Alaina G. Levine gave a presentation on how to become a challenge agent and foster innovation within organizations. She discussed collecting data to understand pain points, having guts to disrupt systems, and organizations providing top-down permission and safe harbors for employees to take on challenges. Levine argued that diversity, cross-functional teams, and developing challenge agents are critical for stimulating new ideas and should be explicitly rewarded. Organizations should create pathways for sharing ideas across divisions and support employees who see problems and want to create solutions.

1. © Alaina G. Levine, 2017 @AlainaGLevine
Alaina G. Levine
President, Quantum Success Solutions
Author, Networking for Nerds (Wiley, 2015)
SWE – WE17
27 October 2017

2. @AlainaGLevine
Feel Free to Tweet
@SWETalk
#we17
@AlainaGLevine

3. @AlainaGLevine
• How to Become a Challenge Agent
• Case Studies of organizations that
nurture Challenge Agents
• How to foster ecosystems to
encourage Challenge Agents

4. @AlainaGLevine
• Personal
• Business
• Guy on the plane to Munich
• No matter the form, Challenges are a gift
• Goal: Make you stronger, more agile,
more aware of Challenges everywhere

5. @AlainaGLevine
Where is the pain point?
What is the wall?

6. @AlainaGLevine

7. @AlainaGLevine
Note, Remember, Retain the Facts:
• Who you are
• The type of person you are
• The type of professional you are
• Your values
• What you have accomplished
• Your skills, knowledge, talents, expertise

8. @AlainaGLevine
• Complete honesty
• With yourself, about yourself
• About your team, organization, culture
• Data Collection
• About yourself
• About the system
• About the culture
• About the challenge you want to take on
• About the ramifications of this challenge

9. @AlainaGLevine
• Guts!
• Disruption
• Creating new categories, products, teaming
arrangements
• Trusting your gut
• Related: Ignoring the Haters
• Listening, understanding, empathy

10. @AlainaGLevine
• Hard work
• Planning
• Networking and Strong Networks
• Willingness to see the bigger picture
for yourself and/or your
organization/team
• Negotiation skills

11. @AlainaGLevine
• “Inviting challenge” – Betsy Cantwell, PhD
ME, VP, ASU
• Appreciation for the challenge and what it
will teach you
• Appreciation for yourself – that you will do
the right thing, for you, at that moment
• Giving yourself a break
• Flexibility and adaptability

12. @AlainaGLevine
• Top down “permission”
• Networking and networks
• Diversity and Inclusion
• Specific mechanisms for suggesting, deciding,
pursuing, investing in solutions to challenges
• Access to the Diverse Mind Field within the org.
• Safe harbor provided
• Ties to employee performance assessments
• Allocation of resources

13. @AlainaGLevine
Alaina G. Levine
Quantum Success
• Innovation is stimulated by diversity
• Diversity of Ideas comes from interacting
with different people, experiences, places,
times, etc.
• Essentially, the mirrored elements of problem-solving
• Diverse Mind Field
• The collection of all diversity as a platform for
stimulating innovation

14. @AlainaGLevine
• The collection of all diversity as a platform for
stimulating innovation
• Active, dynamic, continuous, constantly
changing resource for Diversity of Ideas
• You are a participant – you get and give benefits
14
Image Credit:
Healthcareminds.ie

15. @AlainaGLevine
• Fosters employee ownership of diverse
challenges to foster innovation
• Can assemble teams across divisions to solve
problems not in their job responsibility
• Can take ownership of Challenges
--Levine, Search Results:
Careers in High Tech, Science,
3/16

16. @AlainaGLevine
3 Top Leadership Principles:
• Customer Obsession
• Ownership: “Leaders are owners…They act on
behalf of the entire company, beyond just their
own team. They never say ‘that’s not my job’.”
• Invent and Simplify

17. @AlainaGLevine
Mechanisms:
• Innovation Competitions
• Submit proposals and internal press releases

18. @AlainaGLevine
• ~100k students, FY17 $2.4B revenue, +$500M research
expenses
• Fosters a Culture of Permission
• “Our stove pipes are porous at ASU”
• Share ideas with other units
• Do hand-offs of projects if more appropriate for another
unit
• Share resources
• Do this in real time
• Hold back portion of our budget for those unknown great
ideas
--Elizabeth Cantwell, VP,
Research Development

19. @AlainaGLevine
• Invests in its staff
• % of staff time: devoted to own projects
• Pursuing challenges is rewarded
--Dr. Cristina Thomas, PhD, ChemE, Sr
Technical Leader, Corporate R&D
Services and Operations Support

20. @AlainaGLevine
• “You have to have the trust of your teams”
• You have to be the guardian (my words)
• “They need to know you have their back, that you will
defend them even if we are struggling. I will defend you.”
• They know their team will make mistakes (move on!)
• The Org is willing to take the risk
• Must manage patience in your team
• Recognize that not everyone will see the “problem”
--Dr. Cristina Thomas, PhD, ChemE, Sr
Technical Leader, Corporate R&D
Services and Operations Support

21. @AlainaGLevine
• Experts can help teams across the company
and brands
• Senior leadership does not have to be
consulted for staff to engage other staff

22. @AlainaGLevine
• Develop specific pathways and protocols for employees
to communicate with leadership
• Launch and support metrics within your employee
assessments that reward interactions and productivity
stemming from the Diverse Mind Field

23. @AlainaGLevine
• Encourage all employees to think intrepreneurially
• Create informal networking events that allow STEM and
Non-STEM employees, to learn about each others’
strengths
• Help employees understand the language of tech
problem-solvers, and vice versa
• Coach all employees to aid in their improvement of their
communications practices
23

24. @AlainaGLevine
• Create, support and promote leadership development
councils and organizations (within your organization)
that:
• Build leaders from the Diverse Mind Field
• Encourage cross-functional teaming arrangements
• Foster opportunities to engage with senior leadership
• Hone critical business and communications skills
• Launch and attend cross-functional colloquia
24

25. @AlainaGLevine
• Create mechanisms for Challenges to be identified
• Support your employees when they see a pain point
• Empower (and specifically communicate this!) your
employees to challenge the status quo
• Clarify the issues of risk when taking on new Challenges
• Address the idea of being a Challenge Agent in
performance reviews, make it a metric of success
• Invest resources
25

26. @AlainaGLevine
• Offer professional development
• Support innovative networking – at conferences,
virtually
• Offer opportunities for “walk and talks” – where
staff and volunteers from diverse backgrounds
and in different job functions team up

27. @AlainaGLevine
• Make Challenge Agent and intrepreneurial
activity a part of your metrics for success –
assessments
• Encourage your team to develop business plans
or commercialization plans
• Do surveys of employees regularly to obtain
feedback

28. @AlainaGLevine
• Innovators
• Inventors
• Entrepreneurs/
Intrepreneurs
• Disruptors
• World Changers
• Influencers
• Mentors
• Designers
• Thinkers
• Doers
• Next Gen Leaders

29. @AlainaGLevine
The future of your company, field,
industry, profession
Treat Challenge Agents like a Gift,
a Precious Resource

30. @AlainaGLevine
NETWORKING FOR NERDS (WILEY, 2015)
QUANTUM SUCCESS SOLUTIONS
ALAINA@ALAINALEVINE.COM
WWW.ALAINALEVINE.COM
QUANTUMSUCCESSSOLUTIONS
@ALAINAGLEVINE
“ALAINA’S ALUMNI”
Email Me for a free resume template!
Speaking – keynotes, workshops, training
Leadership, Career, and Comms Consulting
Writing – white papers, reports, articles
© Alaina G. Levine, 2017