Nurturing a Culture of Innovation

Breakout Session

Wednesday, June 8, 10:30am – 11:45am CT


Why are best practices often so difficult to graft into a new company? Perhaps because the soil is so different from one company to the next. The soil in this metaphor is the corporate culture. It is crucial to what grows inside the corporation, but it is often not considered in any explicit way as new initiatives are planned. Of particular interest are the ways in which culture inhibits or encourages innovation. The most pragmatic definition of a culture of innovation is “a place where something new can happen with regularity.” In an innovative culture, deeply held beliefs about what works and what doesn’t work enable innovation rather than impede it.

Edgar Schein, the father of organizational culture, first helped executives realize that tacit cultural beliefs drive the behavior of people in the organization. When corporate intentions (what Schein calls the espoused values of management) conflict with the culture, the culture wins. These underlying cultural beliefs may be about who gets to innovate; whether collaboration is valued; what kinds of innovation are in bounds; or what people believe about the penalties of failure. The beliefs are generally not articulated, but they inform the way people act and interpret events in the company. Because culture it is based on tacit beliefs, it can be an elusive topic. Although there are many tools that can tell you (in some limited way) what your culture is, the results are very abstract. They may resonate, but they provide little guidance for action.

How do you change a culture when the behaviors that were effective in the past are no longer appropriate to your goals? This program will discuss innovation as a system, including both formal practices and informal underlying beliefs. Through hands-on exercises, the workshop will help people to identify critical underlying beliefs, validate their importance, and design interventions that make innovation more possible. It will also discuss how to embed cultural considerations in the design and the ongoing execution of innovation programs.

Speakers

Christian Crews is the Principal of Wavepoint, a foresight and growth strategy advisory services firm. He has over 20 years of experience applying foresight to strategic innovation and growth for Fortune 500 and Global 1000 clients including PepsiCo, Goodyear, and CVS. Previously, he was the Global Foresight and Growth Lead for Kalypso LP, a $50 million innovation consulting firm. Christian has written extensively on the use of foresight for growth and innovation. In 2011 he wrote the definitive case study applying futures thinking to research and development and portfolio management (Research Foresights, in Research-Technology Management). In 2013 he led the Industrial Research Institute IRI2038 project, a multi-company exploration of the future of R&D. His use of foresight for innovation was featured in the 60th Anniversary edition of Research-Technology Management, alongside articles by Henry Chesbrough, Erik von Hippel, Robert J. Cooper, and Don Norman.

Jim Euchner is Partner at Outside Insight Consulting, a boutique consulting firm that helps clients accelerate value capture from innovation. He was previously Vice President of Global Innovation at Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, where he led the development of new businesses and helped launch five businesses on three continents.  Prior to his work at Goodyear, Jim held positions as Vice President of Growth Strategy and Innovation at Pitney Bowes, Inc. and Vice President, Network Systems Advanced Technology at Bell Atlantic (now Verizon). In addition to his consulting work, Jim is Visiting Professor at Aston Business School (UK), where he is industry co-chair of the Aston Advanced Services Partnership. He is also Editor in Chief of Research-Technology Management, a peer-reviewed journal for practitioners of innovation, technology and research management. Jim is a member of the Scientific Advisory Council for the Nissan Autonomous Vehicle program and a co-founder of the MIT Innovation Laboratory, a consortium to nurture innovation in organizations. He has published and spoken extensively on innovation and technology management. Jim received his Bachelor of Science degree from Cornell University in mechanical and aerospace engineering and his Master of Science degree from Princeton University, where he was a Guggenheim Fellow.  He also holds an MBA from Southern Methodist University.

Andrea Kates is a Silicon Valley-based expert in moving innovation to revenue. She has 20 years of experience leading bold initiatives across sectors, in more than 20 countries. Andrea was the CEO of the SaaS company that pioneered application of the lean startup process with more than 13,000 corporate teams. She spearheaded significant transformation in mobility (Ford- US and China, GM, Audi), energy (ABB, Ecopetrol, Shell- Asia Pacific and Europe), technology (Intel, 3M, HP, Cisco); biotech/ healthcare (Atrium Health, Mayo Clinic Ventures, Roche), consumer goods (P&G), hospitality (United Airlines, Hyatt) and financial services (SuMi Trust—blockchain, Allstate, AIG, Citi). Today, Andrea advises leaders based on her masterclass series Get to Next and her bestselling book, Find Your Next, which focuses on novel leadership tools to advance innovation and transform companies. She’s been a keynote speaker at TED main stage, Dubai 2020, Aspen Institute and serves on the advisory board of Copenhagen Fintech.