Do institutional decision- making processes block innovation? Professor Mark Stiles Staffordshire University June 7 2010.

Do institutional decision-making processes block innovation?

Professor Mark Stiles

Staffordshire University

June 7 2010

The Challenge?

• How to free our staff to encourage innovation without losing organisational control?

• excessive hierarchy and over-heavy bureaucracy, the comfort of ingrained routines, strong vertical command structures and weak lateral and bottom-up communication, unbalanced and non-integrated authority across professional domains, conservatism and risk aversion, territoriality, defensiveness and insecurity as well as wilfulness (Middlehurst, 1998)

• The individual experts may be highly innovative within a specialist domain, but the difficulties of coordination across functions and disciplines impose severe limits on the innovative capability of the organization as a whole. (Lam, 2005)

June 2010

Why do I say this?

The last revolution, the one before that, and the one before that, all failed because we made the same non-technological mistakes each time.  It's time to notice those repeated errors, learn from them, and escape the cycle of failure. Ehrmann, Stephen C.,  (2000) "Technology and Revolution in Education: Ending the Cycle of Failure," Liberal

Education, Fall, pp. 40-49.

Have we created a generation of students who are monitored, intervened with, and regulated as never before?

(even if often with good intent?)

June 2010

The problems/questions:

June 2010

• How are innovative “initiatives” initiated?

• How do you plan “against” success?

• How are innovations sustained?

• How can you manage innovation whilst promoting it?

Technology and Innovation in T&L

June 2010

Traditionally:

• technology has allowed adoption of TL&A approches previously difficult to deliver/resource

• interoperability has improved management and development

• development and adoption has followed traditional IT paths

Technology and Innovation in T&L

June 2010

But now:

• web apps, mobile devices, cloud, BYOT

• technologies stand/fall in a “mass-market” way.

• adoption by take-up and “critical mass”

• at the individual user level

• in multiple contexts - private, social and commercial.

• once spread into the mass market - become almost unstoppable

Adoption of New Technologies:

June 2010

One model:

1. personal

2. informal learning

3. overlap into own formal learning

4. practitioners use as independent initiatives

5. success spreads rapidly

6. demands for integration with corporate processes

7. critical level of usage has occurred

8. institutions have to re-examine support, resources, processes, policies, regulations and governance

Adoption of New Technologies:

June 2010

Another model:

1. practitioners seek a solution to a T&L problem

2. a possible technology is identified

3. what differs here is change is based on a specific process change or education model

4. IF the result of the selection process is adoption at the practitioner level, we revert to model one…

Adoption of New Technologies:

June 2010

A third model:

1. practitioners, or a central team (acting against identified common goals) identify a TL&A problem

2. working with/by a central team, a possible technology identified

3. a trial/pilot of the technology is carried out

4. as part of trials, implications of success are considered in terms of organizational impact

5. IF trials are a success, technology is mainstreamed and appropriate changes to support, governance etc made

Adoption of New Technologies:

June 2010

Problems:

• successful pilots not easy to “turn off” and can result in “fait accompli” even if pilots reveal significant organizational issues

• “vetting” proposed trails/pilots can result in practitioners “going native” (a return to model one) if too many are blocked/delayed

• a perception of “the institution getting in the way” can result in an effective block on innovation

Organisational Influences on Innovation

June 2010

• Strategy and Vision

• Policy (the rules)

• Governance (who makes decisions and how)

• Corporate attitudes/culture

• Other cultures

Not seeing the wood for the trees!

