3 Common Misconceptions About Fostering Innovation in Your Team

Team Spirit

You have had several meetings with your team and communicated the need for innovation. You researched what teams need to come up with innovative ideas or solutions to an existing problem. You removed all the barriers you can think of. And yet, Jimmy's team from the other department spits out innovation like a flame thrower gasoline while you are sitting here in this dark meeting room for an hour already deciding if pushing this innovation is worth all that hassle.

Many people find it frustrating to foster innovation when playing in a team, especially with established colleagues and sometimes closed mindsets (or at least this is what you perceive). But it is not always that. Some misconceptions fostering innovation are valid every year, every day (their mindsets might not be closed). The good news is that by realising common misconceptions about innovation in teams, you can indirectly improve it all together.

1) No one is motivated.

A colleague from a few years ago always sat quietly at our long team meeting table. He never really talked much unless he was asked to do so or some idea just sounded super stupid to him and he just had to speak up to save us. With his grey hair and slim appearance, his wisdom and experience clearly made him the commonly viewed expert in our group. When asked for advice or input, he used to first slowly take his watch off, lean back and then, in detail, explain why your grand plan would not work out (or all the barriers that would come at you along the way). He knew his stuff. But he always seemed unmotivated to try out new things or change the status quo. With retirement on the horizon, why would you be motivated to do things differently, right?

People usually care.
Source: tenorc.om, 2022

Maybe. But not necessarily.

People have different outlooks on life - but they usually tend to be on one thing more than the other. All his life, my colleague worked in the same company. Decades. He knew every door, every tunnel (yes, we had tunnels) and many people working at the firm since the start. And because of all his time there, he was involved in many initiatives. He put a lot of effort into helping many divisions across the company succeed, including working on their processes. And he did it with great care. He was someone to rely on.

So we failed to acknowledge his work every time we brought up something new, even if it was just a slight process improvement. He had worked to make that process work. He might have to go through hard times to get things to work properly - or had to jump through many hoops to solve this bloody problem. And now, us, the inexperienced, should know better? Destroy his hard work? You guys have no idea.

It wasn't that much the issue that my colleague was unmotivated. In fact, he was most often very enthusiastic about his work. He rarely called in sick (even though he often should have a few more times) and was always available on call, fixing systems and machines breaking down. The issue was that we failed to recognise his hard work. Instead, we indirectly criticised his work. THAT was one reason he was hesitant to support new ideas.

So how could we have done it better? As always, recognition and communication are critical (boring, but true). We could have said something along the lines of "The old process/machine/idea worked great, and it has served us well. Now the environment changed. Let's improve on this process further to take that into account". Recognition, evaluation and opening the discussion for criticism.

2) Innovation is a solo activity.

Bill Gates didn't invent "the computer" on his own. 

Source: Statista, 2020

The foundation of computers and credit are given to Charles Babbage, a British inventor and mathematician born in 1791. So why is Gates often referenced as the sole inventor? Why does the first person that comes to mind when we talk about the digital age and the start of it fueled by the personal computer often him?

Gates wrote an operating system and distributed it for free, thus setting the basis for further development and an insane market share Windows still has today. However, that market share of Windows of more than 70% worldwide was not a result of Gates "doin' his thing". Instead, he used the ideas of Charles Baggage and many others. They put effort into designing circuit boards, layouts and monitors. And in his garage in Alburquerque, New Mexico, did he work alone? No. Paul Allan, his childhood friend, was always with him.

So is innovation a "solo thing"? No. Getting a product, service or anything else to market does not only take time. 

3) Disruption is the only real innovation.

50 years is a long time—I wonder how they innovated in the last years.
Source: Simon Beuse, 2022, Brisbane CBD

Yes, Uber busted through the door of Taxi companies worldwide and "disrupted" their operations (let's keep Germany out of this claim, unfortunately). Okay, maybe the word innovative disruption for Uber is wrong by theory definition (see HBR), but it still was a big new thing, right?

Yes, it was. But it is not always the most significant, newest or shiniest thing you can label as innovation. A substantial improvement to your manufacturing process or an improvement made to an existing product, incremental innovation is still innovation. So count those as well.

An excellent example of this is the brand I personally can not much relate to (sorry) but is always a good example. The "bitten apple" brand that's in many pockets in the Western world. Again, not a disruption by definition, but an opening of an entirely new market (Smartphones) was a monumental invention. And Apple continued - with more recent phones and more features. Some were more original than others. But in the end, they also practised in incremental innovation. 

Wrap up.

Does this list represent all misconceptions you can make in a team setting? Certainly not. But I think it can be a good start. Especially the first one made me think about my own experience. I often close posts with the following in mind, but it is always so true (just as it is in the cybersecurity sphere): "When you know, you know. And when you are aware, you can recognise and act."

Knowing these misconceptions could aid you in the future to recognise a potential pattern or issue and help to stay calm - and innovate one.

What are your thoughts on this? Did you experience "innovation blockers" in your team? How did you ultimately resolve it?

It would be great to hear from you - maybe even face to face (click that "Connect" button on the top right).