Disruptive Innovation, Hughes R&D style

Innovation. A living dichotomy that can represent either critical differentiation or a meaningless slogan. Every company wants its transformational capacity, but at the same time, as Wired magazine noted, “Innovation has become the buzzword of the decade in the worlds of business and education.”

So then, what constitutes real innovation?

Truly innovative companies and innovative people make things happen. They push transformation and positive development. They create products and services that change how we live. We stand in awe of them.

Innovation is devastatingly hard but rewarding work. It’s visionary at a bedrock level. At Apple, the late Steve Jobs demanded it to the point where co-workers announced that Jobs had created a “reality distortion field” – forcing people to break out of set thought patterns and relentlessly pursue new directions, even if they seemed over the top.

What does it take? “To be truly innovative, you need a combination of critical, conceptual, creative, reflective, and visionary thinking skills combined with behavioral traits such as curiosity, resilience, the ability to collaborate, and the development of both observation and communication skills,” says Wired magazine.

Want to develop and sustain a culture of anti-buzzword transformational innovation at your company? In your life? A good friend of mine is a former head of R&D at Hughes Aircraft and recently retired senior vice president of new product development at a Fortune 50 company. If you drive a high-end car or SUV, you use products he conceived or developed. Here is a short version of his thoughts on developing a culture of real innovation:

• Most companies are risk-adverse. Many are more than satisfied with the status quo as long as they make payroll and keep shareholders happy. They paint the walls a different color, change their logo, and mistakenly call that innovation. Innovation requires risk-taking and a certain acceptance that some innovations will outright fail. An innovation-focused company holds confidence in its employees and develops an acceptable level of real risk.
• Don’t forget: measured and deliberate risk-taking represents a core part of effective leadership.
• A culture of innovation never accepts the notion of “good enough.” Room for improvement is the biggest room at companies seeking to sustain a culture of innovation.
• Bosses have to allow employees to do things differently. Time and resources have to be made available to think and try new things.
• Commercializing technology in large companies is very difficult. Hard to have consistent and dominant discussions focused on pure profitability and then also take the risks required to develop a culture of innovation.
• Many companies are autocratic. Generally speaking, being autocratic defeats any possibility of positive disruption and subsequent innovation. The exception again is Apple. Jobs was an autocrat, but he was a relentless champion of innovation and pushing the envelope. Nothing was ever good enough, similar to the corporate innovation focus at Samsung: “Everything we do at Samsung is driven by an unyielding passion for excellence—and an unfaltering commitment to develop the best products and services on the market.” According to BusinessWeek, Samsung fosters this by creating an artificial sense of positive crisis. There is never any resting on laurels.
• Finally, as one professor at Cal Tech was fond of saying, “If you’re succeeding at everything, you’re probably failing.” (Many little successes all in a row often can mean that you’re operating at half power, playing it safe).

Want to truly develop a culture of innovation and try your hand at changing the world? Get great people, get them built into a team, get them funded, give them confidence (serve as their champion), and turn them loose.

By Michael Snyder, Managing Principal, The MEK Group

About Michael Snyder and The MEK Group – As the Indianapolis Star stated in 2014 profile coverage, “Michael Snyder knows brands.” Snyder today serves as managing principal of The MEK Group, an award-winning marketing, branding and PR consultancy. For more information, please visit www.themekgroup.com