Happy holidays, innovation enthusiasts, and welcome to Mindjet’s 12 Days of Innovation! This 2014 spotlight series features hand-picked resources, upcoming events, webcasts, thought leadership pieces, and more to give you an inspirational boost for the coming year. Enjoy!
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On the first day of innovation, we’d like to share with you: why the term itself shouldn’t be cast aside as just another weightless piece of jargon.
Popular, But Still Purposeful
…that is, if you approach innovation with intent, mindfulness, and strategic planning. One of the great dangers born from our vast, complex interconnectedness — and the resulting easy access to information — is that we tend to develop a numbness towards anything trending. True, there’s an unprecedented amount of content to sift through, and much of it is either slapped together, steeped in personal opinion, or little more than a rehashing of points already made. But with 93% of today’s executives linking success rates to their organization’s ability to innovate effectively, it’s well worth digging through the fluff to unearth the innovation tips, examples, tools, stories, and tactics being used by top-tier companies.
If the sheer prevalence of the word is getting you down, try to focus any research you might be doing on implementing innovation within the structure of your specific organization, and keep keyword searches tightly tied to needs that address problems you know you’re facing. While it’s true that many general best practices are applicable no matter the industry a company belongs to or its size, those pieces of info are a dime a dozen, and are usually responsible for clogging up the information pipeline. That said, if you’re brand new to the innovation management game, general advice is where you should start, in order to get an idea of what makes sense for you, your team, and your business.
Taking the Next Step
Our most important tip? Don’t depend on ideas alone to ignite your innovation program. This is an unfortunately common reaction to facing the deluge of innovation content out there, and one that’s pretty much guaranteed to leave you flailing. A well-engineered innovation management platform, and one that can be tailored to fit your business and team needs, is crucial to continuously turn great suggestions into real solutions. So is a transparent, structured plan to use it, leading us to our second most important piece of advice: never expect that merely giving employees access to a tool means they’ll actually use it.
Nowadays, innovation is absolutely a buzzword — but that’s certainly not all it is. Don’t let the frustration of an overcrowded topic cause your company to miss out on its next big idea.
To learn more, read up on Mindjet’s award-winning innovation management platform, SpigitEngage.
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