by John Brooker | Mar 19, 2018 | Develop Opportunities, Innovate, Lead creatively, Overcome Challenges
YES! AND…blog # 8 “You have the capability to lead. Even if others are not yet ready to follow you can still lead yourself. You can be a leader of one.” John Brooker inspired by the words of Tony Robbins Do you want to be a creative leader? I once attended an Anthony Robbins weekend “seminar”. It was an awesome event. I can best describe it as a self development rock concert, so may I suggest before you read on, you put on the music that most makes you want to dance round the room screaming “Yes”. Tony is a motivational coach. He has a lot of thoughtful information to impart, delivering it with an enthusiasm that fires up 12000 people (and that’s before the fire walk). One point he made that resonated with me I have written as the quotation above. Read it again. Does this ring true with those of you trying to enhance creativity and innovation in your organisation but finding it a challenge? At times, that challenge can daunt you, especially if others are not yet ready to follow. If others are unwilling, there is still something you can do. You can focus on you leading you to be consistently creative, to build your own creative climate and to lead by example. Here are six ideas to be your own creative leader. You might like to develop this list to suit you. Develop a vision for what your work place or home life will be like when YOU are being truly creative and innovative. What will it look, feel, sound, taste and...
by John Brooker | Mar 19, 2017 | Develop Opportunities, Facilitate meetings, Free Articles, Innovate, Overcome Challenges, Solution Focus, Tools
Yes! And… # 133 How do you innovate and maintain the operation? Use Sprint Actions “Great acts are made up of small deeds” – Lao Tzu, Chinese Philosopher Are your people struggling to effect change and run the operation? Some of you may be the type of person to pull out a toolkit at first sight of a drawer knob dropping off or other domestic issue. To my discredit, I can always find something more interesting to do and many jobs build up before begrudgingly, I complete them. However, when our bathroom door hinge recently developed a very high-pitched squeal that grated on the teeth, I lubricated it quickly with WD40. It was easy and the WD40 was handily under the kitchen sink (that had a knob on the door). I wish I could write an article about a tool that cures management issues as easily as WD40 cures many household issues, however, the squeaky door hinge provides a good analogy. When a management team has a “to do” list of more pressing things to do, it takes a very squeaky issue to replace an action on the list. However, I am sure most of you have sat in meetings and created a large list of additional actions to add to the already full “to do” list. Many people are enthusiastic and accept the actions; others are pressured to take them. It is no surprise though that people often fail to take actions because the issue is not squeaky enough. This is especially the case when new actions are about creating change and the existing actions are dealing with operational issues...
by John Brooker | Apr 3, 2016 | Collaborate, Develop Opportunities, Facilitate meetings, Free Articles, Innovate
“As innovation becomes a management discipline there is a danger that it is seen as the end, rather than the means” John Brooker Want to make innovating simple again? I was out riding my bike recently when I found I could not use any gear above number eight, so instead of twenty-four gears through three front cogs, I had just eight gears on one. I couldn’t fix it myself and didn’t have time to take it to the repairers so carried on using it. I am no Bradley Wiggins (Olympic cycling gold medallist and winner of the Tour de France) and after a couple of rides, I noticed that the lack of gears was not causing me much of a problem, apart from going down steep hills where I could not pick up as much speed. After noticing that, I compared the enforced simplicity of my gearing with how complex innovation seems to have become. I appreciate there are some organisations that need more sophisticated approaches, just like the Tour de France needs more complex bikes. I am also sure most organisations could cope with a simpler approach. In fact, many could cope with just three “innovation gears” if they had the nerve to get on the “bike”. So In the spirit of keeping it simple, here is my three gear approach to help your people innovate. The three gears are, Climate, Model and Tools. Create and nurture the right climate to encourage collaboration When you wish people to be more collaborative and creative you need to create a macro-climate within the organisation and a micro-climate within meetings. Here...
