Mahatma Gandhi was against saying, “I don’t know” how to solve a problem. Instead, he insisted on finding a way to solve problems, regardless of the magnitude. This is the spirit of innovation, the laying of the train tracks before the locomotive is built. In order to stay competitive as a leader, you must evolve - and your team must evolve with you. An innovative spirit will keep that evolution rolling. Here are a few ways to encourage innovation both for you and for a team.

First, you should always recognize opportunity. Historical leaders like Joan of Arc, although great communicators and motivators, were in the right places at the right times because they saw an opportunity and took advantage of it. Keep in mind that taking an opportunity for the improvement of a team, an organization, or society in general is not considered to be “opportunistic”, which usually infers taking a chance for personal gain. As long as you know that the organization will benefit and move forward from the advantage, it’s good to take. Obviously seizing an opportunity may involve asking for forgiveness instead of permission - in many organizations, by the time you’ve made the necessary inquiries you may have lost the opportunity. If you’re certain, recognize and seize opportunity - and ask forgiveness later.

Next, be a change agent. This doesn’t mean that you should just embrace change. It means that you should be the one suggesting, inspiring, and motivating the change. Innovation is lost when we believe that the status quo is perfectly fine. In GE’s Work Out program, management found out that the answer to the question, “Why are we doing this?” was usually, “because we’ve always done it”. As an innovator, you will constantly look at what’s going on and think creatively to change it and make it better. Along with motivating change comes the creation of opportunity. For example, if you know that changing a process would free up a team to work on another project or area, you’ve created an opportunity not only for improvement but also for advancement.

Leaders and their teams can work underground, too. In technical and scientific environments, the “skunkworks” sometimes solves problems before they become known as problems. This is the underground lab, the after-hours testing facility, the team that meets during lunch to discuss a particular process change without being asked to. Allow this to go on - as unimpeded as possible. In these environments, the creativity and innovation will naturally flow because many times people look at their underground activity as “off the clock”.

One of the myths of innovation is that any entrepreneur or innovator is a high risk taker - a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants risk taker. This is not necessarily true. You should take risk, but it should always be calculated. Amelia Earhart planned for every scenario she could possibly think of when planning her record-breaking airplane flights. Although we’ll never know what happened to her near Howland Island, we know that she had calculated the risk of each mile. You can be known as a risk-taker, but be sure to be known as a risk taker who calculates each step.

Along with risk comes the possibility of failure. Personally, you should try to learn from every mistake or failure. As a leader, you must learn to tolerate failure in others. Sometimes the simple act of asking someone what they’ve learned is enough to keep the innovation engine turning. Even Abraham Lincoln failed: he ran for the U.S. Senate twice - and lost both times. But he turned the loss into learning and led the U.S. through a very difficult period.

In any situation, be it personal, family, community, or corporate, you can think and act in the innovative spirit. Don’t keep doing something simply because it works and it’s been done the same way for a long time. New processes, products, focuses, goals, and missions are always needed to keep people motivated and inspired. If you’re drawn to one of these things, it’s wise to question it. Innovation comes from questioning - and as a leader it’s your responsibility to create that environment.

Copyright 2007-2008 Bryant Nielson. All Rights Reserved.