Promoting Innovation in your Council JOHN RAVLIC

Transcription

1 Promoting Innovation in your Council JOHN RAVLIC

2 INTRODUCTION Welcome to the Workshop on PROMOTING INNOVATION IN YOUR COUNCIL My main objective for this afternoon is to encourage you to participate in what will very much be a peer learning session I hope to provide you with some information and background that will promote some thinking and generate some discussion It is my intention to call on you to record your key discussion points and present them to the group I will collect, collate and write-up your ideas with a view to making the material available to you in a couple of weeks While you are welcome to take notes you should also be aware that I will provide you with the background paper on which this workshop is based and a copy of the presentation slides

3 Why are we talking about promoting innovation in your council at a Human Resources Conference? Take a few minutes to introduce yourself to the other delegates at your table and then discuss why this is a topic for a HR Conference and record the key discussion points

4 Innovation has everything to do with Human Resources Leadership Engagement Ownership

5 So what is innovation? How do you know when you see it? Take a few minutes to discuss what would be seen as innovation in the local government context and record the key discussion points

6 DEFINING INNOVATION Innovation is defined in Empowering Change: Fostering Innovation in the Australian Public Service as the generation and application of new ideas. This definition helps us remember that: Innovation is not always a new product, service or process. An innovative idea may be stopping something (such as an out-moded or now unnecessary function) or it might be a new way of thinking about an issue Innovation is not just about coming up with ideas, but also their application, integrating them with other systems and processes, and monitoring the results over the longer term Innovation is a process. It involves people, resources and systems and it is something that can be managed and encouraged Everyone has the capacity to be innovative, and many people actively want to innovate and bring creative and new ways to bear on the problems or issues faced in their work by their organisation or their clients and stakeholders

7 LGA UK FUTURE FUNDING OUTLOOK

8 What proportion of your council s savings do you estimate could come from innovative new approaches to service delivery, as opposed to incremental efficiency gains, restricting access to existing services and other kinds of cutback? >= <=10 % of savings

9 DOING MORE WITH LESS! This mantra has been heard the world over as government agencies and councils try to continue service delivery against a backdrop of falling revenues and funding cutbacks. The expectation is that the public service will find a way to stretch whatever resources are available to meet all the community needs.

10 In the past two years the number of Google hits on the words "government innovation" has increased from 38 million to 1.4 billion as leaders and line staff at every level of government look for ways to do more with less.

11 What are the most common stereotypes used by ratepayers, residents, politicians, media etc to describe councils/local government? Take a couple of minutes to discuss, agree and record your top 5 responses.

12 What do you think are the main barriers to innovation in your Council? Lack of time to focus on innovation Lack of skills necessary for innovation The public is resistant to change Lack of belief in the potential of new ideas to deliver practical change Staff are generally resistant to change Too few good ideas being generated within the council Lack of the political buy-in

13 EXPECTATION WITHOUT APPRECIATION The expectation from many quarters was that councils will have to innovate their way through austerity. At the time there was little appreciation for the development and implementation of innovation in traditionally bureaucratic institutions like councils. In implementing an innovation agenda councils need to have greater regard for: time it may take to innovate lag between development, implementation and results required cultural shift and skills to innovate innovation not leading to immediate benefits and savings innovation needing time for experimentation trial and error significant investment at times is required to innovate innovation generating service improvements without savings

14 What organisational culture and workplace conditions would best support innovation? Take a few minutes to discuss and describe the culture and workplace conditions that will best support innovation.

15 CONCLUSION Workforce planning Defining skills and attributes for an innovative future Position Descriptions Incorporating the desired responsibilities, knowledge, skills and experience Recruitment and selection Appoint diverse people with the right skills and experience Induction Promote how we do things around here Training and development Provide the necessary skills and experience to support innovation Performance reviews and rewards Establish and review KPIs that promote innovation and reward Management development Impart skills and experience that build and supports cultures that promote innovation Budget/resource allocation Implement systems that encourage and sustain innovation across the organisation

16 You want an organisation that does things differently, that thinks differently? Then be different! Your council may not be ready for pink hair, nose studs and leather boots, but allowing deviations from the norm when you can is a step in the right direction

17 Promoting Innovation in your Council Workshop John Ravlic

18 GOOGLE S NINE PRINCIPLES OF INNOVATION Innovation comes from anywhere It can come from the top down as well as bottom up, and in the places you least expect. Focus on the user focus on the user, all else will follow Aim to be ten times better If you want radical and revolutionary innovation, think 10 times improvement, and that will force you to think outside the box. Bet on technical insights organization has unique insights, and if you bet on it, it leads to major innovation. Ship and iterate Ship your products often and early, and do not wait for perfection Give employees 20% of time Give employees 20 percent of their work time to pursue projects they are passionate about, even if it is outside the core job or core mission of the company Default to open processes Make your processes open to all users Fail well If you do not fail often, you are not trying hard enough Have a mission that matters Everyone has a strong sense of mission and purpose

