Turbocharging Innovation Implementation in the Water Sector

The Ofwat and MOSL Innovation Funds have turbo charged innovation in the water sector over the last five years, and with a doubling of the Ofwat fund in the next five years (AMP8 )we can expect to see many more fantastic ideas and technologies tested and trialled.

When you factor in all the other innovation projects that are going on inside the companies without external funding there are too many for any company to hope, should or need to be able to implement them all. Once a project has delivered its aims and proven its readiness to scale significant investment decisions are needed. Each company needs to make important decisions about where it invests its money to take the projects to scale.

As I’ve previously written about, 2025 is going to be all about transitioning to the implementation of innovation and achieving real value from the investments made to date. The Water Innovator Alliance has also written about the perpetual piloting issue that afflicts much of the water and wider infrastructure sector. Part of this challenge is that while a pilot may be relatively cheap (and even more so if Ofwat are covering 90% of the cost) the cost to implement is almost always significantly more. This in terms of money, effort and leadership/operational bandwidth. This cost of implementation, as well as the resourcing and delivery challenges that all water companies face in AMP8, means that picking the right innovations in which to make a significant investment is very important.

My focus on supporting innovation teams is to make the implementation more effective. At Expedition Engineering Ltd we have been working with the Environment Agency to develop and now deliver a ￡22m implementation programme, the Decarbonisation Technology Accelerator, to reduce the carbon emissions from the capital programme by 20% by 2030. We are using our Soar model to take 37 solutions that are close to or are commercially available (i.e. post pilot) to business as usual.? The Soar model helps innovation teams to focus on all the issues, risks and blockers that need removing, not just developing the technology.

Typical blockers we are removing include specification and standards updates, as well as contractual and commercial blockers.? Most importantly we are working hard to engage everyone involved in the flood defence capital programme to support their understanding and acceptance of the new low carbon solutions for when they are ready to be adopted.

The Soar model and its supporting tools and features to help innovators, innovation managers and directors to have the information they need to make effective decisions. For example the Portfolio Map allows decision makers to easily see the balance of their investments in terms of potential benefit, risk and investment. The portfolio mapping builds on the work by Alexander Osterwalder , Dan Toma and Esther Emmely Gons on defining what is important to map as well as where on the map you want/can implement a new solution in your organisation.

We have also built a tool that allows you to rapidly and easily see the probability of achieving a required level of return, using the Kromatic - Innovation Coaching & Training innovation accounting techniques as a basis for the monte carlo modelling. The Soar value tool uses the innovation teams’ best estimates for the range of possible values for the key variables in the ROI calculation. The output provides a range of possible outcomes, which can be easily updated as data is collected and risks removed. An example output is below.

Our latest prototype tool utilises the knowledge we have gathered on assessing innovation development levels using the readiness model to give a ballpark prediction of the cost to finish scaling an innovation. Splitting the effort required for an innovation across the 11 criteria, and using the assessment of how far an innovation has matured based on its development phase, e.g. an OIF project. We can project how much additional budget will be required to get the innovation to scale. (Its so prototype we don’t yet have a smart graphic of the output!)

These tools are useful for innovation managers and senior leaders, but only if they have a structured process and plan for supporting the adoption of innovation. There are some key components of any scaling and implementation plan that help an organisation to recognise the value:

• Being clear whether the innovation sits in your core business – which will need to adapt – or if it sits outside in a new unit or company
• Which leader will sponsor the implementation and have a KPI/OKR to support the project
• How middle managers will be incentivised to support this new venture when it diverts attention away from the core delivery they are typically measured against
• Where are the stakeholders? Many innovations will be implemented by the supply chain supporting infrastructure clients, the Tier 1 suppliers can be more easily reached, but what about the Tier 2 and Tier 3 suppliers?

The delivery of innovation and the accessing of value is not a dark art, deploying the effective tools and the right processes makes innovation as systematic as any other business process. The Soar model and its supporting tools takes the mysticism out of innovation delivery and provides innovators, leaders and managers with the tools and measures to deliver value from the right innovations.

If you would like to know more about Soar or see a demo of any of the tool, please book a call.