We need a shared overview of “the big picture”

June 2010

Other “big issues” identified so far:

• Need to join the “strategic top level” with the “independent change initiatives” – eg a programme management approach

• “Solution driven” projects

June 2010

Solution driven initiatives:

• IS/IT departments tend to gain awareness of new technologies from a mainly technical viewpoint

• this can lead to a reactive approach rather than a view of their strategic potential

• problems solved one at a time resulting in multiple corporate applications linked “as needed” via enterprise integration

• lack of an overview of information interdependence results in multiple silos of information

• modern cost constraints make such approaches slow and expensive in time and resource

June 2010

A “Thought” on policy…

Bureaucracy can be a very real barrier to innovation, and much bureaucracy is founded on satisfying “sectional” needs or “regulatory” requirements

I’d like to suggest part of our salvation lies in policy, but using policies which enable and facilitate and not control and regulate

unnecessarily…

June 2010

June 2010

• Little strategy exists for supporting innovation

• Reactive approach to innovation via bespoke solutions leads to processes & systems needing too much effort to maintain

• Lack of shared big picture means innovations are addressed independently - opportunities for sharing support and services missed

• As support burden increases – staff resource available to investigate new technologies reduces

• Lack of institution-wide data services disables innovators from "building it themselves"

This leads to a more controlling approach

Without Enterprise Architecture…

June 2010

• A clear big picture

• Give all operations (including innovations) common support and services

• Avoid addressing individual stakeholder needs to the detriment of others

• Innovators & organisation agree a governance model, eliminate organisational paranoia, and allow a light touch

• Identify & address big problems and cross-cutting issues

• Define the future environment to support innovation at a strategic level

• Give a roadmap to incremental change to achieve flexibility & agility

• Experimentation but with appropriate control of organisational data.

• Change default stance from "can't do because..." to "can do”

The EA model offers:

June 2010

• Clear and appropriate governance

• Involvement of the right people in the right decisions

• A shared vision

• Inclusion of stakeholders

But an EA approach needs:

June 2010

• business plans are formed from wider context and strategic drivers

• business architecture needs to be aligned to the business plan

• governance is formed from business plan + institutional values

• organisational values are vital to ensure cultural factors are properly accounted for

• e.g. what values influence the organisation’s view of data it holds?

• business plans may depend on culture change - but governance must also reflect the organisational values, attitudes and culture

• often the “big picture” is not shared across the organization and “organisational values” are actually at odds with internal culture(s)

About governance…

June 2010

A view of “Control”

A possible “spectrum of control”:

Control - to exercise restraint or direction over; command. to hold in check; curb

Manage - to take charge or care of. to handle, direct, govern, or control in action or use

Facilitate - to make easier or less difficult; help forward (an action, a process, etc.). to assist the progress of

Enable - to make able; give power, means, competence, or ability to; authorise: to make possible or easy

Recognise - to identify from knowledge of appearance or characteristics. to perceive as existing or true; realise

June 2010

Possible loci of activity

Institution Initiated – at a corporate, departmental, or course management level

Tutor Initiated – as part of the learning process and conduct of course delivery

Learner Initiated – either completely independently, or as part of the learners own learning strategy

Using these in a decision-making “grid”, it is possible to position processes and systems and see if the positioning reflects organisational and stakeholder needs

June 2010

Possible loci of activityControl level

Institution Initiated

Tutor Initiated Learner Initiated

Control Enrolment

Progression

Summative assessment

Course structure

Submission of work for assessment

Manage Tutor led discussion

Lecture

Course Resources

Facilitate Group Project Course/Group Discussion

Enable Formal Peer discussion

Blog of learning experience

Recognise Informal peer discussion

Personal Blog

Demonstration

June 2010

Imagine this is a success…

June 2010

Not “waving” but drowning?

1. Wave takes off - students & staff use it in their private lives

2. Students are using Wave to help their learning

3. Staff start using Wave with students.

4. Staff want to connect Wave to Blackboard

5. Certain uses of Wave are thought unsafe/undesirable via an externally hosted service.

6. A corporate Wave server is set up - connections between it and other corporate applications are sought

June 2010

Thank you for

your patience

[email protected]

Tensions between Innovation and Control:http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6572643972

ENABLE: http://www.projects.staffs.ac.uk/enable/

June 2010