Even in the normal times of the 2010s, before the pandemic, the business world was disruptive and innovation was difficult. We had many vice presidents of research and development, digital transformation, innovation, and marketing come to us asking, "Can you get our CEO to focus more on innovation?" "What prevents such a focus?" I always asked. [...]
Behaviorism has long taught us that immediate and direct feedback is critical to reinforce the behaviors and outcomes we want. It has been the source of breakthrough books on leadership, such as the One-Minute Manager. But too much of a good thing can also be detrimental. Long-standing research shows that employees have adverse emotional [...]
The virus COVID-19 proved Plato was right: crisis is the mother of invention. McKinsey's new report on the Trends that Will Drive 2021 and Beyond identifies a wave of innovation and a new generation of entrepreneurs sparked by the pandemic as one of the expected trends for the new year. Companies that want to be a [...]
This is a year to forget. In 2020, we have witnessed more Americans die from the pandemic than many of our wars combined, more unemployment than the Great Depression, social and racial unrest with severely divided politics that we have not seen since 1968. However, on this Thanksgiving, we have the power to be [...]
The pandemic has proven that remote work can increase office employee productivity, morale, and employee-work life integration while reducing carbon emissions. But what about innovation workers? Do they have to be face-to-face every day to innovate? The answer from my experience and research during the past decade is a resounding “No.” In fact, a [...]
The biggest news from last week’s virtual HR Tech Conference was not about tech. It was about research from Marcus Buckingham on how companies can boost the resiliency of their workforces. Resilience is independent of employee engagement, according to Buckingham, but related to it. It is possible to be highly engaged and very resilient, [...]
What does it really mean to be innovative as a workforce? Victor Assad sheds light on how organizations can foster innovation and the maximizing technologies that can help them do so. The empirical evidence shows that companies seldom become innovative from one great idea or technology. It takes a culture of innovation. Read my [...]
With the pandemic and significant decline in revenues, executives know that they must innovate to survive these unprecedented times. But how? Many executives, however, have chosen to play it safe and secure, hunker down, and hoard cash. The problem with playing it safe is while you can cut costs to meet falling revenues, you [...]
In this July 16th, 2020, Orange County ReINVENTHR webcast, I presented 3 robust strategies to crush today’s crises, one of the three strategies is about innovation. I remind HR leaders that HR has the empirical research, predictive models, and digital technology to crush all three of these strategies! The three strategies are: Redefine the [...]
Our most recent research with The Conference Board reveals the importance of managers in encouraging innovation. In our infographic below, the "Innovation Priorities" chart on the right shows that highly innovative companies have managers who score higher in encouraging innovation than low innovation companies. Based on our research at InnovationOne, the managers in highly [...]
