ISO innovation standard

An interview with Leopoldo Colombo, a consultant and trainer who is also a convener ISO/TC279/WG1 as part of ISO - The international organization for standardization.

The ISO organization is very well known historically for standards like ISO9000 which was about documenting the work that you do and then being able to turn whatever you document into a standard practice in the organization. Where did the need for an innovation standard come from?

Organizations worldwide are having difficulty innovating in a sustainable manner. Organizations that expect to innovate haphazardly or perhaps once every few years may not care about this that much but an ever increasing number of organizations, especially medium sized ones are having difficulty with generating sustainable innovation practices. In 2013, ISO (International Organization for Standardization), felt there was a maturity in the marketplace to discuss standardization of innovation practices. The result is, ISO 56002 is a type B standard i.e. a management system standard providing guidance. It was created using ISO High Level Structure in order to facilitate integration with other management standards that are currently prevalent such as ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and so on. Thus, the best practices of innovation presented as a management system may be integrated into management systems organizations already have in place. Innovation is an outcome that organizations seek to achieve and what the standard contains are the best practices that we recommend for organizations that wish to generate such outcomes in a sustainable way.

When you ask the CEO of most companies today how they hire a new manager, that CEO will be able to immediately describe that process to you. However, if you ask about what they do with an innovative idea, most CEO’s won’t be able to give you a succinct answer. Why would you consider managing innovative ideas any different from hiring a new manager? The long term impact of both processes on your organization is substantial and the cost of failure as well. If you are currently using best practices for hiring top management personnel you should also use best practices to manage innovation activities. That is why a standard for innovation management is so important.

Another reason why this standard is so important is that innovation is by definition a risky endeavor and it inherently involves failure. If on top of that you are not using high quality management processes then your chances to be successful become even lower. You cannot afford to innovate without robust best practices in place. It is your responsibility to seek the most effective tools and practices that are available to you for this purpose.

Can you walk us through the steps by which such a standard is created?

An ISO Technical committee was established in December 2013 which then divided itself into three working groups:

Innovation management systems

Terminology

Tools and methods

Each country is invited to propose experts that these committees may consist of. In the beginning, the committee was established of 14 countries, 12 European countries plus Canada and Argentina. Currently, we have 46 countries participating in the activities. We would have 2-3 meetings per year where each meeting lasted for five days. The experts came from various international corporations, national organizations with experience in innovation activities, government’s officials, academia and consultants. Those represented a large quantity of accumulated knowledge. It is a very meticulous process that is aimed at seeking consensus. The discussions involve people with a lot of experience and so they were in fact a rich learning experience for participants.

What was the reception to such standardization of innovation practices in the marketplace? I know from my dealings with managers throughout my career that the order and structure of innovation practices may be off putting due to a concern about innovation bureaucracies or that it would slow down the activities.

Since we are relatively early in the process we are now looking to see how fast the adoption is going to be. More importantly, we are waiting to receive feedback from organizations that adopted the standard or some of it with regards to the level of value it generates for them.

What would you say are the parts of the standard that organizations taking their first steps in systematic innovation should adopt first?

Firstly leadership. It is very important to have an innovation vision and an innovation strategy. Innovation has to be aligned with the strategy of the organization and so this must be established before you begin innovating in an organization. Management should also make sure that your innovation project portfolio is balanced in terms of long, medium and short term projects and in addition, the risk levels should be balanced across the portfolio.

Secondly, organizations must develop a culture that promotes creativity and this has to coexist with the organisation’s existing operational culture that generates products of the best quality in the most efficient manner. For that incumbent culture, innovation is sometimes regarded a mess consisting of “crazy ideas that will never work”. The operational culture is like the “Pacman” trying to eat all innovation projects that for it are wasteful and messy. That is why leadership has a critical role ensuring the two cultures coexist and take care of the existing business efficiently while thinking and nurturing the future business with a long-term vision

Finally, organizations must develop a collaborative environment that drives innovation through collaboration, internally within different departments and externally with the existing innovation ecosystem . This is especially valid for medium sized organizations that cannot afford to have teams totally dedicated to innovation or bring external expertise into the organization.

When speaking to corporate executives I often get a response that innovation is already happening in the organizations and that they don’t need further guidance while in fact what they’re doing is the standard product development or business development waterfall-style practices. When interacting with organizations, what functions, in your experience realize that they’re not really innovating and that best practices are truly necessary?

In every case I was contacted by organizations to implement innovation best practices in their organizations it was done by the CEO. Middle management actually resists this sort of activity because from their position it is more difficult for them to see the value. The CEO is in the position that can realize the value of having a formal innovation process since only when a formal process is in place is it possible to measure and control it. People think that innovation is all about happy and ludic activities, rainbows and unicorns and that standardized processes are bureaucratic and constrictive. However, innovation must be guided by some sort of a structured process just like anything else we wish to run consistently, effectively and efficiently. Just like when you bake a chocolate cake, there are basic elements in the recipe that are mandatory like the ratio between flower, oil and liquid in order for the cake to rise and then you have more freedom with the flavoring and the amount of chocolate. The standard’s purpose isn’t to dictate the entire practice. It is to offer certain basic practices that are highly recommended and then leave high degrees of freedom for the rest.

You also created ISO 56003 Tools and methods for innovation partnership. Why did you choose to dedicate an entire innovation standard to innovation partnerships?

This is because by partnering with other entities like customers, competitors, government and academia, you can get access to knowledge and capabilities that you wouldn’t be able to get any other way. For example, partnering with Academia opens up opportunities to run experiments and prototypes that an organization may not be able to afford internally.

There’s knowledge that has been accumulated regarding IP ownership, terms of cooperation etc’ most companies do not have currently and so this standard offers them some of this information.

Do you see this standard turning into something that organizations can get certification for?

Quite recently a request from 12 different countries was presented to ISO to create an innovation management system standard Type A, meaning for certification purposes. We believe we have accumulated enough knowledge in order to set a basic set of mandatory practices organizations will be required to follow in order to consider themselves as innovating in a sustainable way.