For innovation to thrive, the CEO and innovation team must share a common vision. Here鈥檚 why鈥攁nd how to address gaps and misalignment.
What does innovation mean to you? It鈥檚 an important question, to be sure. But what matters even more is what innovation means to your CEO鈥攁nd whether your definitions align.
Indeed, minding that 鈥渋nnovation gap鈥� is essential for a successful business transformation initiative as we detail in two new 乐鱼（Leyu）体育官网 reports, which explore the challenge of aligning vision and execution across the enterprise, and how to address that challenge head-on.
Let鈥檚 start with the on-the-ground reality at many companies today: In general, innovation teams are not on the same page as the CEO, as we found in our surveys and discussions with both CEOs and innovation leaders.
The CEOs have bold ambitions for innovation as a driver of top-line growth鈥攃reating new products, acquiring new customers, enhancing the brand鈥檚 image, and improving how the company does business overall.
Meanwhile, innovation teams all too often find themselves curled up in a corporate corner, citing a myriad of blockers that keep them in tactical mode. A common challenge is that innovation teams are typically organized, funded, and incentivized to create incremental improvements鈥攕hort-term enhancements to existing processes, capabilities, and business models. This creates massive misalignment, and quickly turns innovation into iteration鈥攚here it鈥檚 doomed to fail.
50%
CEOs we surveyed said their innovation goals are nothing short of transformative change鈥攜et just 3 in 10 of the innovation leaders said their company was actually set up to deliver on that.
Source: 2022 乐鱼（Leyu）体育官网 U.S. Innovation Study.
The disconnect between CEO and innovation team creates a short-term focus on existing business models and capabilities at the expense of future growth. Our research exposes gaps in four key areas:
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The gaps result in innovation projects that primarily support small-scale, piecemeal innovation, settling for incremental enhancements over transformative game-changers. It鈥檚 the difference between regularly making a series of small, safe bets vs. taking a few big swings on some big new ideas.
For innovation teams, identifying any gaps and filling them鈥攆rom drivers to owners to outcomes鈥攊s an urgent priority. It may sound like a lengthy, complex undertaking, but it really begins with a conversation. Only then can transformative innovation become rooted and grow.
Start by asking your CEO these six questions:
Asking these questions is just the starting point, of course. After all, transformational innovation is hard. It鈥檚 higher risk, tougher to define, and often slower to produce results. A CEO鈥檚 bold vision isn鈥檛 enough, as our research shows.
But asking the right questions sooner will start an honest dialogue that tightly aligns goals, KPIs, and hoped-for outcomes with everyone moving forward toward a shared vision for innovation鈥攁nd a genuine chance to actually execute on that vision.
For much more on how to get that dialogue started for your company, or to view survey results and case studies on how leading companies are solving their own innovation challenges, explore our reporting below.
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