Leading Innovation In Organizations

As Duarte grew, I’d hear feedback that decisions were made too slowly, which confused me. In reality, we didn’t have a system to recognize when the team was asking for a decision. We thought they were just informing us, so decisions would languish. We weren’t ignoring them, failing to act, or even making incorrect decisions... We just didn’t realize a decision needed to be made in the first place. It dawned on the exec team that the lack of clarity during the conversation is what slows teams down. Leaders and teams can share the same language for decision-making. Much of it is about shaping recommendations that actually lead to the right type of action and making the urgency clear. Here’s the shift that changed everything… We started mapping every decision against two factors: urgency and risk. Low risk, low urgency: Decide without me. Your team runs with it. Low risk, high urgency: Inform on progress. They update you, but keep driving. High risk, low urgency: Propose for approval. They bring a recommendation, and you decide together. High risk, high urgency: Escalate immediately. You're in it together, right now. Once my team understood which quadrant a decision lived in, they knew exactly how to approach me. And I knew exactly what my role was. The framework gave us a shared language. People can’t act on ideas if they don’t understand how decisions are made. Leaders should define how recommendations move from idea to approval to action. That transparency keeps progress from stalling. Remember: One of the biggest threats to your company isn't a lack of good ideas. It's a lack of clarity. #Leadership #ExecutiveLeadership #OrganizationalCulture #DecisionMaking

Over 100 Companies Are Building Killer Robots for the Pentagon. I Found the 20 That Will Actually Survive. Last week, a defense startup CEO told me something that made me think. "We're not competing with Lockheed anymore. We're competing with 100 other startups who think they're the next Anduril." He's right. And 80 of them will be dead by 2027. I spent three months mapping autonomous defense companies chasing DoD contracts. From Silicon Valley AI labs to Boston robotics shops to D.C. consultancies pivoting to hardware. etc. The carnage has already started. Twelve companies that raised Series A rounds in 2024 are out of money. Three that won SBIR grants can't scale production. One with $50M in funding just lost their entire engineering team. But 20 companies are making headway. And they all share the same DNA. The Pattern Winners don't build for the Pentagon. They built for the 19-year-old Marine who has to use their tech while getting shot at. One company embedded engineers with combat units for 6 months. No contract. No promise of payment. Just learning how operators fight. Result? Their drone requires two people to operate. Competitors need 12. Skydio delivered drones with 70% capability in 3 months. By month 12, they'd pushed 47 software updates based on combat feedback. Traditional contractors were still writing requirements documents. Winners treat manufacturing like a weapon system. Anduril built factories before winning major contracts. Saronic designs boats for mass production, not perfection. Firestorm 3D-prints drones in the field. The traditional primes? Still treating production as an afterthought. The Math Current reality: • 100+ companies chasing autonomous defense contracts • Combined VC investment: $8.7B since 2020 • Total addressable market by 2027: $12B • Winners needed to capture 80% of the market: 20 That's 80 companies fighting over table scraps. The Survivors Based on my analysis, here are the 20 that are leading the charge: The Platforms (One brain, infinite applications): Anduril, Shield AI, Applied Intuition The Swarmers (Quantity as quality): Skydio, Saronic, Blue Water Autonomy The Specialists (Owning one domain): Hermeus (hypersonics), Epirus (directed energy), True Anomaly (space) The Builders (Manufacturing as moat): Firestorm, Forterra, Terminal Autonomy The Enablers (Making others deadly): Scale AI, Vannevar Labs, Rebellion Defense The Wild Cards (Different playbook): Joby (VTOL), Reliable Robotics, Mach Industries The rest? They're building impressive tech, but many will never see combat. Your Move If you're supplying these 20, you'll ride the wave. If you're competing with them, you have roughly 18 months to pivot or perish. Find your unique slot. The autonomous defense revolution isn't winner-take-all. It's winner-take-most. And the winners are already emerging from the pack.

