The forgotten ingredient of innovation

A capacity for divergent or lateral thinking, non-conformity, extreme motivation are the typical psychological traits of people who come up with new ideas – but innovation, understood as getting them over the line in complex bureaucracies, requires something extra.

The business world and press tend to lionise individuals as innovators that single-handedly push the world forward, but the reality is far more social.

Those who push ideas forward are good at changing people’s behaviour by building informal relationships.

The key idea

While this idea won’t be surprising to marketers, its foundations – as outlined in a new piece in Psychology Today – are interesting.

Notably, the creation of psychological safety: allowing spaces in which the other members of an organisation don’t fear embarrassment when trying new ideas.

An equation

One co-author, Dr. Eric Haseltine, describes it as:

“Innovation = (Talent + Relationships) / Formality”.

In essence: maximum trust and minimum process will let good ideas rise. Those informal ties will pay dividends when you need to navigate the idea through the organisation.

Sourced from Psychology Today