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12.09

Want to be an Innovator? New IEEE-USA E-Book Series Tells You How

By John R. Platt

You would not be reading this article, or any other part of Today's Engineer magazine, if not for the innovative thinking of IEEE Life Fellow Gerard H. (Gus) Gaynor.

In addition to being the founding editor of Today's Engineer, Gaynor has a long history of working in innovative environments. He spent the last 25 years of his career at 3M Co., a company that he says approaches innovation from a unique perspective. "3M does innovation in a different sense than most organizations — bottom up, from the employee level, as opposed to top-down," he says.

Gaynor has also written books and articles about innovation, and taught courses on innovation at the University of Minnesota and St. Thomas University.

Now he has taken his ideas on innovation to the next level and produced a new series of e-books for IEEE-USA. The series, Doing Innovation: Creating Economic Value, offers advice on how to be an innovative thinker, how to inspire innovation within an organization, understanding the process of innovation, and more.

The four-book series includes:

• Book 1: Perspectives on Innovation

• Book 2: Developing a Workable Innovation Process

• Book 3: Fostering an Innovative Culture

• Book 4: What it Takes to be an Innovator

The first three books are now available for $19.95 each ($9.95 each for IEEE members). The fourth volume will be 15 December.

The e-books allow Gaynor to address topics he finds to be incredibly important in today's economy. "We don't have enough written about the subject of doing innovation," says Gaynor. "I think companies need to approach innovation by providing the freedom to innovate. It takes a lot of courage to allow people to come up with new ideas, and to embrace them.

"I look at my own kids and tell them, 'Go for it! Don't look for guidance!' Don’t wait until someone tells you what to do, take the initiative! Make those suggestions but think through them before you make them! That's what it takes to be an innovator. It takes the exceptional person who will fight the battles to do the one thing he knows that the company needs that no one else in the company pays attention to."

Innovation as Economic Value

The overarching title of the series — Doing Innovation: Creating Economic Value — illustrates the unique approach Gaynor takes to the subject. "What I'm trying to say with these books is that if there isn't an economic value, there isn't an innovation; there may be an invention, but that’s not innovation" he says.

In the first book of the series, Perspectives on Innovation, Gaynor introduces us to his equation for innovation success: Innovation = Invention + Commercialization or Implementation. This means that for an innovation to become successful, it needs to leave the original idea phase and actually make it to market or to execution. That involves a huge amount of effort, teamwork, and management, writes Gaynor.

Innovations can come in many forms, such as new products, new technologies or new processes. Even social innovations can have huge values, says Gaynor. "Yes, you can have innovation in social systems, but even there innovations have economic value. Look deeply, see the issues, and while you may not be able to create an economic value immediately, if you solve a social problem, like reducing highway deaths from auto accidents, you can create a great deal of economic value."

Not every innovation needs to be a game-changer. "We're dependent on incremental innovations," says Gaynor. "We all like breakthrough innovations, but if you look it realistically, breakthroughs don't happen very often. It's the incremental stuff — for example, in the cell phone industry — which still allows the major players to change."

The way you manage this "is to see whether the incremental innovations can be used across a whole platform of products. At 3M, we started with sticky sandpaper. Then someone removed the grit and got sticky tape. Then we took the sticky tape and modified the adhesive and added glass beads to create reflective signs. These were all built upon the same platform. That's where you really get the benefit of incremental innovation."

Creating a Process for Innovation

So how do you take a new idea to the commercialization or implementation phase? That's where book two of the series, Developing a Workable Innovation Process, comes into play.

"You can't just innovate through the lifetime of an idea," says Gaynor. "At some point, that innovation must be guided by sound project management principles. You finish the innovation stage, then bring in a team to put it together and bring it to market or implement it."

Understanding the processes of your entire organization, and tapping into the correct processes, is key. People who might help your innovative idea come to fruition include design engineers, your marketing or public relations teams, and production, to name just a few.

"Innovation is a systems approach," says Gaynor. "To be successful, an innovator needs to have fingers in sales, marketing and production during the innovation stage."

How do you get there? First, prove your concept and demonstrate it. "Then the real investment is needed," says Gaynor. "That's when it becomes a project — a project for the entire corporation. The bugs are worked out, the stumbling blocks are identified, and the innovation gets brought to market.

"You need to understand the process and make sure it works for you," says Gaynor.

Culture: The Challenges to Innovation

Book three examines how to create a culture that supports innovation. This involves finding the right employees, giving them just the right amount of freedom, having a management class that supports innovation, and focusing on results.

An organization needs to give its employees the right amount of freedom and the right amount of structure at the same time. "At 3M, our technical people had 15 percent of their time to spend as they wanted, including looking at new ideas," says Gaynor. "It was a benefit to the organization, because there was a lot more passion and enthusiasm in what people were working on. But it takes a lot of organizational courage to allow people to have some free time."

In order to create innovation, says Gaynor, both companies and individuals need to have the freedom to fight for new ideas. "It not only takes somebody who can come up with new ideas, it takes somebody who can fight the status quo. You can always find nay-sayers in the crowd, people who tell you can't do something new. You may need to get these people on your side in order to make your ideas a reality," says Gaynor.

If you are working for a company that doesn't foster innovation, find at least one person who will advocate for you. "Innovation can work if you find someone at the upper level who likes what you're doing and supports you, even if that support is done quietly," says Gaynor.

Can You Be An Innovator?

Book 4 in the series, What it Takes to be an Innovator, "is where the action is," says Gaynor. This volume looks at the characteristics and attitudes of innovative thinkers, the skills that are required to innovate, and what innovators bring to their companies.

Gaynor lists several characteristics that make for good innovators. Innovators search for both problems that need to be solved and opportunities that can be created by new ideas. They have a strong network, not just of their peers, but of people up and down the organization, and know how to work the entire corporate system. They don't take "no" for an answer, and they are also good communicators.

When it comes to communicating your ideas, you can't get better advice than by talking to your public relations department. "Engineers don't tap their PR people enough," says Gaynor. "Get some pointers so you can sell your ideas and projects better. The PR department knows what your company's board wants to listen to, or what they don't want to hear."

There are also risks and challenges to being an innovator. "You can take a lot of flack," says Gaynor. "You can be seen at 'the crazy guy down in the corner.'"

Developing ideas into understandable and implementable concepts is tough, says Gaynor. But the end result could be worth it, not just in terms of personal satisfaction, but also for your career.

Moving Forward

So are you ready to be an innovator, or to support innovative people in your organization? "Get into the details," says Gaynor. "Look at your corporate culture. Look at the processes and the resources. Ask what people think. Seize the right time.

"I'd like my readers to keep thinking deeply about innovation. This is a 24/7 process." Get away from talking about innovation and "just do it," says Gaynor. "For the people who want to do this, there can't be any greater satisfaction. Absolutely none."

For more information on the Doing Innovation: Creating Economic Value series, visit http://www.ieeeusa.org/communications/ebooks/innovation.asp.

John R. Platt is a freelance writer from coastal Maine. He is a frequent contributor to Today's Engineer, and writes the Extinction Countdown blog for Scientific American.

Comments may be submitted to todaysengineer@ieee.org.