Is it possible to have too much innovation?
Paul Howell HRM Asia talks with Andrew Grant about the Smart Workforce Summit (Singapore).
Speaking at the sidelines of HRM Asia's Smart Workforce Summit in early September, It is indeed possible to have too much innovation, according to researcher, speaker and author Andrew Grant. Andrew says that can lead to too much freedom, not enough checks or balances, and the organisation going 'off the rails'. Grant noted that true, sustainable innovation - more than the occasional hackathon or unintegrated innovation lab - was the result of a "managed tension" between the highly creative and free-roaming parts of the organisation, and the "preservers" who take a conservative approach to the gains created. “Along with a lot of freedom, which is what we think you need in innovation, you also need control,” he says. “To make sustainable innovation, you need the exploration people and the preservation people in tension. If that tension is managed really well, then that fuels people to move forwards in innovation.”
