Get Your Organization to Behave Like a Startup - Part 3

In parts 1 and 2, I shared the basics of how an Actionable Collaboration and Creativity Team (AC2T) can be used as a catalyst for innovation.  In Part 3 of this 4-part series, I share the basic principles that are essential in making an AC2T effort work for you.

There are a number of critical components necessary for AC²T to generate useful results.  These components have criteria that are essential.  AC²T teams that have been chartered and adhered to these principles have regularly produced actionable ideas that are not only innovative, but are often highly competitive and disruptive.  The objective for an AC²T team is to explore alternatives a company’s own resources either didn’t identify or were unwilling to pursue.  Acting as a start-up whose objective is to disrupt and “beat” the company provides a motivating backdrop against which the team operates.  The idea is to create sufficient competitive motivation within the team to transform them from employees to owners.

The Charter

The charter statement is a clear and compelling challenge that succinctly defines the problem or topic to be addressed.  It is defined with sufficient clarity to provide direction focused on the topic to be addressed yet without too much detail that it acts as a constraint on alternative ideas.  Strong charter statements are structured as a question that evokes critical thinking.  For example:  how can we develop and deliver a new social media service that customers feel compelled to use and will actively recruit others to?  Such a statement provides direction (social media service) without stating how to meet that objective.  Simultaneously, a good charter provides a challenge for the team to reach that is compelling and sparks creativity.  From a competitive perspective, a charter statement could be structured as follows:  how do we displace the ABC company as the leading provider of widgets?  Another approach is to imagine a future state.  One team used the following approach: how do we create a factory of the future for production that is a fraction of the cost of conventional companies.  This team was challenged to imagine themselves as a group starting in their garage and envision a future where products could be produced efficiently and cheaply.  Out of that effort, an entirely new production process was envisioned and subsequently introduced into the parent company.

Bottom line:  keep charter statements simple, clear, and compelling.  The charter statement has to act as the fuel to get the team’s innovation engine ignited while keeping them focused on the problem to be solved.

Team Composition

A major impediment to innovation within established organizations is culture.  As noted above, organizations with particularly strong culture often overcome newcomers quickly.  Therefore, AC²T team members should come from early career professionals with no more than five (5) years with the organization.  If the culture is particularly overwhelming, AC²T team members should have no more than three (3) years with the company.

Diversity is another key component.  A team that is drawn from within the same product or service area as the problem to be solved is less likely to generate alternatives that are revolutionary or disruptive.  Instead, those already familiar with the product area routinely fall back upon what they already know versus exploring and testing new territory.  Effective AC²T teams often have no more than two (2) members who could be considered subject matter experts (SMEs) in the field related to the charter.  One team used a member from an application area similar to the problem but in a different industry.  That team member subsequently provided experience and creative ideas that opened alternatives that subsequently enabled the team to envision a solution by leveraging and adapting an approach from an entirely different industry.

Depending upon the size and complexity of the charter, the ideal number of team members can range from five (5) to eight (8).  Fewer team members limit the diversity and number of unique inputs.  Teams larger than 8 are more difficult to manage and have difficulty coalescing around a potential solution(s).  This is true for even larger more complex problems.  Experience has shown that teams larger than 8 result in diminishing returns because the group becomes bogged down in internal team management and less focused on the problem.

Leadership Support

There are several principles that leadership must embrace if the AC²T team is to be successful.  First, leadership must unequivocally support the effort.  The team must be viewed as an equal if not more critical group chartered with solving the problem.  Second, leadership is responsible for selecting the team members.  Therefore, they must be willing to select team members who will challenge the status quo, not those that are likely to parrot back to leadership what they ‘want’ to hear.  Third, they must provide the team with direct access to the executive team and equip them with sufficient resources to meet their objective (more on this later).  Lastly, they must provide an executive sponsor capable and empowered to support the team throughout the process.

The executive sponsor is a key component of the AC²T model and provides the means to protect the team’s efforts from being overcome by the organization’s culture.  The role of the sponsor is not to provide guidance or direction.  Instead, the sponsor is responsible for removing organizational barriers and obstacles that could limit the team’s ability to explore and experiment with alternative solutions.  The sponsor runs interference between the organization and the team, protects them from unwarranted reviews and questions, and allows the team sufficient room to function.  AC²T efforts are normally run in parallel to team member’s other responsibilities yet requires sufficient time and resources to meet their objectives.  A common problem with AC²T teams is that team member’s managers often treat their participation as an extra duty rather than part of their job and therefore provide no relief or assistance while the employee is working on the team.  It’s imperative that the sponsor addresses those issues quickly and ensures that every team member has adequate time to support the AC²T team while balancing the normal business of the organization.

Duane Grove is founder of Connect2Action, a strategy execution specialist at the intersection of employee engagement and executive leadership, igniting innovation as a lever to accelerate your growth.  Follow Duane on Twitter @connect2action and connect with him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Google+.  Learn more by visiting www.connect2action.com.