It has been said that the purpose of organisation is to eliminate uncertainty. Is this stifling the ability to innovate?
I recently spoke with the innovation leaders at a major biopharmaceutical firm. They were lamenting the challenges of designing an innovation program that seemed overwhelming. No matter what they did, the organisation just kept focusing on execution and narrow thinking rather than innovation and big thinking. I reminded them that big companies are like slowly sinking ships (sinking under the weight of their own execution orientation); efforts to innovate will never be ideal, rather it’s a matter of pumping water out of the hull to keep the ship afloat.
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