Innovation. We’re certainly hearing a lot about this topic in the association arena. If it’s on your radar, I believe there are three myths that need to be debunked:
- Innovation requires creating something from nothing. Most innovation is evolutionary, not revolutionary. (Even the revolutionary products such as the iPod or iPhone evolved from other product categories.)
- Innovation is easy. If you think long enough and hard enough, you can innovate, right? Actually, it’s much more difficult than “thinking up” new ideas. It requires a lot of listening, creating, experimenting, and recalibrating. Those who follow a set process may be able to innovate more easily, but it’s still not “easy.”
- Innovation leads to success. Failure is a large part of innovation. To minimize the risk, consider changing your internal terminology from “failure” to “discovery opportunity” or “learning experiment.” Creating a culture that values learning agility makes it more likely that innovation will occur within your organization.
To learn more about creating an innovation mindset, see Google’s 9 Principles of Innovation.