Innovativeinitiatives

Organizational leaders need to take a holistic look at the variety of business relationships and interconnectivity, apply the system perspective to see things from a broader lens.

Due to high velocity, pervasive information growth and frequent disruptions, organizations become complex if things do interact, particularly in the case of "non-linear" interaction with the very characteristics of hyper-connectivity and interdependent relationships. Also, every organization is at a different level of business maturity, has its own struggles and conflicts.

 Change is the norm, the highly intensive changes do not happen in isolation from each other in predictable ways, but act as a complex system feeding, amplifying and ameliorating change effects and creating business synergy. Organizations need to capture the right moment to decide, change, and innovate. People are inspired to take initiatives for self-discovery and growth. So collaboratively, businesses spiral up to reach the next level of intelligence and transformation.

Considered decision-making: A decision is needed when there is uncertainty or ambiguity. Decision power is a mind power; people need to leverage both critical thinking and creative thinking to ask tough questions for framing the real issues behind decision making. Decision-making usually cannot be postponed till the availability of complete knowledge. Timing is critical; it is often said that a wrong decision taken at the right time is better than a right decision taken at the wrong time. The knowledge constraint or emotional irrationality are paramount issues during the decision process. It’s also critical to take logical scenarios, frame the right issues as well as decide how to deal with them in a structural way.

Fast decisions are made of necessity; slow decisions are made of consideration. Time also allows a decision-making process to emerge by consent. Potentially, longer time frames allow the creation of more alternatives from which to choose, using both rational and instinctive knowledge. Besides quality information, emotions and intuition matter. A condition of benefiting from considered decisions is having a good decision -making process to use time effectively, think fast and slow accordingly to improve decision effectiveness.

Innovative “aha” moment: Creativity is the most needed skill and innovation is unique business competency. The “aha” moment refers to that joyous exciting moment when a valid generalization emerges, when what was perplexing and contradictory suddenly falls into place, to shape novel ideas; just like the moment that the light is switched on, having the transcendence from darkness to the brightness; the warmness permeants into surroundings, people experience the precious “aha moment: to spur creativity.

In fact, the "AHA" moment often comes from the “unexpected moment” via some seemingly "mindless" activities such as walking, stretching, meditation, or even sleeping can ignite your creativity. Because there are both conscious and subconscious activities involved to spark new ideas and stimulate creativity. The more dots you have, the better chance you are able to create “aha” moments and switch on creativity. 

Right moment to change: We are living in a complex world in which changes and conflicts are continuously changing and that makes it impossible to have complete knowledge and understanding of many issues facing the business today. Change happens seamlessly when change is easier than maintaining the status quo. The good moment to change is when strategy management gets stagnant; when the top senses the urgency and the bottom feels the pain; when people play numbers, but not achieving high performance; When weak cultures rely on a bureaucracy to enforce rules and regulations that undermine an organization's speed, simplicity, and competitiveness.

Organizational leaders and managers must first examine their own mindset, whether they are ready to change: are they part of the change force or resistance force? Some lagging companies only react to the changing environment; but leading organizations take a proactive approach to manage change systematically. Change leaders must have a clear vision about change, not vision clouded and distorted by rosy colored glasses or narrow-minded perspectives. They are decisive to capture the right moment to change, amplify change impact and improve change management success rate.

With the faster paces of changes and continuous disruptions, businesses become more dynamic and hyper connected. Organizational leaders need to take a holistic look at the variety of business relationships and interconnectivity, apply the system perspective to see things from a broader lens, set the rules and offer guidance for running a dynamic business, and take the right actions at the right moments to drive transformative changes.

Posted in: Innovation