The Innovation Mindset: Eight Essential Steps to Transform Any Industry
Lorraine H. Marchand with john Hanc
Columbia Business School Publishing (July 2022)

Innovative thinking can be much more than a process: it should be a way of life in the workplace.

With the assistance of John Hanc, Lorraine Marchand has created what is best viewed as an operations manual for establishing a workplace culture that embraces new ideas and encourages creativity within almost any “organization that, when properly tapped, could produce a torrent of free-flowing. fresh ideas worthy of satisfying customers and making it to market. It’s what I call the Innovation Mindset.”

Ignore this book’s subtitle. Its greatest value will be the nature and extent of assistance it provides to those who read it — especially C-level executives — to transform their organization. in some cases it ould be a division or even a department. Marchand focuses on three forms of innovation: Incremental (improvement of what is now does and how it does it), Breakthrough (new products and services), and Disruptive (whatever will “change the world forever”). She recommends an eight-step process with separate but interdependent components that she characterizes as “the Laws of Innovation.”

“To create meaningful change, to be innovative, we have to first adopt the right posture, the right attitbude. An Innovation Mindsedt emanates from a problem-solving cuture coupled with personal curiosity, passion, and natural talents. From there, you have a springboard to explore an area where ynou can understand and empath ize customerrs’ needs and develop solutbions they want. It all comes together when you understand what you’re good at, what the customer needs, and the impactb you want to have.” (Page 8)

Marchand makes effective use of several reader-friendly devices that include real-life case studies, Tables, examples, recommended website resourcess, and tools. I especially appreciate her provision of the “Chapter Takeaways” section at the conclusion of her Introduction, “nuggets”  of innovation applicatbions (e.g. RISK MATRIX SAMPLE on Page 157) and seven appendices after the final chapter. I urge those who read this book — in fact, any business book — to highlight key passages and have a lined notebook near at hand in which to record comments and questions as well as annotations to the narrative with page references. These two simple tactics will facilitate, indeed expedite frequent review of key material later.

Whatever their size and nature, all organizations need innovative thinking at all levels and in all areas of the given enterprise.  According to Lorraine Marchand, the innovation mindset is based on these principles:

o Each innovation must solve a problem (the right problem) by focusing on its root cause(s) rather than on its symptoms.
o Consider several possible solutions and then select the one that makes the most sense.
o Make certain the solution is as simple as possible…but no simpler.
o Ask those who will derive the greatest benefit from an effective solution.
o Be willing and able to modify the solution at any time to increase its effectiveness.
o All innovations involve risk. Use innovative thinking to minimize it.
o Gain wide and deep support for the innovation with persuasion rather than argumentation.

These are among the same key points to be made about design thinking. In Scramble, for example, Marty Neumeier explains what he characterizes as the “Five Ps”:

1. Problemizing:

Design thinking “isn’t about solving problems, but about framing them. Never accept a problem at face value. Instead, try to find out what the real problem is — the problem behind the problem — by asking a few questions such as “Is this the right problem to solve?'”

2. Pinballing

“The same way a pinball bounces off obstacles and other pinballs, ideas can bounce off obstacles and other ideas…The goal is to put options on the table that weren’t there before.” Why not a sunscreen lotion that repels mosquitoes? Why not a handle built into large containers? Mary Kay Ash once asked, “Why not add a pleasant fragrance to a leather softener lotion and sell it as skin cream to eliminate wrinkles?” You get the idea….

3. Probing

Neumeier credits Edward de Bono for having much of value to say about parallel thinking, “a technique in which the members of a brainstorming group think in the same direction at the same time. You take an idea from the pinballing stage and view it through six symbolic ‘hats’ [or modes of thinking]”: white for helpful information, red hat for evaluation based on emotions, yellow hat for positivity, black hat for caution and disagreement, and green hat for creative thinking. What about the sixth hat? Blue for the group leader who determines which “hat” or mode of thinking will guide and direct the discussion.

4. Prototyping

Prototyping is the magic that makes design thinking more powerful than traditional thinking. It adds the making step between knowing and doing. It’s the difference between deciding the future with off-the-shelf practices, and designing the future by working from first principles…Prototypes are essential for testing and learning.” Thomas Edison thought the greatest benefit of prototyping was to learning what wouldn’t work and (especially) why.

5. Proofing

“Assumption is the enemy of strategic thinking. We all make assumption about the way the world works, but assumptions can blind us to possibilities — and even reality itself…To get the most out of proofing, test two or more prototypes against each other.”

There is one other troublemaker I resume to add to this discussion: The “unknown unknown,” developed in 1955 by two American psychologists, Joseph Luft (1916–2014) and Harrington Ingham (1916–1995). This is what Mark Twain has in mind when suggesting, “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.”

I commend Lorraine Marchand for her brilliant, innovative contributions to knowledge leadership at a time when the need for innovative thinking, for the innovation mindset, is greater now than at any prior time that I can recall.  There are so many serious problems to solve. In this context, I am again reminded of the fact that the Chinese character for “crisis” (危机) has two meanings: peril and opportunity. How we approach the challenge of solving them will — to a great extent — determine how effectively they are solved.