Innovation audit introduction v4.0 by Rod Willis

Assentire Limited Innovation - Change - Facilitation Helping Organisations Grow Through Change

The Innovation Audit: because work can be a better place Enabling organisations to create the optimim working environment and enhance productivity WHY have we created the Innovation Audit? Data from the perspective of the organisation looking at its employees is already widely available via typical employee engagement and well being surveys. Our approach is unique in that it seeks the views of the individuals within the organisation about the organisation. The Innovation Audit measures the performance of an organisation by exploring and integrating three time perspectives: past, present and future potential. Building on and integrating years of practical experience, established theory and the latest research into ‘resistance to change’ to measure the context, culture, beliefs and behaviours within and across an organisation. It is widely acknowledged organisations that are able to innovate, adapt and respond readily to challenges and opportunities will be most likely to be successful and stay ahead of the market through its ability to innovate and change effectively. The conditions for change readiness and agility are closely linked with how the organisation has dealt with challenges in the past and the culture and management style today. Where an organisation is, in terms of its organisational lifecycle impacts the way in which it thinks and behaves: is your company being forced to innovate to respond to a changing, declining or growing market, or even might it be in denial (an all too common reality) starting to drift strategically? Do past and present behaviours and current culture create the optimum conditions for tomorrow’s challenges? An organisation that is able to listen, reflect and learn, gaining valuable insight, by capturing the views of their own people, will be best positioned for enhanced productivity. Your staff have informed views, this audit process enables you to systematically ‘hear’ their voices enabling you to decide where you want to take the organisation.

The Innovation Audit Time Perspectives

The Organisational Culture from the Individuals’ Perspective

Can you answer questions about past performance from the individual employees’ perspective? • •

To what extent do I sense the change programme aligns to the purpose of the overall organisation? To what extent do I feel the change leadership understand how different groups within the organisation are impacted?

How would your people describe the culture and management style of the organisation today? Do people feel they can try new ideas and be allowed to fail and learn without blame. How might they respond to these statements? • •

When someone expresses a different view or position, their reasoning is not explored or asked for There is quite a high level of trust across the organisation The Innovation Audit takes the pulse of the organisation for innovation and change.

Innovation Audit Flyer v4 5.04.2014.docx

Do the people in your organisation feel empowered, motivated and supported to work differently to bring about innovation and change, enhancing overall productivity? • •

Is there an integrated monitoring and support for both the Change-Cycle and Individual Transition? Does the organisation ask open questions and invite participation in problem solving?

Organisations that are able to engage with this unique organisational monitoring process with confidence will have a clear idea of the issues and where to focus their attention and efforts. The Innovation Audit can help you start this process by using a confidential online questionnaire for unlimited participants, which provides a high level visual Dashboard Summary with colour coded Risk Indicators and Interpretation Guide.

Using The Innovation Audit With real time data available online combined with the Summary and Detailed Dashboard, your organisation will gain clear insight and understanding of potential issues, even if there seems to be no apparent issues at present. It can highlight risk factors that could potentially derail change initiatives if the organisation needs to adjust rapidly. It allows the organisation to measure ‘meaningful’ Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and decide Why, Where and How to focus its attention. By understanding the KPI results, realising which ones significantly impede and which support the success of your organisation, the management and leadership team now become empowered with insights from a completely new perspective.

Summary & Dashboard The Innovation Audit can be used independently by the organisation enabling you to see ‘at a glance’ your staff’s view of the organisation. An Interpretation Guide is supplied to enable organisations to take advantage of this information from the outset

The Innovation Audit Report & Feedback For maximum benefit and insight a comprehensive Feedback Report is available from Assentire. By arrangement we can provide a highly interactive one to one or group Feedback Session to share your results. We will explore the underlying theory for this audit, drawing on organisational dynamics, resistance to change theory and evidence based research and psychological/behavioural frameworks to understand through new insights and reflection on what has occurred already. We will explore how the performance and experiences of the past and the context of the present significantly influences and interacts on and with, the future potential performance.

The Innovation Audit in practice • •

As a standalone measurement tool for benchmarking, monitoring performance and development, providing a robust framework to engage in ‘meaningful’ ROI discussions This is designed for those companies that want to know how they can improve their own inherent capability to respond to the challenges and opportunities, doing more with the resources they already have, and significantly enhancing the organisation’s productivity Visit www.assentire.net/innovation to view a Sample Dashboard and Summary Report For further information please make contact.

