How Operational Innovation Can Transform Your Company

Deep ChangeHow Operational Innovation can Transform Your Company

By Michael Hammer

Meet Bill.

Bill is...• Creative...thinks outside the box• Influential...respectable and

trustworthy• The type of guy who goes big

(but doesn’t go home)

Bill wondered...

Step 1:Look for role

models outside your

industry

Step 2:Identify and

defy constraining assumptions

Step 3:Rethink critical dimensions of

work

Bill, BEWARE!

Organizational barriers exist to operational innovation.

These include:1. Business culture undervalues

operations2. Top management ignorant

about operations3. Lack of ownership Not built

in to formal org. structure

Then Bill throws a party to celebrate success!

...While the company refined its innovation, it

continued to look for new methods of

operational innovation.

Great success, Bill!

Big Idea #1Companies can gain competitive

advantage through operational innovation.

• Organizational complacency:– Organizations content with methods by which

operations are executed– continue to do what “has worked for them in the past”

(Kotter, 2008, p. 21)

Big Idea #2Operational innovation should

be the way of life.

• Organizations continuously change in order to thrive– Encourage a business culture that promotes

change

Big Idea #3Operational innovation is increasingly important due to global competition and

low industry growth.