What’s stopping you from being innovative?
Before you answer this question, think back to when you were in elementary school. Your teacher asks the class a question, and you THINK you know the answer. Were you the kid that raised your hand to give it a try or the kid that didn’t raise your hand for fear of being wrong? Whichever kid you were back then, chances are, you are still the same person today.
If you were the kid to give it a try, you weren’t that concerned about being wrong and feeling rejected. You knew there was the chance you could be right or you could be wrong. Your desire to get it right outweighed your fear of being wrong. If you were the kid that didn’t raise your hand, your fear of being wrong discouraged you from giving it a try. Perhaps, you even thought, “Someone else will answer the question.”
Now imagine you are in a meeting and your boss asks for some ideas to make your department’s services more innovative. Perhaps, your boss has even given you some time to think about it and has asked those with ideas to submit them by the end of the week. This is an optional request, but your boss is encouraging those who have ideas to share.
If you have some ideas you believe to be innovative, will you share them with your boss? Will you let fear of rejection stop you from exploring ideas and seeking innovative solutions? Will you have a hard time coming up with innovative solutions?
Defining “innovative”
“Innovative,” can be a vague term and sometimes people misunderstand the concept. For starters, being innovative is NOT following the “status quo.” Many times in the workplace, we do things because everyone one else is doing it. We can be content with accepting the excuse: because this is the way we have always done it.
For instance, have you ever been a member of a project team or committee and after meeting for several weeks, the group settled on a solution, an event, or list of ideas that wasn’t really different from what you had done on other projects?
Most of the time, we like selecting those easy solutions because we focus on our own comfort zone, knowledge, and experiences, or because it is quicker to check that task off our list and move on to our next task. We fail to really embrace the opportunity to make things better and to ask the important question. Could we do something that is more efficient, more effective, or much cheaper that would give better results?
Being innovative doesn’t mean creating something that is costly. Innovation is when you set a new standard. That new standard can leave others wondering, “Why didn’t I think of that?” This is because, sometimes the most innovative ideas are sitting right in our faces, but we are too busy to notice or too afraid to really push the limits or sadly cursed by linear thinking.
Linear thinking versus system thinking
Linear thinking is when you follow a step-by-step approach that is based merely on your experiences and what you have learned or read. It is often from one point of view: yours. Linear thinking is thinking in a straight line and not thinking out of the box.
Innovation involves system thinking; the process of understanding how things influence one another within a whole. For example, Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, used system thinking effectively when he developed an innovative idea. He saw that the Internet was the fastest-growing industry on the planet, so he quit his job and started Amazon in 1995. He worked in a garage with only five employees. Today, his network is $28.6 billion.
Bezos could have opened a book store like so many others, but his thoughts went beyond the “status quo,” and his business went global. Could he have succeeded by viewing things from only one point of view with a constant fear of being rejected? No, he had to scan the environment from many points of views and he had to be willing to take a risk.
Becoming innovative
While some people may have reached success by luck, in most cases, success involves being motivated and innovative. Even if your boss never asks you for innovative ideas, you have the opportunity every day to explore some out-of-the-box solution.
Maybe you have a hobby or a skill that isn’t used in the workplace, but you just don’t know how to take it to the next level. First, you need to have the motivation to go beyond your normal way of thinking. Then you must seek innovative ideas.
- Consider that there may be more efficient and effective solutions and not settle for the “status quo.”
- Overcome your fears.
- Be willing to take risks and share your ideas.
- Except constructive feedback when you share your ideas.
- Force yourself to look at all situations from various points of views.
- Research what is going on externally; outside of your department, in your organizational system, other businesses, the news and media and/or marketplace.
- Always be willing to try again when things don’t work out the first, second or third time.
Further reading
