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Task:

Drawing on the work of influential contributors on climate for creativity and innovation and creative leadership critically evaluate how creativity and innovation are promoted and sustained across multiple levels of the organisation in the Infinitif Innovation case study (see below). You will present your analysis in report format of approximately 1500 words excluding references and appendices.

Case Study: Infinitif Innovation:

Creativity and innovation are key assets for any organization. Let us assume you agree with this statement and decide to bring innovation into your organization. If yours is a typical company it may fit the following profile:

hundreds, maybe even thousands of employees;

company work processes formalized over the years that seem to be doing their job pretty satisfactorily

shareholders who are more or less satisfied with the company’s financials.

Yet, there is a niggling sense that your company can be performing at a higher gear, and that innovation can make the difference. So what do you do?

Do you change your workplace to include only the most creative people?

Do you prioritize investment in new technologies?

While these are steps in the right direction, their impact on the company may not be sustainable. Employees come and go and technologies are constantly changing. In this case study we describe a different approach that can make innovation a more sustainable asset for an organization. It involves changing the way people think, act, and work and an integrated effort at all levels of the organization: individual, team and organizational.

Let us begin by looking at these three levels.

On the individual level, everyone in the organization is required to acquire a skill-set that will allow them to think and act innovatively. This can be a crucial difference to many common (and uncommon) work tasks: from juggling projects within a time pressured and resource-scarce environment to dealing with the accidental deletion of an important file or a missing suitcase on an important week-long business trip.

On the team level, providing the right tools and setting up the right work processes can enable real changes to be implemented. This can make a whole range of activities more effective: new product development, project management, inter-group communication and meetings (that great stealer of work time) that lead to better results.

On the organizational level, the key move is to put in place a culture that encourages creative thinking and supports implementation of innovative results. Many times organizations have lots of good will and motivate their employees to come up with new ideas (idea boxes and the like), but they are never followed up and gradually the hype falls. Effective structures and supportive cultures, as uncreative as they sound, are essential in sustaining the motivation to keep on innovating.

Infinitif Innovation is a multinational group with an asset value in excess of £10bn. Its holding companies include banking, insurance, construction, mutual funds, and leisure resorts. For two years Infinitif Innovation had been searching for a way to achieve the company’s vision of long-term, sustainable innovation. They were looking to find a structured methodology that would allow everyone in their organization to be more innovative and so challenge the general consensus that innovation and creative thinking is an inherent trait among gifted individuals. Infinitif Innovation was interested to teach its organization how to create sustainable innovation.

Infinitif Innovation launched a comprehensive innovation programme that has created a culture and an attitude of innovation across the company’s sub-businesses and 14,000 employees.

On the individual level Infinitif Innovation trained creativity champions in creative thinking skills and group facilitation using structured techniques. Champions were then responsible for regular group facilitation of idea generation with their teams.

In this way employees gradually develop a repertoire of skills that they could apply at any time or in any situation. From senior managers to salespeople to bank clerks, employees now have a method for coming up with fresh approaches to their daily tasks or solving problems.

On the team level trained innovation managers and coaches were given responsibility to actively disseminate innovation throughout the companies thousands of employees, and helping specific teams achieve innovation successes and establishing processes that ensure that ideas generated in the innovation process are evaluated and implemented. These skills give the teams the means of working and thinking together, and ways to make sure that their decisions are carried out.

On the organizational level, Infinitif Innovation designed and implemented an culture to support creativity and innovation to ensure all processes are self-sustaining in the long run. This involved establishing dedicated innovation positions, new work processes, and success metrics. Existing company structures were utilized as far as possible, making it easier and more natural to implement the new innovation process within the organization.

Between 2008 and 2009, over 400 new products, services, business models and work processes have been successfully implemented yielding new revenue on one hand, and cost saving and efficiency on the other. Two examples include: a) a new service in Infinitif Innovation’s industrial machinery leasing company that created a new market, and b) new banking services that led to hundreds of thousands of dollars in cost saving.

Over 600 innovation champions were trained throughout the entire company to lead systematic innovation inside the organization. To date, close to 2000 employees have developed creativity and innovation skills from the coaches who run regular training.

Infinitif Innovation’s structure includes two directors responsible for overseeing all innovation processes and 20 innovation managers who support the cross-organization innovation coach activity. An innovation portal was established to support the innovation managers and innovation coaches by giving them access to innovation tools, workshop scripts, and examples that they can use in their work.

Infinitif Innovation established internal communication mechanisms that would update the entire organization on innovation activities and achievements. This continues to create a buzz in the company, getting everyone on board, and at the same time shows management support and commitment to the process. Infinitif Innovation regularly puts out quarterly booklets on new products and services in the company born out of the innovation process, corporate DVDs showing different divisions’ accomplishments, and ‘Innovation of the Day’ emails giving both real Infinitif Innovation cases as well as information on innovation tools.

After less than three years Infinitif Innovation has much to show in terms of its ROI – return on innovation. The model they applied made innovation a concrete tool across all levels of the organization:

1. Individuals are more creative and give better performance.

2. Teams have enhanced work processes for rolling out their decisions.

3. The organization has a supportive culture and structure to implement real changes across the entire company.

*** Word counts = 1500 Words

*** In-Text citations and references using Harvard style.