Rod Willis is an APECS Accredited Executive Coach Assentire Ltd, PO Box 4481, Maidenhead, SL60 1FY, UK September 2013

www.assentire.net

Innovation Audit Flyer v4 5.04.2014.docx

T: +44 (0) 1628 632 340 M: +44 (0) 7788 457 202 rod.willis@assentire.net

Assentire Limited Innovation - Change - Facilitation Helping Organisations Grow Through Change

An Introduction to The Innovation Audit V4.0 Background about the Tool and detail of the Summary, Dashboard and Reports

Rod Willis is an APECS Accredited Executive Coach Assentire Ltd, PO Box 4481, Maidenhead, SL60 1FY, UK Jan 2014

www.assentire.net

T: +44 (0) 1628 632 340 1 457 202 M: +44 (0) 7788 rod.willis@assentire.net

Contents INTRODUCTION

BACKGROUND THE NEED FOR MEASUREMENT RETURN ON INVESTMENT CONCLUSION ANY QUESTIONS INNOVATION AUDIT SUMMARY SAMPLE AUDIT SUMMARY UNDERSTANDING THE DISPLAY INNOVATION AUDIT DASHBOARD SAMPLE DASHBOARD BLANK SUMMARY TEMPLATE

3 4 4 5 5 6 6 7 7 7 8

REAL TIME ONLINE REPORT

MANAGEMENT STYLE (CURRENT CULTURE) ORGANISATIONAL CONTEXT (CURRENT CULTURE) THE ORGANISATION’S READINESS FOR INNOVATION & CHANGE (FUTURE POTENTIAL) THE ORGANISATIONAL DYNAMIC (PAST PERFORMANCE) DOWNLOAD INSTRUCTIONS

9 9 10 10 11

Introduction The ‘Innovation Audit’ has been developed to help organisations gain new insight into how they are positioned regarding their past performance, current organisational context & management style, and readiness for innovation and change. These are some of the key components for Innovative organisations. The audit explores yours and others perspectives of the organisational culture and Eco-cycle. It adds a unique all-round perspective of your organisation, exploring how it has performed in the past in prior change programmes and its future potential for change. Many organisations believe they already learn from their past or desire to enhance this behaviour. Some questions to hold: How well do you respond to the dynamic demands of your market? Do you and others; • • • •

have a dominant Performance or Learning Culture? know the 'Strategic Direction' of the company know where you are on the 'Organisational Eco- Cycle’ know how your profile looks in terms of the 8 domains of the Organisational Dynamics 'Change Matrix’ PURPOSE, LEADERSHIP, MANAGEMENT, COMMUNICATION, PERSONAL DYNAMIC MOTIVATION, CULTURE, GROUP DYNAMIC

Background Many people recognise that sometimes organisations and people can look as if they are ‘stuck’, seemingly not wanting to change. We hear all too often, ‘People are Resistant to Change’. As a result of two evidence-based research projects, one explores how Relationships Impact the Success of Information Systems and another on How Leaders’ Perceive Resistance to Change. We have developed a new way of exploring this space. This Audit is available in two formats. One is in Paper format, which is often used for a small number of participants. A report can then manually be created to enable the new insights to be shared. There is also an Online version. This is ideal where there will be many participants. The online profile takes less than 30 minutes to answer the 92 questions. It has two advantages, as participants complete their input, they can look at the real-time reporting to see how the output is trending as more and more participants complete their input. For some organisations, this may be the first time they are able to see an accurate view of how the people across the organisation ‘see’ the organisation.

The need for measurement Another advantage of the online system is, that we can create a Report that provides statistical information, and understanding what the organisational ‘norms’ are. This then enables us to measure later on to compare and contrast. This creates an ideal basis to benchmark a change or developmental initiative across the organisation. Importantly providing a means to measure the impact of such a programme. We always need to keep in mind; measurement is just that, it is not judgment. We measure things so we can understand them better and then make informed decisions. Measurement is a means to support a process to come to an outcome; it is not the outcome in and of itself.

Return On Investment Those with robust leadership experience and judgment, often have the ability to ‘see’ what is occurring within their organisation, understanding what interventions and behaviours help the organisation as a whole, perform more effectively and efficiently. They have developed an acute ability to ‘read’ people and the market and lead the organisation with clear direction in the most productive manner. Within this context, this type of person is able to make the business case to invest in specific interventions, supporting personal and professional development. Bottom line, they can make the business case. In other situations, there is a need to provide ‘scaffolding’ for those developing this ability. This could be yourself, or your peers. This reality seems not to be consciously managed in many organisations we have worked with. As a result, the following scenario can unfold.

