The all in one thought leadership and industry meetup: OpEN Talks
Based on the success of the first OpEN Talks, we could not wait to get the second one in the books – which is why we invited Cris Beswick in. As well as working with leadership teams from organisations around the world, Cris is the Co-founder of the website “The Future Shapers” which offers insights, analysis, and tools to help tackle the ever-evolving challenge of boosting innovation in business. Cris is also the co-author of the bestselling book ‘Building a Culture of Innovation’.
In his fast-paced and conversational keynote, Cris explored the challenges of building a culture of innovation – something he described as “the holy grail of competitive advantage and even business survival” – but also went on to explain why he doesn’t think, as Peter Drucker famously quoted “culture eats strategy for breakfast” but that in the continuously changing world we’re now forced to operate in, strategy, leadership & culture should eat breakfast together.
Three magic words: culture of innovation
What exactly is a culture of innovation? What is the magic behind it? Cris continued to explain that, the first thing to be clear about is: innovation is all about people.
“Organisations must move quickly to design and implement innovation-focussed cultures. But, the challenge we have is not an easy one. The strategic approach required to build new cultures in a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex & Ambiguous) world where information and technology is changing so rapidly is an evolving one, so we need to move as fast as possible”, Cris told the audience in his keynote.
Organizations have – in Cris’ experience – been too focused on ‘innovation tools, frameworks and methodologies’ but in order to build innovative as a cultural capability, there is more of a need to have absolute clarity on strategy, especially ‘why’ innovation is important. Companies need to ask themselves: “What is our current level of innovation maturity?”. In his mind, there has also unfortunately been little focus on executive education in respect to leading for innovation – but things are starting to change, organisations are starting to ask what skills do people need to be able to innovate?
The problem is: the majority of organizations are based on an old way of thinking about innovation. To Cris, you have to differentiate between two things: “Do you want to disrupt, or do you want to be a fast player?”
And you need to be fundamentally prepared for creative freedom. Because if you want to attract a younger generation (including the great talents that go along), innovation, creativity and experimentation have to be fundamental parts of your organisational culture.
Innovation is not something that just happens
Cris’ keynote shows: Innovation is not something that you will create within a process or a system. It is something that you nurture with an environment and an ecosystem that delivers innovation as an outcome.
The best thing a company can do, is to build a culture of ‘intrapreneurship’ that enables people to be future-focused, fantastic leaders, capable of delivering against brilliant, ambitious strategies. Because in the end, it is about creating a culture where everyone can contribute to innovation – and that starts with creative and curious leadership.