Wednesday, November 19, 2014
Innovation in the workplace
In class the other day, a guest speaker came to talk to us about technological entrepreneurship. One major theme that I took away from his presentation was that it is OK to think outside the box. Most companies have a set of norms, both implicit and explicit, that employees are expected to follow. These norms are important, but like Eliot Jacobsen, I believe that sometimes there are exceptions. There are times when it is OK to break the mold. I believe that some ground rules are necessary to maintain order and uniformity. On the other hand, I fully support establishing guidelines. These guidelines should be followed when the situation reasonably allows. But some hurdles require improvisation and unconventional methods. I think employees should be empowered. If they feel that they can't exercise creative liberty, they will not reach their potential. Conversely, if an employee feels trusted enough to innovate, he will be more productive.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I agree. This is why I think Google is making such innovations. Google has it built into their culture to be innovative. They even have their 20% time that employees can use to come up and work on new projects.
ReplyDeleteI would say trust is the key. When they don't trust you, if you stray from the norms, then bye bye job.
ReplyDeleteI've seen that in my own experience, too. I've worked somewhere that I felt didn't allow me to think and it felt truly confining compared to an internship where I was given a problem, some parameters, and then told to get to work. The latter system encouraged me to work harder and smarter and I think both myself and the company benefited. Obviously you can't manage a company if every last employee is just following their whims in an attempt to innovate, but it's equally dangerous to restrict the creative thinking to the top layer of management.
ReplyDelete