Innovation Architecture

Innovation and Creativity

Innovation and creativity are crucial competencies for firms to succeed in the developed economies. Due to the numerous management-related difficulties that exist and call for imagination to discover suitable answers, innovation and creativity have grown over time. Innovation is a process that converts an innovation or concept into a service or good that adds value and commands a fee from the client. A careful application of initiative, creativity, and knowledge is also necessary to derive new or higher values from resources. This involves the procedures that produce fresh concepts and turn them into worthwhile outcomes. Organizations that act and see possibilities and opportunities of change by innovating in the present uncertain and volatile business environment can flourish in a wide range of hostile condition that emerges and successfully competes. The organizations use innovation as a technological, systematic, and strategic tool for establishing international industries, an accountable process of business management as well as innovative cultures. An organization’s growth and leadership are also encouraged by innovation. Additionally, organizations have identified ways in which employees can share their creative ideas and talent to help the innovators who have the key role in growing the business. Every business requires the employees to generate new ideas which could be achieved through research. Miller and Wedell-Wedellsborg in their book Innovation as Usual, they stated that innovation should not happen in many times as Brainstorm Island (Miller & Wedell-Wedellsborg, 2013). As an alternative, there are several ways that innovation can be maintained as usual activity in the workplace through cautious integration in the business environment. The paper will discuss three companies that are well known for successfully supporting a culture of innovation.

Apple’s Culture of Innovation

Apple is one of the companies that is known for supporting a culture of innovation. The elements of the company’s culture, process, management systems and styles that work well to support innovation are identified in her ability to create a long lasting product as well as an advantage in competitive position. Apple uses the style her brand as a powerful tool that keeps the company alive by creating a long-lasting and deep bond with their customers. Most people have associated the company with a culture that has been instilled by her management of having products that are innovative, elegant, and simple. Also, the company has a management system and process that is consistent enabling customers to have the same experience whenever they walk into any Apple store in the country. Apple has been able to capitalize on innovation and intrapreneurship while others have not since the company rewards ideas from strong innovators by exploiting good ideas with an appropriate level of support and speedily. Speed is very crucial for innovation and employees who are talented do not like working in a bureaucratic environment they prefer organizations that get things done. Apple can work in a small unit to increase the speed of research and development of new ideas promoting growth. Investors of other companies become more conservative after attaining a certain size where their employees are less willing to bring new ideas as well as less entrepreneurial and the organization is comfortable with her past success (Conway, 2013). Apple capitalizes on innovation through hiring great innovators who want to make the things that are best in the world. Additionally, Apple has shown commitment to innovation as a culture where employees can make successful products without formal structure by an innovative system that harness their creativity.

Google’s Approach to Innovation

Google has also worked in different style and processes to support innovation using computing resources to create services that cannot be matched. Google uses a unique management system that let ideas to penetrate up to the top management from the employees. The company has few employees compared to companies such as Apple and Exxon Mobil that create an appropriate environment for innovation. Google uses the style of recognizing different individuals and their different ideas to encourage employees across and within teams to promote innovation. Google has a culture of trying to innovate a product by ten times but not by ten percent. Another culture is sharing everything it can which helps the employees to strive for transparency. Also, the system only uses data in everything they do including streaming information for decisions. The reason why the organization has been able to capitalize on innovation and intrapreneurship when others fail is that it invests in research and encourages collaboration. Annually the company funds over two hundred and fifty research projects that spend billions of dollars (Benlamri & Sparer, 2014). Also, Google invests in growing companies to assist them to refine or develop products. The investments help them to identify product ideas and current trends. Google has also created an environment where innovation can flourish through collaboration. Project managers, engineers, and researchers work together and looking to the future make important decisions. Such collaborative approach to innovation aims at maintaining a strong feedback who promotes quick decision making. Scientists can talk directly to the individuals gathering customer input, and the individuals can refer the scientists, and in such cases, new ideas flow freely among the team members.

Exxon Mobil’s Commitment to Innovation

Exxon Mobil has been leading in energy technology for a long time with systems that are committed to supporting innovation. The organization culture promotes employees retention and training to attain innovation. Innovative employees are cultivated to facilitate an environment that is suitable for the development of new ideas that develop the organization. The management system and processes work through innovative means to preserve and conserve the environment as well as energy. Through innovation and research, the organization has identified algae biofuels to reduce greenhouse gas emission. The organization has been able to capitalize on innovation and intrapreneurship by generating products that are environmentally friendly unlike other organizations in the same industry whose main concern has been profit without care for the environment.

Barriers to Innovation

The processes and systems that might stifle innovation and intrapreneurship may emerge from an organizational structure that involves its leadership or even from the employees. The forces suppress innovation by eliminating creative and innovation possibilities. The forces include resistance to new ideas and processes since the management is uncomfortable with potential changes. Also, assumptions, beliefs, or old habits that would prevent the management from embracing innovation and creativity since they do not prefer the changes. Most leaders are from systems that are a tradition where organizations are rewarded for continuous profit and producing outcomes that are predictable. Changing the structure of such organization would make the management lose control, and according to such leaders, the change will only cause a mess. The organization’s culture can be a barrier to innovation if it does not support a creative environment that involves exercising something new (Lewicka, 2013). In other cases managers may fail to reward or recognize innovation thus the employees will not feel motivated to spend their time in creative thinking. Additionally, when information sharing in an organization is effective employees do not find new ways to solve problems since they do not know if they even exist. An organization that does not support networking limit its workers’ ability to explore and learning new approaches outside the department or the company. Also, when employees lack freedom in their work, there may be a decline in their ability to innovate since innovation need a supportive environment. Subjecting the employees on challenging task may reduce their creativity and innovation skills since most of their time will be spent addressing the tasks presented to them may also stifle innovation.

Fostering a Culture of Innovation

As an innovation architect, the processes that I would put in place to foster a culture of innovation within my organization would begin by embracing change. Creating an innovative organization involves accepting the unexpected since it is out of embracing new products that a company can stand to be unique. Any innovative thinking among the employees would be rewarded to encourage innovators to identify new ideas that are unexplored (Arvanitis, Seliger & Stucki, 2016). Collaboration among members of the organization will be promoted as well as that of government agencies and outside groups. Innovation does not always pick to high positions thus a means for embracing failure in the field of discovery will be put in place to give time for innovations that require time to develop. Also, time and space will be given to innovators with all the necessary equipment provided for an experiment to ensure that their research would be complete. Since intrapreneurship set the background for innovation the support needed for innovation will be provided which involve the right environment, process, or people to ensure a continuous innovation culture in the organization. Finally, my organization would ensure that it cultivates a culture that balance intrapreneurship and innovation to optimize profit and growth.

References

Arvanitis, S., Seliger, F., & Stucki, T. (2016). The relative importance of human resource management practices for innovation. Economics Of Innovation And New Technology, 25(8), 769-800. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10438599.2016.1158533

Benlamri, R., & Sparer, M. (2014). Leadership, innovation and entrepreneurship as driving forces of the global economy. NewYork.

Conway, C. (2013). The Importance of Innovation and Design. The International Journal Of Entrepreneurship And Innovation, 14(2), 129-129. http://dx.doi.org/10.5367/ijei.2013.0116

Lewicka, D. (2013). Supporting innovation through HRM practices - importance of motivation. International Journal Of Innovation And Learning, 14(2), 217. http://dx.doi.org/10.1504/ijil.2013.055525

Miller, P., & Wedell-Wedellsborg, T. (2013). Innovation as usual.