#TeachMeTuesday How much innovation are we missing if we only look at the R&D line in financial statements? 👉 Result: a lot! 📄 In a newly published Research Policy article (👉 https://lnkd.in/enDMWuVA), Neophytos Lambertides, Marina Magidou, and Anna Emilia Maruska, Ph.D. , the authors ask a simple question: what if part of the innovation signal is hiding in plain sight — in what firms say, not only in what they report numerically? Evidence in the paper then shows that over 10% of firms reporting zero or missing R&D expenditures nonetheless exhibit clear signals of innovation activity. 🧠 What this implies for innovation measurement The results reinforce a broader message: innovation is increasingly intangible, distributed, and poorly aligned with traditional reporting categories. Relying narrowly on reported R&D risks underestimating innovation — especially in services, digital-intensive sectors, and firms innovating through processes rather than products. 🏛️ What could better measurement look like? Building on the paper’s contribution, three complementary directions stand out: 🔔 Systematic use of narrative disclosures to capture latent innovation activity beyond formal R&D 🔔Broader “total innovation investment” concepts, combining R&D with other innovation-relevant intangible expenditures 🔔 Richer output indicators, integrating patents with trademarks, designs, and market-based innovation signals 🌍 Link to global policy work These insights align closely with the measurement philosophy of the WIPO, which combines traditional and non-traditional indicators to better capture innovation in all its forms.

GCC Leaders: Are You Measuring What Truly Matters? To measure the real impact of your Global Capability Center (GCC), you must go beyond traditional operational KPIs like cost savings or headcount. Those are hygiene. What truly matters is how your GCC moves the needle for the business. Here are 5 strategic metrics every GCC leader should track: 1. Value Delivered per Dollar Spent Why it matters: Shows how effectively the GCC converts investment into business outcomes. How to measure: • Business value (e.g., product revenue, productivity gains, IP created) / Total GCC cost • Can be benchmarked against alternative models (outsourcing, onshore) 2. Time to Market Acceleration Why it matters: Reflects the GCC’s ability to improve speed of execution for product development, support, or operations. How to measure: • % improvement in release velocity or cycle times after GCC involvement • Lead time from idea to launch before vs. after GCC enablement 3. Innovation Output Why it matters: Indicates contribution toward competitive advantage and future growth. How to measure: • Patents filed, features launched, automation use cases deployed • Number of AI/GenAI initiatives incubated and scaled • New product ideas or MVPs driven from GCC 4. Business Function Ownership & Accountability Why it matters: Measures the maturity and strategic importance of the GCC. How to measure: • % of global business function fully owned or co-owned by GCC (e.g., platforms, support functions, analytics COEs) • Strategic roles (Directors, VPs) based in the GCC • Participation in global decision-making forums 5. Customer or Stakeholder NPS / Satisfaction Score Why it matters: This metric reflects how well the GCC is delivering value—both through the products it helps build and the support it provides to global stakeholders. How to measure: • NPS from external customers using products or services developed by GCC teams • NPS from internal stakeholders on the GCC’s responsiveness, collaboration, and strategic alignment • Qualitative feedback on product quality, innovation, speed of execution, and business understanding If your GCC isn’t driving the business forward, it’s just another offshore team. And in 2025, that’s not enough. Rethink how you measure. Reframe how you lead. Redefine what your GCC stands for. Zinnov Amita Goyal Karthik Padmanabhan Amaresh N. Mohammed Faraz Khan Namita Adavi Dipanwita Ghosh Sagar Kulkarni Hani Mukhey ieswariya Rohit Nair Komal Shah Saurabh Mehta

