The fear that major business leaders have of being overtaken by startup technology companies leads them to invest millions in groundbreaking innovations. But a large number of these investments fail. The truth is that you can have the right investment portfolio, the right metrics and governance, the right development process, and the right talent on the right teams, but if the handoffs between your teams aren't done effectively, the whole plan falls apart.
If innovation projects are to be successful, they will need to survive a transfer from an innovation team to an execution team. And every time a transfer occurs, there is a risk of losing control.
How does a project transfer process work? Suppose a company has a design lab to develop new ideas and hardware products, and they decide to manufacture a custom computer for 3D modeling. The project manager simply ignores the design lab's concept and applies the developed design to another product already under development. Sales become a failure. Why does this happen? Because the company didn't have a clear project transfer plan between teams, and this leads to a disruption in the process.
How do you avoid this disruption? By adapting each deliverable to the teams involved. In many companies, innovation teams tend to divide into three groups: Optimizers, Scalers, and Explorers.
Optimizers are skilled at enhancing and improving existing businesses, driving or enhancing operational growth. Explorers work in teams such as research and development, customer insights, or product development; they are adept at discovering new opportunities amidst ambiguity and are individuals who translate inspiration into ideas using methods such as design thinking.
Meanwhile, scalers test and adjust new ideas until they find product market fit using agile or lean methods. These labels also accurately describe the phases of innovation: Explore, scale, and optimize.
Given this, how do you create a smooth handover between teams? The right path for each part of your innovation portfolio will depend on the integration of your projects with your... core businessLet's look at four paths:
The Owner's Manual
This is the most common and most difficult deliverable to execute. After months – sometimes years – of work, an innovation team extensively documents its work in hundreds of pages and passes it all on to a new team responsible for execution. When was the last time you read an Owner's Manual? Exactly. You only pull out the Owner's Manual in a moment of panic when something is broken. In this model, a frightening amount of innovation work is skimmed and forgotten. The new team risks moving forward without absorbing the learning from its predecessors. This model works best when there is no longer ambiguity in the challenge, when the project is ready for implementation by technical teams, and when the manual can be broken down into small, specific, and applicable chapters for each of its stakeholders.[/ Vc_column_text] [/ vc_column] [/ vc_row] [vc_row] [vc_column] [vc_column_text]
The architect
The best way to avoid disruption is to eliminate handover. In this model, the future owner of the work incorporates the explorer and dimensioner teams. These people act as connectors, knowing all the paths already explored and all the learning already acquired. This is a strong model for sectors like consumer packaged goods, where one person, such as a brand manager, is responsible for product development from start to finish. Although the architect may not be leading the project at every stage, they will need to finalize approval of the team's work. If the architect doesn't believe in the work, they will end up killing the idea.
The ambassadors
Similar to the previous model, in this model, innovation team members remain embedded in each phase of the project to ensure that no learning is lost and that each phase of the work is designed to smoothly feed into the next. Furthermore, this model improves the future work of innovation teams by helping them create awareness of what the teams need most. This model is most common in software development teams, where UX designers may be involved in both initial user research and long-term product management.
The beehive
In this model, multidisciplinary teams face challenges throughout the initiative's lifecycle. This is most common in accelerators and incubators, where a new organization is set up as a microcosm of the parent company and composed of people from all major functions and disciplines. Hive teams also have representatives from functions that typically act as corporate antibodies, such as legal, finance, or HR.
With the exception of the “Owner’s Manual” model, each of the other transfer models guides implementation teams through the innovation process to seamlessly transfer knowledge. Doing so reduces the feeling that a new idea wasn’t invented here and makes delivery smoother.This article was originally published in the Harvard Business Review.[/ Vc_column_text] [/ vc_column] [/ vc_row]