•

Many developmental programmes gain sponsorship through what we refer to as the ‘belief-sell’. The sponsors truly believe it is the right thing to do.

•

The challenge, if there is no measurement system in place, it becomes very difficult (maybe impossible) to establish an ROI calculation.

•

As sponsors move on, and they do, then the initiative can become suddenly at risk.

•

Importantly, this could mean all the investment (and potential gain to individuals and the organisation) becomes effectively discarded, as it is not understood, often due to the fact it was not measured.

•

When you don’t measure something, you don’t know what you are letting go!

•

By introducing a measurement system, you know what you have and you can now make informed decisions based on this.

Conclusion To know where to invest resources in any change or development programme can be a tough call. This profile starts you on that pathway by providing a unique opportunity of capturing your performing and learning culture; strategic direction and your overall capability in terms of your Organisational Dynamics Change Matrix and Readiness to Change. If you want to increase the success rate of your change initiatives, enabling greater Innovation within the organisation, then you will need to try something different to what you have been doing.

"We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them." Albert Einstein

This approach is a simple way of starting your own Innovative Leadership and Management Process. There are three documents to support the use of the Innovation Audit. • • •

Innovation Audit an Introduction (This document) Innovation Audit Basic Interpretive Guide (See download Instruction) Innovation Audit Advanced Interpretive Guide (See download Instruction)

If you would like to use the Innovation Audit, just navigate here and register for your own instance.

http://goo.gl/OCh6E0 We aim within 48 hours to issue you two URLs, one will be to distribute to those you wish to complete the Audit, the other will be the Real-time report made available as part of the set-up.

Any questions If you want to know more about this profile, our approach, or our range of facilitated workshops to help you explore this and other material in an interactive group setting. Please make contact: our details are at the end of this document Rod Willis – Assentire Ltd © 2013

Innovation Audit Summary The Innovation Audit Summary is a high-level single page document with 3 images. These summarise the views of Individuals across your Organisation and provides an overview of: •

How individuals perceive the organisation has dealt with change in the past, through eight different perspectives informed by Logical Levels (inspired by Gregory Bateson) and Organisational Dynamics

•

The organisation context in terms of life-cycle and management style

•

The organisation’s agility in terms of Readiness for Innovation & Change

The Innovation Audit has been developed so it can be used independently by any organisation enabling you to see ‘at a glance’ your staff’s view of the organisation. An Interpretation Guide is also available to enable organisations to take advantage of this information from the outset and a template based on the Innovation Audit Summary below is available full size to all users of the Innovation Audit. For those that commission Assentire Ltd to administer and produce the Final Report; we will provide a colour-coded version with full text description supporting the results per dimension.

SAMPLE AUDIT SUMMARY

There is also a template version that enables the user to take the results from the Real-Time online report based upon the ‘Innovation Audit Summary’ above and manually add to the template to share within the organisation.

Understanding the Display The Innovation Audit Summary is organised to display the results in three different time frames (Past, Current and Future Potential), exploring key areas of interest detailed next. Past Performance • •

Micro Factors (Purpose, Leadership, Management and Communications) Internal Factors (Personal and Group Dynamic, Motivation and Culture)

Current Culture • •

Organisational Context (Emergent, Rational and Constrained thinking) Management Style (Control, Learning with Supportive Leadership)

Future Potential •

Ten key behaviours organisations can benefit from to remain agile

Innovation Audit Dashboard This provides the detailed view of ‘Past Performance’ in terms of ‘Micro Factors’ and ‘Internal Factors’, illustrating 40 different parameters, key to any organisation. The Innovation Audit Dashboard below is available full size to all users of the Innovation Audit. For those that commission Assentire Ltd to administer and produce the final report; we will provide a colour-coded version with full text description supporting the results per dimension.