How can you grow innovation in an organisation that is tired and overloaded? No! Not by launching yet another innovation programme. Tired teams don’t need more. They need different. Here are 5 things to do: 1. Kill before you create You can’t grow innovation on top of a full plate. Make a stop list before a to-do list: which meetings, reports, projects and rituals will you end to free up energy for new ideas? 2. Protect small islands of focus time Innovation dies in back-to-back calendars. Block fixed “no meeting” slots or a monthly sprint where teams can work on one opportunity without interruptions. Guard this time like you guard client deadlines. 3. Shrink the ambition, speed up the learning Overloaded people fear “big transformation”. Instead, ask for tiny experiments: 1 idea, 1 customer segment, 1 simple test within 2–4 weeks. The goal is learning, not a perfect business case. 4. Change leadership behaviour, not posters Culture follows what leaders do on Monday morning. Leaders should ask: “What did we learn?” more often than “Did we hit the numbers?” and publicly reward smart experiments, even when they don’t “win”. 5. Make progress visible and human Tired organisations often are moving… they just can’t see it. Create a simple “innovation wall” (physical or digital) showing ideas, tests, and outcomes. Celebrate small wins with names and faces, not just dashboards. Innovation culture doesn’t start with energy. It starts with permission, space and small, real progress – especially when everyone is tired. #innovation #innovationculture #leadership #change #futureofwork #organisationaldevelopment

Are we measuring the wrong things in drug innovation? Some of the most valuable therapies might never show up on our innovation radar. The typical view in US #biopharma has long equated “innovation” with patents, new drug approvals, and R&D spend. They're easy to count and look good in investor decks. However, these metrics often reward volume more than total value. They don't tell us whether a therapy meaningfully improves patient lives, strengthens public health, or delivers returns beyond the financial metrics. A new six-dimensional framework published in The Incidental Economist offers another option. Drawing from over 600 interdisciplinary studies, the authors propose a more rigorous definition of #innovation: - Scientific and Technological Advances: Captures innovation and productivity using metrics such as new molecules, new drug applications, and patents. Emerging indicators, such as AI-enabled R&D and digital biomarkers, offer forward-looking insights. - Clinical Outcomes: Highlights therapeutic impact through metrics such as safety, efficacy, and patient-reported outcomes, emphasizing real-world patient benefits and delays in disease progression. - Operational Efficiency: Measures efficiency in development and production using trial success rates, R&D timelines, supply chain resilience, and adaptive trial designs. - Economic and Societal Impact: Evaluates economic returns and societal benefits through cost-effectiveness analyses, budget impacts, and productivity improvements. - Policy and Regulatory Effectiveness: Assesses how regulatory frameworks support innovation through approval speed, breakthrough designations, and surrogate endpoint integration. - Public Health and Accessibility: Examines broader health impacts, including reduced disease incidence, healthcare access improvements, and equitable geographic distribution, ensuring innovations meet widespread public health needs. This doesn't have to just be academic. It could change what gets funded, approved, and reimbursed. Some examples mentioned in the article: -An Alzheimer's therapy might look risky on paper, but when viewed through long-term productivity gains and reduced caregiver burden, it becomes a more attractive, high-risk/high-reward bet. -A platform technology (e.g., mRNA) may not boost new molecule counts today, but could enable faster, more precise drug development in the future. -A one-time gene therapy with high upfront cost could prove more valuable than chronic treatments when lifetime adherence and hospitalizations are factored in (if payers can afford the upfront investment). Of course, expanding how we define innovation introduces trade-offs. Complexity increases. Metrics will compete against each other. The question is whether the upside of greater alignment with ALL stakeholders is worth the operational complexity and potential reductions in value for some individual stakeholders. Would you be in favor of evaluating innovation more holistically?

