"That was most impressive.... There's absolutely a positive change”

Technical Director : Industrial Equipment

We use our expertise in innovation to help groups and their leaders

• develop a confident and creative culture,
• support this with appropriate processes,
• build a sustainable internal innovation capability

Typically the change process involves three stages

• Initial interviews and analysis.  
• A structured feedback report and workshop for the group to create a shared and focused desire for change.  
• Coaching, workshops, training or other interventions to support the desired change, and foster the internal capability to sustain it.

To initiate a programme, we often use a process based on Appreciative System Mapping. This is a highly effective way of building on a group’s strengths, while initiating dramatic and rapid improvements in key areas that have become a barrier to performance.

example 1: R&D effectiveness

The Creativity Partnership helped the Board of a successful Plc in the Industrial equipment sector get maximum value from its investment in R&D. 

We worked with the Technical Director, management and engineering staff to identify the factors which were reducing the innovativeness of the department, to explore their underlying causes and identify solutions.  The shared insight generated by this resulted in an immediate and sustained improvement in performance.

After the initial interventions, the Technical Director said

The programme then continued with occasional mentoring of some key middle managers for about 6 months, to help them reinforce and embed the new way of working.  Two years after the start of the programme the department was widely recognised as being innovative and was delivering real value. The Technical Director said

"There are now lots of people in engineering having ideas.. Now marketing can't handle them ..... We're restructuring marketing and recruiting to cope!"

example 2: radical innovation

The Creativity Partnership helped Sainsbury’s develop a process and culture in which radical innovation can be developed ‘faster, simpler, together’. 

We developed a process and structure to enable radical innovation, ran a stimulating workshop for the Quality and Innovation Group and provided management training.  The new system started operating in late 2002, getting enthusiastic reactions from staff and suppliers.  A typical staff reaction was

example 3: business transformation

Forthcoming changes in EU price support mechanisms are having a significant effect on the profitability of our client’s primary business, while also opening up new areas of opportunity. It has become very important to develop a thriving, creative and effective New Ventures programme. This in turn required the team charged with this work to develop a more entrepreneurial culture, new processes and new skills.   We have been helping with this for several years.

The programme started with a short research programme to understand the key issues affecting the team.  We then undertook some carefully targeted interventions to help them realise their potential.  These interventions were very successful in releasing the team's energy and ideas. The development programme then continued, addressing specific topics as required over the next few years. These included team development workshops on "communication" and on "scouting for innovation", providing advice on the improvement of innovation management processes and providing coaching for key managers. The programme has been very successful, so  the company has made a number of major UK and International investments, in support of the innovation opportunities identified by the group.

The manager in charge said of the programme :

• Workshops and events.
• Learning and development.