While business sustainability and economic growth are the ultimate goals of most companies, evidence shows that these effort are best served by a strong and stable work environment. Our sustainability consulting finds that successful business sustainability cultures focus on communication and learning. We believe that by allowing for flexibility and promoting innovation across the value chain, an organization can capture the interests of current and future employees. But what are others saying?
The Innovation Excellent post, What an Innovative Culture Looks Like, provides its own unique perspective on sustainable organizational development. This article focuses on leadership’s role in the process.
“An innovative corporate culture is one that supports the creation of new ideas and the implementation of those ideas. Leaders need to help employees see innovation in the right light.”
The ability to remain open to test new ideas and innovative strategies has proven to be a successful business sustainability strategy. Businesses who continuously assess and reassess the needs of their internal and external stakeholders are often more adaptive to the dynamic landscape of today’s business. Leveraging Innovation Excellence’s view, we get an inside look into how leading companies now perceive managed creativity. These organizations:
See innovation as a competency: Innovative companies treat it as just another core skill.
See innovation as a competitive weapon: Innovative companies use innovation to differentiate themselves.
See innovation as a process: Innovative companies don’t treat innovation as special, unique activity. They see it instead as an ongoing “stream of effort” along with quality, leadership, productivity, and other imperatives.
See innovation as both systematic and opportunistic: The most innovative companies flex between different styles of creating opportunity.
The business world too often approaches sustainable development with traditional structured implementation processes. In contrast, we have observed that those who excel are those who step outside the traditional business structures to add and spontaneity to their long-term business sustainability plans.
Article by Julie Urlaub, Founder and Managing Partner at Taiga Company; appearing courtesy 3BL Media.
