The document provides tips for organizations to promote idea generation and implementation among employees. It suggests that frontline staff, not management, are often the source of novel ideas. It advocates focusing on small, easy-to-implement ideas rather than large ones. Key recommendations include not rewarding individual ideas financially and measuring idea quantity/quality rather than results. Managers should promote idea sharing and hold regular idea meetings. The benefits of ideas are difficult to quantify fully, so cost-benefit analysis should be avoided. Instead, organizations should focus on being process-oriented and solving specific problems. Fostering conditions for creativity like self-initiation, unofficial activity, serendipity, diverse stimuli and communication can also increase idea generation.
8. Most great ideas come from
front line staff individuals,
not management
9. Study of projects in Japan
Facts:
• More then ½ award winning projects initiated by
individuals, not anticipated by management
• Novelty and impact of these projects far exceeded
those initiated by management
• Award winning projects were individual initiated
• Not especially novel ones were management
initiated
12. Small ideas
• Would you prefer to implement 1 big idea or
10 small ideas?
• Easier to implement:
– Less resistance
– Easier to do
– Lower risk
– Better for learning
• Stay proprietary and create sustainable
competitive advantage
14. How to share new ideas?
• Who needs to know this buttons?
• Ideas of the week/month newsletter
• Ideas corner on intranet
• Ideas searchable database
• My great idea workshop
• Push and pull strategies (push- newsletter,
ideas corner, pull database, workshops)
19. Idea Goals
• For Employees measure:
– Quantity and quality of ideas
– Number of ideas, number of ideas implemented
• For Managers measure:
– How well they promote ideas
– How many get implemented from their teams
**there is no such thing as a bad idea
22. Increase share of wallet Increase efficiency Innovate Growth
Actions
These are the goal categories of what we want to achieve
23. Increase share of wallet Increase efficiency Innovate Growth
Actions
PROBLEMS GO HERE
Input can be complaints, inefficiencies, new ways of doing things, from your team or from
suggestions from others
27. Increase share of wallet Increase efficiency Innovate Growth
Actions
ACTIONS GO
HERE
Actions Owner Date
28. Increase share of wallet Increase efficiency Innovate Growth
Actions
PROBLEMS GO HERE
Input can be complaints, inefficiencies, new ways of doing things, from your team or from
suggestions from others
ACTIONS GO
HERE
Actions Owner Date
29. Good idea process
• Drive down decision making and
implementation to the lowest possible levels
• Pass constraints down as well
• Resource support functions for the volume
and type of ideas that come in, make
supporting ideas part of the job
• Only pass up completed work
34. CBA
• Can be good priority/ decision making tool
– appropriate when outcomes are well known or
when prior experience with similar situations
• Tends to see the costs more readily then the
benefits
– Estimates CBA sees as little as 20% of benefits
• Increases the cost of decision making, filters
out small ideas
37. Focus Employees on Ideas You
Want
• Articulate and legitimize
• Focusing people on particular topics leads to
more ideas
• Expose employees to new experiences to
broaden their perspectives
– Improve their powers of observation
– Hone their idea generating skills
– Give them problem-sensitizing questions