Crafting an Innovation Narrative

Once a new innovation mandate gets going, stuckness will emerge. It is to be expected, as it only takes five minutes of compassionate observation inside any organization to appreciate what is at stake.

People can intellectually understand the mandate but cannot yet reconcile what it means personally because the work is just starting, which will conceive, design and deliver the new improvements that will chart the organization's course.

In the words of Spanish poet Antonio Machado, "the path is made by walking." While the vision of the destination may be compelling, what it looks like in practice only becomes clear, specific and tangible as you move closer to it—like a village off in the distance.

At an organizational level, stuckness manifests as low confidence, high defensiveness, disconnected action, disbelief, or interpersonal conflict, to name a few patterns. These signals can be read, heard or observed in the narratives and memes circulating about the organization that are outdated, personal perceptions, or generic myths of any organization.

The trap is to focus excessively on alignment. Once a direction is set, what's needed is movement—not in a straight line, as that's unrealistic. Like water flowing down a mountain, you want movement to find its best path around real obstacles and the true terrain ahead.

These narratives speak to the wishes most people have within them: to improve things, learn new things, build a personal legacy, and be part of something bigger than themselves. When done masterfully, new narratives expressed in stories, terminology, visualizations and physical changes in the work environment replace the outdated, stifling narratives with they are motivating, future-oriented narratives.

At a grand scale, I've lived within two different narrative transformations at a national level. First, in France, which in 2010 was a digital laggard. Triggered by aspirational discontent over their wounded pride at being digital pioneers in the 80s, a narrative of "we can if we want to, because we have before" transformed France into the digital leader of the continent at all levels—from startup to multinational legacy corporations.

Britain followed the same path with a narrative of deserved pride. As the global pioneer of innovative finance for centuries, they were laggards in 2010 as well. They cultivated a narrative of "why not us?" that built on their leadership in legal expertise and the world's primary non-NY trading market. Within five years, “Silicon Roundabout” was minting unicorns, and large firms were transforming private markets.

To intentionally craft and adopt a new innovation narrative, approach the work at three levels in parallel:

Macro- Narrative generation, management and harvesting is an essential aspect of fulfilling a new innovation mandate.

Meso- Set high-level narratives addressing perceived constraining factors. At team levels, generate challenge-specific narratives highlighting motivating factors and tangible assets that enable progress.

Micro- As work progresses, identify and elevate documented stories that fill in or refine the macro and meso narratives—this, over time, becomes your new company lore, culture and way of working.

Like any practice, some go overboard. Excessive narrative management can distract from doing real work. Likewise, excessive control or a "good news only" culture are signals of persistent and chronic stuckness.

As a play on the old trope, it is helpful to remember that “the fish swims from the head”, and that is why each senior leader needs awareness of their personal relationship and response to innovation emotions. The true narrative isn't the one that is crafted in a boardroom or conceived in your head—it's the one that is told back or between colleagues when you aren't there.

There will be frustrations and setbacks, which are the normal course of innovation and culture change. It may be slow to start or require significant surges of energy to get moving, but as you observe the new narrative emerging, you can shift from active management to pastoral care with the periodic guidance to keep the narrative, culture and work on task.

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Learn more about how to develop impactful innovation leaders.