Driving Eureka!. Doug Hall

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СКАЧАТЬ are in good company. Every week, when business leaders tell me they already have a system for innovation, I ask to see it. A moment of confusion then occurs. I follow up by asking to see the operations manual for it, the training program curriculum for teaching new employees and new managers. Confusion is now replaced with bewilderment. I then explain that if you can’t write it down, you don’t have a system. This also means that you can’t blame employees for not following the company system for thinking smarter and more creatively when you don’t have a system.

      Why Should You Care?

      Innovation Engineering will help you increase innovation speed and decrease risk. However, that’s NOT the most important benefit of Innovation Engineering. According to Sheldon Scott, CEO of the Whitney Blake Company, the most important benefit is to “Make Work Fun Again!”—a close variation to Dr. Deming’s promise at the start of seminars, stated earlier: “Why are we here? We are here to come alive, to have fun, to have joy in work.”

      By “fun” we don’t mean frivolous play. We’re talking about the joy that comes from doing something that makes a difference in the world. Said another way: In the irreverent manner of members of the Innovation Engineering movement on and off campus . . .

       The fundamental aim of Innovation Engineering is to enable people to do COOL SH*T THAT MATTERS.

      The simple fact is—when you spend your time and energy on projects, products, or services that matter to YOU, your ORGANIZATION, and to CUSTOMERS, then you experience a chain reaction of Pride of Work, increased sales, and profitability.

      Pride of Work was a very important concept for Dr. Deming. He was once asked how he would summarize his overall message in a few words.

      I’m not sure, but it would have something to do with variation. Later he added, I said earlier that my message had to do with variation. I’ve given it some more thought, and I would say it has to do with Pride of Work.

      —Dr. W. Edwards Deming

      Whatever Happened to Pride of Work?

      In my opinion, one of the greatest benefits of the internet is that it has enabled the “craft” movement, from distilleries to breweries to farm-to-table restaurants to Meaningfully Unique tools and toys. When you visit a new city, it’s commonplace to search for real craft experiences.

      What separates craft companies from mass-market companies is Pride of Work. Leading a team of young people, crafting Innovation Engineering courses and tools, and starting our Brain Brew craft distillery has provided me with a first-person understanding of the new way of business. At its core, it’s about doing meaningful work. We aren’t just doing our job. We are creating whiskey, classes, and internet tools that we are deeply proud of. We sweat details that our competitors ignore.

      Steve Jobs’ success with Apple and Pixar was due in large part to his commitment to maintaining a craft mindset despite being one of the largest companies in the world. His biographer, Walter Isaacson, told CBS News that Jobs learned this from his adoptive father, Paul Jobs: “Once they were building a fence. And he said, ‘You got to make the back of the fence that nobody will see just as good-looking as the front of the fence. Even though nobody will see it, you will know, and that will show that you’re dedicated to making something perfect.’ ”

      I believe that the source of the wide range of positive and negative feelings toward Steve Jobs is this craftsmanship mindset. To those who get craftsmanship, fanatical passion is part of the process. To those who are practical and prudent, it’s craziness.

      Pride of Work is enabled when you are working on Cool Sh*t That Matters!

      Some folks talk about innovation being constrained by the worker’s fear of failure, laziness, or short-term targets driven by greed. The cause for this runs deeper. We have lost the joy of work for work’s sake. It takes very little additional effort to do something right than it does just to do it. Don’t make excuses, because ultimately the only person that will know if it’s great work or not is you.

      —Ken Grier, creative director

      The Macallan Scotch whisky distillery

      Never-Ending Innovation on Innovation

      We practice what we preach—never-ending continuous innovation of our training and tools.

      We don’t claim to know all the answers. We regularly upgrade our best practices with: 1) ideas from users, 2) academic research discoveries, and 3) licensed content from commercial experts.

      We are very disciplined in what we add to the Innovation Engineering curriculum and tools. Our upgrade process involves a small team of volunteers adapting and applying the new approach to their work. Their focus is an “engineering” mindset of finding the 20% who give 80% of the benefit. They are relentless in simplifying and streamlining new systems and methods. When innovation system improvements or tools are validated as reliable, they are incorporated into our best practices.

      We aggressively embrace new methods, systems, and tools. As I write these words, members of the Innovation Engineering movement are gathered at the Eureka! Ranch to innovate on our project management system. They are using stimulus from experiences, academic research, and other systems to ignite ideas for how we can further accelerate development projects.

      We believe that learning how to innovate smarter and faster is not a competition. We encourage our students, both on and off campus, to experience every innovation class and tool they can find. We have designed our innovation systems to make them work well with others. Within our community we have many organizations that have painlessly integrated Innovation Engineering with 6 Sigma, Lean, Lean Start Up, Design Thinking, Business Model Programs, and Phase Gate systems. We believe in collaboration. As Ben Franklin said, “We must all hang together or most assuredly we will all hang separately.”

      Never-ending, continuous innovation on Innovation Engineering systems means that, while this book details the state of the art at this time, I anticipate that this book will be regularly updated with the latest learning. In the short term, you can keep up with new learnings by signing up to receive our blog. You can find it by going to innovationengineering.org/news.

      The Organization of this Book

      This book provides a beginning understanding of the six college courses that make up the Innovation Engineering curriculum. It begins with a discussion of the Innovation Problem and Solution. It then details how Innovation Engineering came to be born, developed, and validated. Chapters 3 through 8 outline systems for how to Create, Communicate, and Commercialize innovations. Chapters 9 through 12 review principles for how you can upgrade your internal innovation systems to be faster and more effective. They include a collection of four subsystems that are critical for enabling innovation: Alignment, Collaboration Cafe, Merwyn Rapid Research, and Patent ROI.

      The book closes with a chapter on how to create an innovation culture within your team, company, or community.

      How СКАЧАТЬ