by John Brooker | Apr 1, 2016 | Collaborate, Develop Opportunities, Facilitate meetings, Free Articles, Innovate
“Encourage people to innovate, but employ a metaphorical guillotine to restrict discussion on innovation.” John Brooker Here are seven metaphors to help you as a Creative Leader, drive innovative behaviour. 1. Lift the veil – why does your organisation want to innovate? If your top management team plans to launch an innovation initiative, have them answer three questions first: a. What value will it bring in business terms? Will it drive more revenue, save costs, differentiate you from the competition, or improve staff retention? How will you quantify this in business terms? b. What will be the signs of progress? Recently, I reviewed for a government organisation a list of proposed measures to show innovation progress. Primarily they were input measures, (e.g. the number of people trained, the number of innovation champions appointed). Input measures often show you have built an innovation bureaucracy, not that you are more innovative. Ensure there are output measures too, e.g. the number of propositions implemented and achievement of business value. c. What will tell you this initiative is sustainable? You can create a one-off innovative proposition fairly easily. How do you recognise your organisation is sustainably innovative? Clues might be that, you identify opportunities regularly, create propositions frequently, kill poor propositions quickly and explain why you have done this. To do this you need a creative yet structured model for innovating at the front end. Creative Leader Tip: Ensure your leadership team thinks through these questions before you start an initiative. 2. Focus the lens – what type of innovation does your organisation require? Recently, a colleague and I visited a potential client...
by John Brooker | Mar 29, 2016 | Collaborate, Develop Opportunities, Facilitate meetings, Free Articles, Innovate, Overcome Challenges, Tools
To innovate in an organisation requires people to collaborate and think, logically and creatively. To enable this, you need to use a structured approach and tools to innovate, plus you need to foster an innovative climate. I consider that there are two types of innovative climate. One is the microclimate that you create in a workshop situation. The other is the macroclimate that you develop in the organisation. Recently, we worked with the leadership team in a commercial organisation to develop innovative propositions, using our Inn8® Workshop Programme. As part of the first workshop, we used many of the “action dimensions” below to develop a microclimate for people to innovate in. Having experienced this microclimate as a team, we asked them to use the Action Dimensions Table (see below) to assess the macro climate in their departments. So enthused were they by this simple assessment, the managers took it upon themselves to carry out assessments with their teams after the workshop. They each chose three dimensions to address to begin enhancing their macro climate. To understand more about climate and how to rate this, read on. To understand more about climate and how to rate this, read on. About Climate Goran Ekvall carried out a well-known study (Google, “Goran Ekvall study reference” for a range of articles) on organisational climate for creativity. He identified dimensions on which to measure creative or non-creative climates in organisations and other researchers have extended and amended his original dimensions. James L. Adams also identified blockages to creativity in his book, “Conceptual Blockbusting”. Later studies on climate use different words but identify much the...
by John Brooker | Mar 28, 2016 | Collaborate, Develop Opportunities, Facilitate meetings, Innovate, Overcome Challenges, Tools
Have you ever rejected a solution from people on your team because it was not well thought through or not clear enough? Despite being a good idea, one reason a solution can fail to gain support or funding is because the innovator fails to either explain it properly or convince decision makers they have thought it through thoroughly. This can lead to negative responses, critical questioning and a chastened innovator. For the company, it can mean potentially good solutions lost and perhaps fewer ideas submitted in the future. In this short and practical article we explain how people on your team can develop a clear and powerful statement that enables the relevant people to understand it and make a sound decision on whether to proceed. This is an initial presentation of the solution, not a business case, something As a general rule, the proposition statement should include the following points: Specify who the problem impacts State what problem the proposition solves Describe the solution, explaining how it solves the problem (benefits) and how much of the problem it solves Explain how it differs from competing products These four points provide a statement that explains the basic proposition. Now to appraise and hone that proposition people need to: Show the issues and risks to be managed State who else has a significant stake in this solution, how interested they might be in it, what their level of influence is and how likely are they to use it Be clear on any data / information needed to progress Suggest solutions to overcome difficulties Identify the resources required to progress the solution...