Sometimes, finding a compelling problem instantly inspires possibilities. Other times, crickets. Rather than waiting around for lightning to strike, we recommend that teams take a more proactive approach, and deliberately provoke their own imaginations. One of the most effective, powerful, and fun tools we have created for such self-provocation missions is what we call “Analogous Exploration.” Building upon the extensive research demonstrating the power of unexpected new combinations, we encourage folks to seek radically unexpected sources of inspiration to provoke their thinking. This means not only leaving the room, and not only leaving the building, but also leaving the industry and the conventional definition of “competitor set” behind. Analogous Exploration is not benchmarking. One early application of this radical tool was with a struggling Semiconductor Company whose sales organization had been refined over time to cater predominantly to its largest customers (who ordered hundreds of millions of units annually). The company’s senior leaders felt they needed to “reinvent the customer experience for smaller customers,” and asked for our help. (Story too long for LinkedIn tldr: they instituted a radical new information-sharing agreement with their largest distribution partner, which they believe is one of the largest supply chain innovations in their industry in the last 50 years.) The COO of the company jokingly confided later that they had been watching the competition closely… but the competition didn’t know how to solve their problems either! By deliberately seeking out unexpected sources of inspiration, the organization was able to jump-start revolutionary innovations that serve the smaller businesses every bit as well as they already did the large customers. Getting out of the box like this will not feel efficient. But it is effective. We have since seen Australian financial services organizations glean insights for how to establish trust with new customers from a barber shops & tattoo parlor (those are fascinating stories), Israeli tech companies learn from farmers’ markets, New Zealand fisheries take notes from prominent tea purveyors and bespoke coffee shops, and Japanese conglomerates attracting top-tier millennial talent based on insights from a rock climbing studio and a belly dancing instructor. Despite their differences, one critical commonality among each of these environments is that the teams positioned to solve the newly-defined problem lacked the requisite inputs to trigger fresh ideas. Imagination is fueled by fresh input, and yet all too often, teams are stuck in a conference room, post-it pads in hand, banging their heads against an all-too-ironically spotless whiteboard. Analogous Exploration is a tool to help folks get out of their context on purpose, with intention, to come back with the inspiration they need to fuel fresh thinking.

If you’re trying to foster innovation but feel stuck, You are DEFINITELY not alone. Here’s what to do: A fascinating insight from leaders like Satya Nadella, Elon Musk, and Amy Edmondson highlights a key truth: Innovation doesn’t just happen—it’s cultivated. The challenge? Most organizations struggle to create an environment where creativity thrives and risks are managed effectively. Here’s what’s holding innovation back: • Fear of failure stifles creativity – Teams hesitate to take bold steps when failure is punished rather than seen as a learning opportunity. • Creativity is left to ‘creative people’ – Innovation isn’t just for a select few; every team member should feel empowered to contribute. • New ideas lack structured support – Without a framework for brainstorming, testing, and iterating, promising ideas never get off the ground. The result? Companies miss out on game-changing innovations because the culture discourages experimentation. There’s good news, though. You don’t need unlimited budgets or cutting-edge tech to build a culture of innovation—just the right mindset and leadership approach. Here’s how to get started: 1️⃣ Adopt a “Fail Fast” Mindset Innovation requires risk, but the key is failing fast and pivoting quickly. Encourage teams to test ideas rapidly, recognize setbacks early, and adapt. The faster you learn, the faster you innovate. 2️⃣ Create Psychological Safety Amy Edmondson’s research proves that innovation thrives when employees feel safe to voice ideas and challenge assumptions. Model vulnerability as a leader, welcome diverse perspectives, and reward curiosity over certainty. 3️⃣ Structure Creativity, Don’t Stifle It Edwin Catmull’s Braintrust at Pixar proves that great ideas don’t emerge randomly—they need structured opportunities. Set up brainstorming sessions with clear guidelines to encourage input from all voices, not just the loudest ones. 4️⃣ Manage Innovation Risks Wisely Innovation without direction can lead to chaos. Follow the approach of Microsoft and Tesla: Balance risk with strategy – Don't fear failure, but ensure each experiment has clear learning outcomes. Encourage a growth mindset – Frame failures as stepping stones, not roadblocks. Innovation isn’t about chasing the next big idea—it’s about creating an environment where ideas can flourish, evolve, and drive impact. This isn’t easy. But leaders who get it right unlock extraordinary results. What’s been your experience? Repost to share with others, and follow Anand Bhaskar for more insights like this. —- 📌 Want to become the best LEADERSHIP version of yourself in the next 30 days? 🧑💻Book 1:1 Growth Strategy call with me: https://lnkd.in/gVjPzbcU #Innovate #Growth #FailFast #LeadBold #Create

