A Month in the Life of an Innovation Consultant

Welcome to this special edition of our newsletter. Why special?

Sending out this newsletter regularly is a goal of mine, but achieving this isn't always feasible. My intention is to bring you valuable insights with each issue, and that requires time to research, reflect, and articulate thoughts. And lately, time has been a scarce resource.

February 2024 has been a whirlwind of activity : high-stake meetings , delivery of innovation programs and engaging community events, all spanning across different countries and cities. At this point the familiarity of airport lounges has begun to rival that of my own living room.

This edition, penned from my hotel room in London, is a closer look at the behind-the-scenes of innovation consulting – the challenges, the breakthroughs, and the unique experiences that come with the territory. But it’s also an opportunity for you to see what other organizations are up to, how they approach innovation and what what they’re doing to succeed.

So here’s a run down of the month.

Table of Contents

• Facilitating high-stakes decisions Warsaw

• Office days in Berlin: strategy and developing a n …

• Innovation training in Rome: shaping public sector …

• Breaking into the innovation scene in Riyadh & Dub …

• Running Design Sprints at scale in London

• Insights from my conversations with innovation lea …

Facilitating high-stakes decisions Warsaw

Solving problems that matter is critical for the success of any endeavour. We kicked off February with one-day Problem Framing Workshop to help a group of stakeholders / sponsors define and decide which challenges their teams should tackle during their company-wide Innovation Hackathon.

Effective decision-making hinges on having clear criteria for guidance. For this workshop, we employed the 4U Framework to evaluate and prioritize problems across four key dimensions:

• Unworkable → what are the consequences of inaction?

• Urgent → is immediate action necessary?

• Unavoidable → can we avoid it?

• Underserved → are existing solutions inadequate?

Our goal was to pinpoint problems that were significantly unworkable, urgent, unavoidable, and underserved. For more insights into this framework, you can revisit a previous post here.

Office days in Berlin: strategy and developing a new product

Back in Berlin, our focus shifted to developing a new product specifically designed for innovation teams.

The Challenge. In many organizations innovation is often sidelined, underfunded, and understaffed. Despite its potential, innovation is not really core to the business, lacking attention and importance.

The Core Issue is the lack of alignment between the innovation efforts and the business goals. There's a gap in understanding—innovation teams are not fully aware of what the business truly needs, and conversely, the business side lacks insight into how innovation can drive value.

Our Solution. To bridge this gap, we've developed a half-a-day workshop designed to create alignment between business stakeholders and innovation teams. The goal is to secure the essential buy-in and support innovation efforts need to thrive. Over the past three weeks, we've been testing and refining this workshop with various innovation teams, and we’re now ready to launch it.

So if your team is struggling to gain the attention and support of stakeholders, get in touch with us.

Innovation training in Rome: shaping public sector solutions

Our journey took us to Rome to collaborate with Italy's leading consulting firm in the public sector, boasting 1,500 employees. Their challenge was to find more effective methods to engage with public authorities and co-create solutions that serve the broadest user base: the entire population of a country.

We delivered a three-day intensive training program focused on design sprints and problem framing. Given the plug-and-play nature of our approach, the team can immediately apply their new skills and start seeing tangible results.

Breaking into the innovation scene in Riyadh & Dubai

Innovation is booming in Riyadh and Dubai. We spent a week between the two cities, meeting innovation teams within both corporation and public sector at our “Innovate or Hibernate” events.

These sessions were dedicated to exploring how design sprints can help organizations navigate the delicate balance between risk and opportunity in their innovation efforts.

Key Observations:

• Innovation teams in these regions are backed by clear mandates and set ambitious goals.

• The size of innovation teams is notably larger than those I've encountered in Europe, reflecting the significant emphasis placed on innovation.

• They move fast, are willing to learn and curious.

For a glimpse into the energy and engagement at these events, check out some snapshots from Riyadh and Dubai.

Running Design Sprints at scale in London

Innovation isn't just about having new ideas; it's about making those ideas tangible and testing them in the real world. That’s not possible without running experiments.

And when it comes to that, it’s hard to find something better than design sprints.

The corporation we work with has experienced the power of design sprints last year, when they engaged Design Sprint Academy to conduct two design sprints to expand their product offerings.

The success of these initial sprints sparked a desire for more, leading to an ambitious plan of conducting 15 design sprints in 2024. To ensure sustainability and internal capability, they needed to bring this expertise in-house.

Hence, at the end of February, we're hosting a five-day bootcamp for 30 of their product managers, agile coaches, UX designers, and facilitators.

Imagine the competitive edge this organization will gain by the end of 2024:

• They will have conducted 15 experiments, each an opportunity to learn, adapt, and potentially succeed.

• They'll have developed 15 tangible prototypes, moving beyond abstract ideas to concrete solutions.

• Regular testing with customers will become a new norm, spreading customer-centricity across the organization.

• Each sprint requires a multidisciplinary team, fostering improved cross-functional collaboration.

Reflect on this:

Insights from my conversations with innovation leaders

In between these projects I've had the privilege of conversing with around a dozen innovation executives, both in person and remotely. The insights garnered from these discussions will definitely inspire future editions of this newsletters. For now, I'll briefly outline the recurring themes that have surfaced:

➡️  The Ambiguity of Innovation: The term "innovation" remains nebulous, lacking a universally accepted definition. This ambiguity leaves many innovation teams grappling with the what and how of their mandate.

➡️  Fragmented Innovation Systems: Related, very few organizations have a mature innovation systems, most have bits and pieces and trying to make it work. That made me think about the importance of a coherent innovation framework.

➡️ Opportunity Identification: The primary focus for many innovation teams is the identification of new opportunities.

➡️  Stakeholder Management Challenges. The biggest struggle across the board is stakeholder management, overcoming gatekeepers, and influencing decision-making processes.

➡️  The Role of Governance in Innovation: Interestingly, the concept of governance within the context of innovation was highlighted as a key to success. That was a new to me insight, but made perfect sense when that innovation leader explained to me how this helps them manage innovation from the early ideas to launched products in the market.

Let me know which of these topics you find interesting for deeper exploration in upcoming editions.

Until then, it’s a wrap!