"Most organisations pay lip service to innovation. That is very different from doing anything about it. Executives do not really like new ideas at all.
Executives get to senior positions through managing continuity. This means keeping things running as they are and solving problems as they arise.
Innovation means disruption. Innovation means risk. Innovation means new resource allocation.
That there might be rewards is of significance to the organisation but not to the individual executive."
Edward de Bono 20th March 2004
I just love this slide from a DeBono talk.
I am sure we all know the type of organisation he talks about.
That company where managing the status quo is all important - don’t encourage change – this is the way we have always things here. You have heard them all.
As I get older I am more and more signed up to the concept of encouraging change - even creating change so that the organisation does not become comfortable and therefore complacent and therefore loses to its competitors because they tried something different that worked.
I am not a change junkie - I just feel that ‘staying the same’ is no longer an option because the customer is often one step ahead of us.
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Hi Simon - I am all for testing.... I sign up to your views.
At the same time we must also allow mistakes to happen -though not perhaps in your world of medicine!
I am sure you would agree progress comes sometimes as a result of mistakes or bad experience/feedback.
I remember jokes and jibes a few years ago about Skoda cars - now Skodas are excellent quality and value with good customer feedback – and the jokes have stopped.
Keep rattling cages Simon - the NHS needs people like you in leadership roles - I look forward to our next meeting.
You might like to contact Steve Prevette – one of my Rattle the Cage Colleagues. Steve describes himself as a ‘passionate statistician’ and is a 'virtual' friend of from America.
Steve and I are planning a book on measurements of leadership. Let me know and I will ‘talk virtually’ to Steve.
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