Innovation

The drive to harness the energy of the workforce might start within the HR department, but it cannot stop there. There must be buy in from the CEO, from the top managers, and most importantly from the immediate managers. Without buy in from these groups, this will be just another initiative, not an innovation. The April 24, 2006 BusinessWeek discusses the world's most innovative companies. The front cover shows the who's who of today's successful businesses and some of the things they are doing to stay on top. Almost all of the how to's deal in one way or another with people.

An interesting concept they talked about was CEO's becoming innovators-in-chief. The top dog sets the tone and culture of the company, large or small. If they are open to new ideas and try new things, their people will too. If they are risk adverse, the company will show it.

In order for people to be passionate about work, the management of the company needs to make it a priority to take steps to allow that. They need to see how much of an influence they have on their teams. I was trained perfectly on this. “People usually don’t quit their company, they quit their boss.”

You may hire great people, but if your management is weak, the great people will go somewhere else or be miserable and not produce like they are capable of.