Sample Dashboard

To take the insight from this audit to the next level, you will need a copy of the ‘Basic Interpretation Guide’. The remainder of this document is aimed at those wishing to self-administer the ‘Innovation Audit’, providing high-level guidance how to interpret the results. We have made the tool and Dashboard Summary available to those that are interested free of charge via our online trial service. Our services are available upon request for those that would like more advanced support. When you download your free Dashboard template, you will be automatically added to our mailing list and we will inform you when the Advanced Interpretation Guide is available for purchase. When your dedicated online profile was provisioned you should have received two URLs. One was to share for those that would complete the profile and the other was for the Real-Time report. This next part of the document will talk you through extracting key results from the Real-Time online report. Some organisations would benefit in having different areas of the organisation take the Innovation Audit so the results can be compared and contrasted. One example would be to consider the ‘Operational’, ‘Middle Management’ and the ‘Senior Management’ view. Clearly alternative groupings may be considered. If you have an interest to do this, place make contact with us and we will see how we can best support you.

Blank Summary Template

Real Time Online Report The Real Time report presents data in the same order the questions were answered. This differs slightly from how they are shown in the Innovation Audit Summary. There are 15 different tables of results covering the following areas. Current Culture: • Management Style reported in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd tables. • Organisational Context reported in the 4st, 5nd and 6rd tables. Future Potential: • The Organisation’s Readiness for Innovation and Change in the 7th table. Past Performance: • Micro Factors and Internal Factors in the remaining tables.

Management Style (Current Culture) The first three table results give you the granular results for the Management Style semi-circle. Management Style • • •

Control Learning Support

These can be identified by the heading text of each table. Note the report presents the information in a slightly different order to the illustration in the Innovation Audit Summary. In each case, scan to the bottom of the table where you can read off the Table Average value. This will range from 1 to 7. Based on the value per segment, ‘’colour in’ the same number of sections for each segment, with the score starting from the centre, where the ‘centre circle represents a value of ‘0’. We recommend rounding up values to zero decimal places. This means an average value of 3.49 would be shown as 3 sections and a value of 3.50 would be shown as 4 sections. NB: A section is a ring within the given segment. Notice, there are only seven sections per segment corresponding to the score 1 to 7.

Organisational Context (Current Culture) The next three tables (4th, 5th and 6th) enable you to explore the following areas. Organisational Context • • •

Rational Constrained Emergent

As was the case for the ‘Management Style’ segments, just read off the average for each segment and ‘colour in’ the number of sections corresponding to the average score reported.

The Organisation’s Readiness For Innovation & Change (Future Potential) The next table (7th) displayed is used differently that the prior 6. Within the Innovation Audit Summary you will notice there is a table with ten segments numbered one to ten. These correspond to the ten questions detailed individually in the table headed ‘Readiness to Change’. As was the case for the ‘Management Style’ segments, just read off the average for each segment and ‘colour in’ the number of sections corresponding to the average score reported. The score will range from 1 to 7 and we recommend you consider the following banding. 1 or 2

=High Risk

(RED)

3, 4 or 5

=Medium Risk

(AMBER)

6 or 7

=Low Risk

(GREEN)

The Organisational Dynamic (Past Performance) The Real-Time report now has only eight tables left to extract data from, and each table is headed by one of the following dimension names. Take care, as the order may be different to the online report. Purpose

Leadership

Personal Dynamic Motivation

Management

Communication

Culture

Group Dynamic

We recommend you read from the Real-Time report the average score for the each domain and ‘colour in’ the number of sections corresponding to the average score reported. Note the report presents the information in a slightly different order to the illustration in the Innovation Audit Summary. The score will range from 1 to 7 and we recommend you consider the following banding, however this time with a slight difference from before. We suggest you look at the individual values that make up the average per segment, and use the colour associated with the lowest value in the dimension 1 or 2

=High Risk

(RED)

3, 4 or 5

=Medium Risk

(AMBER)

6 or 7

=Low Risk

(GREEN)

See example following.

In the following example, we show how the average value for the dimension ‘Purpose’ is 4.50. You might consider colouring ‘5’ sections of the Purpose segment and with the banding prior you would use the colour Amber. If you look at the example below, you can see there is an important question with a score of only 2.0.

By using the banding of the lowest value, we would colour in ‘5’ sections (because of the average value of 4.50) with the colour Red, due to the lowest score being 2.0. This way, important isolated results will not get ‘lost’ by an averaging effect.

Download Instructions You can download your pdf copy of the Innovation Audit Summary from here

http://goo.gl/PJBkGV

For further information, contact details

T: +44 (0) 1628 632 340 M: +44 (0) 7788 457 202 rod.willis@assentire.net 11