work with the new fresh common eyes wide as a desert rose.

* The role of innovation to tackle humanity challenges is an extremely complex question. Innovation involves market adoption, how could innovation solve a problem the market is not desiring? Who desires solutions to the climate change issue before the need, i.e. before it's too late? Embedded too, is the political"blind alley", but it remains a philosophical set of questions (responsibility, obedience, species, values ...)

If you are interested I can do an article on that.