ABSTRACT
As we have seen from previous chapters and everyday observation, innovation results more from an organization’s culture than any particular processes or approaches. Innovation is not an outcome in and of itself, and neither can it be legislated or regulated. There is no recipe for innovation, but we can identify some “ingredients,” or enablers, that make an organization much more likely to produce innovative ideas and products. These enablers have been discussed in detail in previous chapters and include characteristics like risk tolerance, peer-to-peer networking and communication, the 3 Ps of permission/privacy/proximity, candor and curiosity, awareness of external developments, collaboration, and customer/user empathy. These ingredients do not need to be combined in any particular ratio, and not every example of successful innovation includes them all. But the presence of these elements certainly appears to make innovation more likely. In some respects, building a culture of innovation is similar to fishermen chumming the waters they fish. The desired outcome (catching fish) is never guaranteed, but experience has proven that chumming increases the likelihood of a successful catch. As any truthful fisherman will tell you, failures will still be frequent, but the steps taken to increase the likelihood are well worth the effort.