19 10 WAYS TO PROMOTE INNOVATION Give employees a reason to care Feeling connected gives employees a reason to be innovative Stress the importance of innovation Ensure all employees know that you want their good ideas Schedule time for brainstorming Allocate time for new ideas to emerge Train staff in innovation techniques Employees may find training in formal techniques worthwhile Encourage change Broadening employees experience can be a great way to spark ideas Change the way staff work Encourage employees to look for new and better ways to do their job Be supportive Respond enthusiastically to all ideas Tolerate mistakes Risk taking is inevitable allow your employees to learn from their mistakes Reward creativity Recognise individuals and teams and all the ideas that have been generated Act on ideas Innovation is only worthwhile if its actioned

20 PROMOTING INNOVATION IN YOUR WORKPLACE Be easy going A relaxed and flexible work environment increases your team s productivity by letting ideas flow Recruit for culture Look for team members who understand your vision and align with your culture Bring on people who love what they do Hire people that are passionate about their work. You want people who really care; people who are excited to go to work everyday because they believe in what you do Encourage diversity Having a group with different backgrounds, passions, and capabilities - diverse ideas and problemsolving approaches helps push your outcome forward Incorporate sprints Distractions are endless that s where a sprint, a set amount of time in which your team works to finish a project, can be the solution. Take ample time off Communicate how important time off is and make it non-negotiable

21 APPROACHES TO SUCCESSFUL INNOVATION Nurture innovation in-house invest in creativity training to help unlock innovation within the workforce Collaborate with a partner Joint innovation with external partners Cultivate many partners innovates through a network of third parties CrowdSource or co-create Encouraging wider public innovation Find an innovative start-up and acquire it Complimentary but different core capabilities

22 FOUR INNOVATION LESSONS One thing leads to another Innovation begets innovation There are almost always unintended consequences with innovation Leading to innovation that could not otherwise have been imagined The best spring not from EUREKA moments but slow hunches Process of an idea coming into focus over years or even decades Following a hunch for a long period of time Innovation arises from collaboration The most successful innovators tend to work with others and bounce ideas Lone genius with a blind spot may miss the obvious Altruism has inspired some crucial innovations Sometimes its just about making life better for someone There's no business in it afterwards

23 FEW ARE ABLE TO MAKE INNOVATION A WORKPLACE REALITY Cultural Shift Businesses want innovation and some expect it without accepting the required cultural shift that breaks with tradition or conventional wisdom new ideas, behaviours or lifestyles In highly innovative circles, thinking-outside-the-box isn t just an expression, it s a way of life encouraging employees to become more curious thinkers could be a first step toward a culture that seeks new solutions for businessrelated challenges

24 FEW ARE ABLE TO MAKE INNOVATION A WORKPLACE REALITY Make Time for Innovation Google asks its employees to spend one day a week working on projects outside their usual job description to encourage innovation Encourages employees to take something old and make it new again If innovation is seen as how we do business and its recognised employees are more likely to get involved

25 FEW ARE ABLE TO MAKE INNOVATION A WORKPLACE REALITY Problem Solving Develop an environment where problem-solving is encouraged Desire to solve problems is what can lead to a more innovative workforce Once problem-solving becomes a part of one s daily work responsibilities, solving larger organizational issues becomes much less daunting You don t need to hire a team of geniuses to achieve innovation, but you do need to give your workforce the confidence and incentive to solve the problems around them, until problem-solving becomes just another part of the culture. challenges

26 Channel Socitm 2012 Socitm 2009 Face to Face 8.62 per transaction Phone 2.83 per transaction Web 0.15 per transaction 8.23 per transaction 3.21 per transaction 0.39 per transaction With 600 million plus customer contacts received by English Councils per annum you can see for yourself what that translates to in terms of costs and potential savings if there was a strategy to drive channel shift to digital. Today two thirds of all contact with English councils comes through online/digital channels.

27 INVENTIUM INTERNAL INNOVATION DEVELOPMENT investing in training adding innovation to key performance indicators building a dedicated area for creativity and idea generation holding idea creation sessions and appointing a dedicated innovation director

28 Why does the public sector seem so completely immune to innovations that deliver more for less over time? Disruptive innovation in government is an oxymoron. Government is a monopoly that lacks both competition and a profit motive. It s an institution that deliberately protects incumbent producers and programs against disruptors. Policymakers and voters tend to be averse to both risk and failure when it comes to government.