9 general rules for maximizing innovation
- Mike Harlow
- Dec 3, 2024
- 4 min read
Updated: Dec 30, 2024
Few things today carry the buzz of ‘innovation’ and ‘creative genius’. While a lone genius lead character is great for selling books and movies, the truth is that there is an innovation process and anyone can leverage it.
I'm not dismissing the importance of highly innovative people and teams, but want to highlight the most common thing they do. They combine and recombine existing knowledge, ideas and inventions from diverse disciplines and fields.
For a relevant example, look no further than the initial launch of the Apple iPhone. For the iconic iPhone, did Apple invent the MP3 player? The cellular phone? The app store? The online music store? The touch screen? The digital camera? Wi-Fi and Bluetooth?
No. All of these inventions not only already existed, but were in widespread use.
What Apple did was combine and recombine technologies and ideas in new and unexpected ways (and that in hindsight seem obvious).
Now that we have a powerful smart phone in most of our pockets, the innovation question becomes, what are the new opportunities?
You can think of this core innovation technique as the 'adjacent possible'.
Stuart Kauffman coined the powerful term the ‘adjacent possible’ to explain improvements in biological systems. He observed that there are always possibilities in every system, but they are limited by the existing biological diversity and the opportunities in the environment. Biological systems are built on a foundation of prior adaptations and continually test new adaptations for their potential environmental advantage.
More recently, Steven Johnson borrowed the term 'adjacent possible' to describe human innovation. Like biological evolution, he provided an example of the simple 'grape press' (for faster wine production) morphing into the revolutionary 'printing press' that kick-started the information age. In the printing press example, each idea built upon a previous idea and combined opportunities from others in the environment until a radical new invention was realized.
While this is great advice, there is one thing we all need to be very careful of. The idea of 'adjacent' innovation can be easily confused with simple 'incremental' continuous improvement.
The printing press is not a better grape press. The iPhone is not a better flip phone.
The adjacent possible is not about incremental improvement (although that is important too), it's about combining what exists in new and creative ways to achieve radical recombinations.
Although some people and environments are naturally more innovative, I think that any group can be more innovative with a a good understanding of what innovation is.
With the 'adjacent possible' in mind, we use the following 9 rules to maximize innovation in our projects. We invite you to try these rules in your initiatives. If you would like to discuss our detailed approaches that support these rules, feel free to contact us.
 | Always start with a strong 'Why': The purpose for your project or initiative is fundamental to the buy-in, creative thinking and aligned ideas of team members. With a clear and compelling 'why' your team will be energized and aligned to find the most creative 'how' |
 | Create space to innovate: Put too much focus on defined tasks and deadlines and you will miss opportunities to see what others in similar fields are doing and to explore and try new ways to do things better. Create dedicated space to explore ideas and options. |
 | Build diverse teams: There’s an old saying, ‘if two of us always agree, one of us is redundant’. Seek creative people with diverse experience and that voice their opinions. Studies prove, small increases in real team diversity yield big increases in innovation. |
 | The best idea wins: All good ideas are worth fighting for and should be able to withstand scrutiny. Present, discuss and build on ideas, but regardless of where they come from, when the best idea emerges and is qauntifiably better, everyone should get behind it. |
 | Avoid rigid hierarchies: Diverse ideas come from everywhere. Power hierarchies limit alternative ideas and contributions in an organization. Opportunities are lost when people with diverse viewpoints are afraid to offer alternatives or scrutinize ideas. |
 | Expect to put in real work: Allocate time and resources so problems and potential solutions are thoroughly evaluated and all risks and benefits are articulated. Know that modern solutions require deep exploration, extensive debate and honest evaluation. |
 | Find and recognize sources of contribution: Nothing stops the sharing of ideas faster than the taking of credit for someone’s thinking or work. Build a culture of individual and group recognition that openly and honestly rewards real contributors. |
 | Try and test options: The creative process often results in alternative options or ideas that are hard to validate. If the best option is not clear, find a low cost way to test the options, gather feedback, and push the best idea to the surface. |
 | Explore the spaces in between: By nature the adjacent possible is a gap between A (today), and B (something better). The only way from A to B is through the space between. Take time to understand the gap and create concise plans to execute the change. |
I hope you enjoy our rules for maximizing innovation and find them useful in your projects and initiatives.
Until our next article, keep on creating innovative solutions, and, where you can, take some time to share your findings and opinions so that we can all design a better future together!
Mike Harlow
Solution Architect
Hive One Justice Systems, Hive One Collaborative Systems
©2024
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