Leadership

Without effective leadership and management, no organisation can achieve productive ends. Leaders have dual roles when managing innovation. In a bottom-up role, they stimulate innovative results as they facilitate ideas and initiatives coming from individuals and teams. In a top-down role, leaders are the primary means for the organisation to realise its innovation goals and strategies. A fundamental challenge is to balance these two roles.

A study undertaken by Stanford University in 2017 concluded that the abilities of a founder and management team are the most important factor driving investment decisions — often more important than the product or technology itself. The capability of the jockey is a better indicator of potential for success than the horse.

Components of Leadership:

Champions

Every worthwhile project is driven by at least one person with the passion and the skills to make it happen.

Management

Managers are central in creating the operational context in which individuals can realise their full capacity and teams can work productively towards commonly understood outcomes.

Strategy

If you are building a business, your innovation strategy should align seamlessly with your overall strategy for growth.