Society is undergoing rapid digital change. Organizational charts are becoming shallower and processes are becoming more elastic, even in large companies. In product development, marketing, rewards, measurement, summer party programs, and management practices, new things must be constantly invented. Continuous change emphasizes a company’s ability to produce innovations; to create new things.
Managing creative work is its own art form, which is as precise as tightrope walking. A creative mind needs a sufficient amount of dedication, passion, and ambition, but also enough analytical skills, objectivity, and community. Too much dedication causes problems; work begins to be done with the ego and the employee begins to define his or her own identity through work. The work becomes the self. For example, a film becomes only the director’s work, and the process is driven by the individual’s raging ego. The same can happen to a coder, copywriter, or lawyer. Ego often storms over the work community and all human relationships as if nothing else matters. Analytical, business-oriented dialogue is challenging when work is a question of identity.
Murtuza Ali Lakhani and Michelle Marquard studied over two hundred participants over a five-year and wrote an article called Mastering the Innovation Paradox: The Five Unexpected Qualities of Innovation Leaders. The researchers were able to prove that the way a company is managed has a significant impact on the quality of innovations it produces.
Companies are changing due to digitalization and virtualization, but also due to the values imposed by new generations: ecology, diversity, representation and responsibility have been in discussions at the workplace if you have hired talented millennials for your project. In leadership, traditional authority based on hierarchy is giving way to self-direction and community management. At least that’s what they say in seminars. Knowledge workers are known to love their autonomy. However, that doesn’t mean that innovations are best created completely without leadership, alone in dark back rooms. Quite the opposite. Leading creative work, innovative product development or change in an organization is its own complex challenge.
Murtuza Ali Lakhani and Michelle Marquard conducted their study in five different American companies. Management styles were observed by employees, middle management and senior management. The study discussed both those management methods that seemed to produce innovative results and those that did not work. Each participant assessed themselves. In addition, he is evaluated by subordinates, superiors and colleagues. The study states that while R&D investments, business strategy and hiring the right talent are important, more than two-thirds of a company’s ability to innovate is created at very low costs. That’s how important the quality of creative work management is.
It is difficult to develop and implement a company’s strategic direction within the framework of financial pressures and constraints. It is perhaps even more difficult to create a work environment that, as a result of efforts, harnesses the social, emotional, analytical and creative potential of employees. According to the study, creative work managers who produce great results had a lot in common, but the five most clear similarities were:
A Wide Circle Of Trust That Accommodates Diversity
In creative work, it is easy to build a small circle of lukewarm supporters around the leader. Trust is limited to a harmonious inner circle of a few people. The circle of trust of innovation leaders is wide and extends beyond what seems obvious to many. The circle also accommodates people who see the world from a different perspective, special types and those who disagree. Apple CEO Tim Cook hired designers, fashion designers, doctors and personal trainers to accompany technicians and engineers. Without communication based on trust, disagreements that could refine an idea into an innovation turn into energy-sapping discord.
Impatient Curiosity
What unites successful innovation leaders is their ability to explore the world, to imagine possibilities, and to connect seemingly disparate ideas and values. They are able to form communicable visions from abstract things that engage others. Curious leaders scan, read, and absorb information from their environment: they take the time to reflect and, above all, ask questions. Gaining new insights into any situation is automatic for them, allowing them to understand the big picture and prioritize long-term goals over short-term solutions.
#nofilter
Successful innovation leaders apply the same methods to themselves as they do to understand the world. They strive to see themselves objectively and are eager to hear how others perceive them. They have the ability to see the world from another’s perspective and maintain empathy even in difficult situations. Empathy also helps build trust in the work community and is one of the most important values for millennials. According to research, the ability to observe oneself objectively is one of the most important qualities for a leader. Leaders need to not only understand their own strengths and weaknesses, but also know how to surround themselves with people who complement their skills.
Knowledge & Creative Madness In The Right Proportion
Innovation requires data, analysis and objective, cold-blooded assessment. In addition, crazy ideas, silly questions and thoughts from and outside the box are needed. Knowledge and creativity are yin and yang, one is unnecessary without the other. Innovation leaders not only recognize the necessity of these opposing forces, but also know how to read and guide their team during this process, which moves in waves. Sometimes the silent intuitive insight of the subconscious is needed. When the depths of creativity do not provide clear answers, the innovation leader navigates his team from the storm to a data-based, measurable, modelable, balanced and rational harbor.
Encounters On Many Levels
Successful innovation leaders encounter their teams on many different levels. They are sincere and benevolent and present in discussions. They set an example in the organization on how to communicate without considering age, gender, hierarchy, cultural background or sexual orientation. They listen, inform, persuade and share ideas. They know how to verbalize and reinforce common intentions and communicate even abstract and complex issues in a community in an understandable way.
Lakhani and Marquard’s findings seem intuitively reasonable, even though the innovation leader seems almost like a superhero. Perhaps no one can implement these almost otherworldly qualities every day, but every success certainly leads towards new innovations.
