When the United Way told the story of their crowdsourcing program, Edwin Goutier, Innovation Lead at Unitd Way, said that one of the things that he hears a lot is that people don’t think of the United Way (or nonprofits in general) as innovative.
Even if your organization doesn’t yet have an embedded innovation program, I can guarantee that your organization cares about finding opportunities for savings. That’s why programs like LEAN and Six Sigma continue to do so well. There are always new ways to improve efficiency and time saved almost always means money saved.
Truly innovative companies do not aim to be innovative. Rather they relentlessly strive to follow a unique strategy, says Jeffrey Baumgartner.
Over recent years the terms innovation and design thinking have taken on a life of their own through a variety of channels and media. Millions of words have been written on these topics by journalists, consultants, practitioners, and curious bystanders. Then throw in discussions about design itself and an even wider range of opinions emerge. What is a business leader supposed to make of all of this?
A recent article in the journal Academy of Management Perspectives provides insight into senior leadership traits that are necessary to inspire the people in a business and support a creativity and growth-oriented culture, key ingredients for expanding a firm's innovation capabilities.
