Sparks to fire up your innovation combustion
This coaching session discusses how to address managers who are skeptical about innovation.
Starring: Inna (Innovation Leader in a large Pharma corporation) and Wim (coach for Innovation Leaders). [Transcription far below]
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Are you looking for a personal innovation coach?
- Do you want a soundboard, a sparring partner?
- Did you just start an innovation program or want to improve it?
- Do you need practical ideas to stimulate innovation or on how to manage an innovation portfolio?
If yes, I’m ready to help you!
- I believe in KISS: Keeping Innovation Super Simple. High focus on passion, low focus on processes.
- I have coached more than 50 innovation leaders across the globe in Pharma/healthcare.
- I work as independent coach: per hour or as long as you consider valuable at wimvand@outlook.com
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Transcript
Inna:
⁃ Hi Wim. Several managers in my company are skeptical about innovation. Any thoughts on how I can convince them?
Wim:
⁃ Hi Inna. It’s indeed typically middle managers that are most skeptical about innovation. There can be many reasons why they are not supporting innovation. To manage this, you would need to start by identifying those skeptics and discuss with them the reasons they feel this way.
Inna:
⁃ How did you approach this?
Wim:
⁃ Well, when I started in my role as Innovation Leader, I actually held off spending energy on the skeptics. I instead focused my time on those employees who were passionate about innovation. This was especially effective early in the innovation process: it helped me to create quick wins and illustrate the value of innovation to everyone in the corporation.
Inna:
Did you see skeptical managers change their mind?
Wim:
⁃ Absolutely! Again, it depends on why they were skeptical.
⁃ But I noticed that some managers suddenly started supporting innovations when their colleagues got recognized by senior leaders for the innovations they worked on. This was driven by a “friendly” competitive spirit.
⁃ Some managers became champions when one of their employees created a successful innovation. Suddenly they became a source of inspiration for the rest of the company.
⁃ The most positive experience I had, was when managers had a “change of mind” because they realized that innovations really created business or/and customer value.
Inna:
⁃ That’s helpful! 1. Focus on passionate innovators; 2. Demonstrate value for/to skeptics
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