How to Foster an Innovative Environment

I am constantly thinking about how to foster innovation in my product organization. Building teams that are experts at execution is the easy part—when there’s a clear problem, product orgs are great at coming up with smart solutions. But it’s impossible to optimize your way into innovation. You can’t only rely on incremental improvement to keep growing. You need to come up with new problem spaces, rather than just finding better solutions to the same old problems. So, how do we come up with those new spaces? Here are a few things I’m trying at Duolingo: 1. Innovation needs a high-energy environment, and a slow process will kill a great idea. So I always ask myself: Can we remove some of the organizational barriers here? Do managers from seven different teams really need to say yes on every project? Seeking consensus across the company—rather than just keeping everyone informed—can be a major deterrent to innovation. 2. Similarly, beware of defaulting to “following up.” If product meetings are on a weekly cadence, every time you do this, you are allocating seven days to a task that might only need two. We try to avoid this and promote a sense of urgency, which is essential for innovative ideas to turn into successes. 3. Figure out the right incentive. Most product orgs reward team members whose ideas have measurable business impact, which works in most contexts. But once you’ve found product-market fit, it is often easiest to generate impact through smaller wins. So, naturally, if your org tends to only reward impact, you have effectively incentivized constant optimization of existing features instead of innovation. In the short term things will look great, but over time your product becomes stale. I try to show my teams that we value and reward bigger ideas. If someone sticks their neck out on a new concept, we should highlight that—even if it didn’t pan out. Big swings should be celebrated, even if we didn’t win, because there are valuable learnings there. 4. Look for innovative thinkers with a history of zero-to-one feature work. There are lots of amazing product managers out there, but not many focus on new problem domains. If a PM has created something new from scratch and done it well, that’s a good sign. An even better sign: if they show excitement about and gravitate toward that kind of work. If that sounds like you—if you’re a product manager who wants to think big picture and try out big ideas in a fast-paced environment with a stellar mission—we want you on our team. We’re hiring a Director of Product Management: https://lnkd.in/dQnWqmDZ #productthoughts #innovation #productmanagement #zerotoone

I was fortunate to be a founding member of the innovation lab at PayPal and we learnt a lot along the way! most importantly that cultivating innovation is essential to navigating the digital landscape. It requires a foundational shift in our corporate culture. Here are some ways to build and nurture a workplace that drives digital transformation: - Encourage Curiosity: Promote an environment where questioning and exploring are valued. Innovation begins with curiosity. - Invest in Resources: Equip your teams with the necessary tools and continuous learning opportunities to turn innovative ideas into reality. - Normalize Risk-Taking: Support a culture where calculated risks are encouraged, and learning from failures is as celebrated as achieving success. - Enhance Collaboration: Encourage diverse teams to work together, leveraging different perspectives to ignite creative solutions. - Demonstrate Commitment: As leaders, our actions must reflect our innovative values—showing commitment through active participation and support. - Acknowledge Creativity: Regularly recognize and reward creative efforts to motivate sustained innovation across the organization. - Build Networks: Stay engaged with industry leaders and outside thinkers to bring fresh insights and practices into our fold. Fostering a culture of innovation is a commitment to continuous growth and adaptability. #DigitalTransformation #Innovation #BusinessCulture #Leadership #Growth

I found this while on an afternoon stroll through Esalen. It beautifully summarizes my key learnings from this past week. Innovation doesn't happen during planned meetings or zoom calls. It happens through collisions of people who care about similar problems, and who have the freedom to ideate together. Our job as leaders is to create a culture where creativity thrives and is celebrated. Here are a few ways we can all work towards creating more innovative cultures: 1) Share your mission. Be loud. Be clear. Be consistent. In order for our team members to innovate, you need to give them something to care about first. Employees at mission driven companies report higher levels of engagement, higher retention and higher levels of innovation than companies who don't have a clear purpose or mission. 2) Focus on outcomes not outputs. Employees who have greater freedom on how they get their work done tend to report better overall outcomes and higher profits than companies with more rigid frameworks. Align on overall targets and objectives and let your team figure out their own ways of achieving them - you may be surprised at how good the results are. 3) Acknowledge and celebrate failures as learning moments. One of the best leaders I've worked for held space in each weekly team meeting for "F*ckups of the week" - a practice I have since emulated within my own teams. In order for creativity to flow, employees need to know that it's safe to make mistakes. A culture where failures are celebrated as learnings is one where creativity can thrive. 4) Create room for collisions. If you haven't been living under a rock, then you know the importance of hiring diverse talent and have done so. Groovy. The next part of the equation is amplifying the power of your diverse workforce by creating opportunities for these employees to engage with each other. I'm not talking about switching to being in the office 5 days a week. While that might yield positive results, it might also do so at the cost of employee wellness (this is not a ding on RTO - it's right for some companies, just not all). Instead, try creating quarterly employee summits where you openly discuss current business challenges and welcome all voices and ideas to be shared. If you have other thoughts or ideas on cultivating innovation, I'd love to hear them. #innovationculture #leadershipcoaching #leadershipdevelopment #esaleninstitute #humanpotential

Do I have all the best ideas?  Not even close! While many would like to think that all the best ideas only come from the top, that’s simply not true. Building a diverse team that is empowered to take ownership in driving innovation and improving IT efficiencies can drive an incredible amount of change at a much higher rate than a small group of leaders. I’ve the opportunity to lead many teams over my career and the one thing I realized earlier on and still holds true to this day is to allow teams to feel empowered. Give the team room to grow, come up with ideas on their own, and learn from failure. When employees feel trusted to make decisions and experiment, innovation explodes!  I see it all the time - a fresh perspective from a team member can totally change the game. Then add on building a diverse team that brings in different perspectives from a variety of backgrounds and experiences, and you get innovation and change on steroids! Here's how I try to foster that ownership culture: 🎯Clear goals, not micromanagement: 🎯 The leadership team sets the vision, but let my team figure out the "how." This gives them the freedom to be creative and find the best solutions. Celebrate failures (as steppingstones!): 💪 We ALL mess up sometimes. The key is to learn from it and move on. A "fail fast, learn faster" mentality encourages taking risks and pushing boundaries. 🌟Recognition that rocks! 🌟 When someone goes above and beyond, I make sure to shout it from the rooftops. Put it in the whole IT channel on teams, call it out during a team lunch, and share with all the IT leaders. Public recognition is a powerful motivator! What are your tips for empowering your team and fostering innovation? #leadership #innovation #employeeownership #itculture #thoughtleadership

Creating a culture of innovation starts with making space for it. I learned that innovation requires time that is untethered from the daily grind. In my latest initiative, we instituted "innovation hours"—a set time each week when the team could explore new ideas without the pressure of immediate deadlines or deliverables. During these hours, the usual hierarchy flattened. Everyone, from interns to executives, had an equal voice. The diversity of thought led to some of our most creative projects. It wasn't about forcing creativity but providing the right conditions for it to flourish. Encouraging this practice showed me that when you give people the space to think creatively, they will. Make innovation hours a part of your company's routine and watch the seeds of creativity grow into something extraordinary.