Within the innovation space there are a number of common misconceptions.
For example, some people confuse innovation and creativity. Others believe that innovation and cost reduction cannot coexist.
But one of the most frequent misconceptions we see and hear is that “it’s all about the volume of ideas“.
Well, it’s not.
Indeed, in our recent survey of over sixty Australian CEOs and senior executives, only 6% identified ‘lack of good ideas’ as a major barrier to organic growth! That’s telling stuff – especially when compared to other factors such as competing priorities (54%), availability of capital (35%), lack of skills, and the inability to execute (both 26%).
Idea generation is also seen as substantially less important than other key growth competencies – including customer and market insight, sales capability, culture and strategy.
It’s not that these CEOs aren’t recognising innovation as important (on the contrary, it’s clearly seen as an essential) – it’s just that the innovation challenge isn’t primarily one of generating more ideas. Instead, it’s a challenge of strategy, process, culture and execution.
Specifically, it’s a challenge of focusing ideas in the right areas, selecting, developing and resourcing the right ones, and executing quickly (and successfully) – all in an environment of supportive culture and process.
Yet why does this misconception persist? Why do we see so many innovation ‘experts’ expounding the virtues of one million ideas?
Well, the cynic’s answer might be because it makes for a nice sound-bite, and helps sell creativity training to accessible HR budgets! But a more considered response would be because in some cases this viewpoint is quite legit.
In a brainstorming context, the volume of ideas generated (as well as the initial tolerance of all forms of ideas etc…) can indeed be a key ingredient for success. Similarly, at an individual level, the ability to generate lots of ideas and angles on an issue is an important personal capability (and a key input into bottom-up innovation activity). So in these cases, the ability to generate a large volume of ideas does indeed have a critical role.
It’s just that at an organisational level, the same priority does not necessarily apply. Faced with limited dollars to invest in building innovation capability, companies may be better placed investing in fresh market insight and strategy, the processes and skills for developing real ideas, hothouse teams, and the organisational development programs needed to assist (e.g. leadership, incentives).
It’s this challenge – of identifying which levers to pull and when – that’s at the heart of unleashing innovation (and why we enjoy doing what we do!).
Sometimes the answer might be ‘you just need more ideas’, but many times, it’s not.
