Fast Company:

Fast Thinking

Let the Best Ideas Win

Creating Corporate Environment Where the Best Idea Does Win

By: Vadim Kotelnikov

Founder, Ten3 Business e-Coach Inspiration and Innovation Unlimited!

 

 

"The further backward you look, the further ahead you see."

~ Winston Churchill

Creativity Management: INSPIRING CORPORATE CULTURE (Ten3 Mini-course)
 

Practices Preventing Idea Generation by Employees in Hierarchical Structures1

  1. Hijacking of ideas by the time they make it up the corporate ladder – when that happens, workers retaliate by keeping good ideas to themselves, thus slowing down the organization's thinking

  2. Taking away sharp edges of ideas while they pass up through a hierarchical structure - when their ideas get honed down to something that doesn't mean anything, people become discouraged and state that they either don't have the time or interest in putting forth their ideas

  3. Human barriers to change rejecting good ideas that may change the status quo and thus threaten personal interests of a corporate 'gatekeeper'

  The Jazz of Innovation: 11 Practice Tips

 
 

 

Creativity Management: INSPIRING CORPORATE CULTURE (Ten3 Mini-course)

 

 

Though Nobody Argues...

Though everybody agrees that the best ideas should win, creating a corporate environment where the best idea – regardless of origin – does win is an art not yet mastered by most companies and it prevents them from thinking and moving faster than their competition.1

 

9 Signs of a Losing Organization

  • Lack of Initiative: poor motivation and encouragement; people do not feel their contributions make a difference; management fails to engage the organization effectively; people work defensively and not creatively, they do their job, and nothing more... More

12 Effective Leadership Roles

Loose-Tight Leadership

 Case in Point  GE

"Use the brains of every worker," kept teaching Jack Welch, the former legendary CEO of  General Electric (GE). "Make sure that it is the person with the best idea who wins. Reward and celebrate new ideas to encourage others to want contribute as well. Reward those who live the company's values, show "guts", and, in doing so, make the numbers."... More

With Work-Out as part of its DNA, GE has become one of the most innovative, profitable, and admired companies on earth. At its core, Work-Out is a very simple concept based on the premise that those closest to the work know it best. When the ideas of those people, irrespective of their functions and job titles, are solicited and turned immediately into action, an unstoppable wave of creativity, energy, and productivity is unleashed throughout the organization. At GE, Work-Out "Town Meetings" gave the corporation access to an unlimited resource of imagination and energy of its talented employees.

25 Lessons from Jack Welch

 Case in Point  Google: 10 Golden Rules

Encourage creativity. Google engineers can spend up to 20 percent of their time on a project of their choice. There is, of course, an approval process and some oversight, but basically we want to allow creative people to be creative. One of our not-so-secret weapons is our ideas mailing list: a companywide suggestion box where people can post ideas ranging from parking procedures to the next killer app. The software allows for everyone to comment on and rate ideas, permitting the best ideas to percolate to the top... More

 Case in Point  Lend Lease's Guiding Principles

  • No individual has a monopoly on good ideas... More

 

 

 

References:

  1. It's not the BIG and eats the SMALL... it's the FAST that eats the SLOW, J. Jennings & L. Haughton

  2. The GE Work-Out, Dave Ulrich, Steve Kerr, Ron Ashkena

  3. The Jazz of Innovation, Vadim Kotelnikov

  4. Inspiring Corporate Culture, Vadim Kotelnikov

  5. New Product – Fast!, Vadim Kotelnikov