Many senior leaders I work with care deeply about innovation. And still, they experience a tension they don’t always state out loud. Control vs. curiosity. Alignment vs. disagreement. They know innovation doesn’t come from everyone just doing what they’re told. But they also believe that too much freedom, without enough structure, can quickly turn into chaos. What they often do not realize is that they do not need to pick a side. Instead, they need to learn how to hold both at the same time. In my work, I’ve seen that innovative teams don’t try to get rid of dissent. They embrace it and shape it. And they don’t just tell people to “be curious.” They use practices that make curiosity possible, every day. Here are a few principles that help leaders navigate this tension: 1. Keep dissent about ideas, not people. The best debates focus on the work: the data, the assumptions, the trade-offs. Not egos, titles, or who’s “right.” When leaders stay open (especially when they’re being challenged) it gives everyone else permission to do the same. 2. Give curiosity clear boundaries. Curiosity actually works better with structure. Be clear about where experimentation is encouraged, what constraints matter, and when decisions are final. Too much freedom without clarity is overwhelming. Clarity creates room to explore. 3. Don’t mix learning moments with performance moments. If every conversation feels like a test, people stop taking risks. Say out loud when the goal is learning, reflection, or trying things out. And protect those spaces. 4. Reward contribution, not agreement. If people get ahead by agreeing, that’s what they’ll do. If they get ahead by improving thinking, raising risks, and expanding options, you’ll get better decisions. 5. Remember: culture follows behavior, not demands or promises. Curiosity isn’t what leaders say they want. It’s what they notice, what they ask about, and what they act on, especially when things get tense. To me, innovation does not mean letting go of control. It’s about using control more thoughtfully, in ways that leave room for learning, challenge, and discovery. Leaders who get this right build teams and organizations that keep learning long after today’s problems are solved. #teams #collaboration #control #innovation #rules #practices #tension #learning #leadership

Far too often, I see leaders and companies move on from innovation, believing it's only necessary during the startup phase. In reality, it's what keeps companies alive and thriving. As companies grow, it's easy to fall into routine and let creativity fade. But innovation must continue-even as you scale. An older HBR article I came across this morning highlights how breakthroughs in management can create lasting advantages that are hard to replicate. Companies focused only on new products or efficiency often get quickly copied. To stay ahead, businesses must become "serial management innovators," always seeking new ways to transform how they operate. This idea remains as relevant now as it was back then. The benefits of sustained innovation are undeniable: •Competitive Edge •Increased Revenue •Customer Satisfaction •Attracting Talent •Organizational Growth and Employee Retention Embrace the innovation lifecycle-adapting creativity as your organization matures. Sustaining creativity means creating an environment where people feel safe to push boundaries. Encourage your teams to think big, take risks, and use the experience of your organization. Here are three strategies that I’ve seen work firsthand: Make Experimentation a Priority: Mistakes are part of the process—they help us learn, grow, and innovate. As leaders, share your own experiences with risk-taking, talk about what you've learned, and celebrate those who take bold steps, even when things don’t go as planned. It sends a powerful message: it's okay to take risks. Promote Intrapreneurship: Many of the best ideas come from those closest to the work. Encourage your people to think like entrepreneurs. Give them ownership, the tools they need, and the freedom to explore. Whether it’s through ‘innovation sprints’ or dedicated time for passion projects, showing your team that their creativity matters sustains momentum. Address big challenges, ask tough questions, and let your people feel empowered to tackle them head-on. Break Down Silos: True innovation happens when people connect across departments. Create opportunities for cross-functional interactions-through gatherings, open forums, or spontaneous connections. Diverse perspectives lead to game-changing solutions, and breaking down silos opens the door to that kind of synergy. Innovation doesn’t happen by accident. It requires dedication, a commitment to growth, and a willingness to challenge what’s always been done. To all the leaders out there: How are you ensuring your teams remain creative and engaged? What strategies have you found that create space for bold ideas within structured environments? —-- Harvard Business Review, "The Why, What, and How of Management Innovation" #Innovation #Leadership #ContinuousImprovement #Creativity #BusinessGrowth #Intrapreneurship #CrossFunctionalCollaboration #ImpactLab