The Process of Change, Creativity and Innovation - the Key Dimensions of Organisational Change. Which one Do You Think Is the Most Important?

The process of change, creativity and innovation –

SUMMARISE THE KEY DIMENSIONS OF ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE. WHICH ONE DO YOU THINK IS THE MOST IMPORTANT? WHY?

Understand the concepts of change, creativity and innovation

Change: Process of moving from a current state to a desired future state

Creativity: Generation of novel and useful ideas

Innovation: Translating ideas into useful and used new products, processes and services

Identify the key dimensions and triggers to organisational change

Dimensions:

• Scope of change
• Scale of change
• Timeframe of change
• The context within which change occurs
• Strategies used for managing the change process
• Change Variations:

• Developmental and transitional change (incremental changes)
• Transformational change (frame breaking changes)

Triggers:

• Drivers of change occur in the external environment (external to org)
• Task environment (unique to each org)
• Within organisation (intertnal to org)

Appreciate the debates around creative process

Myths:

• Smarter you are, more creative you are
• Creativity derives from eccentric personalities
• Creativity exists solely in the arts
• Creative output is always good

Realities:

• Individuals require a certain level of intelligence, must be willing to think in non-traditional ways, and be persistent over time
• Creative ideas should be translated into realisable products and services

Gain greater awareness of the key models of innovation

• Early four stage process of creativity by Wallas (1926)

• PREPARATION > INCUBATION > ILLUMINATION > VERIFICATION

• Three stage model by Basadur and colleagues (1982)

• PROBLEM FINDING > PROBLEM SOLVING > SOLUTION IMPLEMENTATION

• Five stage model by Amabile (1983)

• PROBLEM PRESENTATION > PREPARATION > RESPONSE GENERATION > RESPONSE VALIDATION > OUTCOME

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•  4PS of Innovation

• PRODUCT: iPhone and flat-screen TVs
• PROCESS: supply chain integration, cellular work arrangements, continuous flow assembly line
• PARADIGM: reframing (e.g. air flight expensive way to travel until challenged with the emergence of low-cost airline)
• POSITION: repositioning (e.g. Lucozade as a health drink for sporting activities rather than as a medicinal drink for sick children)

• Forms and levels of innovation

• Incremental innovations: Small changes e.g. picture quality, hi-fi sound
• Modular innovations: middle-range innovations e.g. b&w to colour TV
• Radical innovations: new knowledge e.g. telephone, internet, motor car

• Process model of innovation

• Search and assess: Scan environment to identify changes
• Select: Choose innovation
• Implement: Develop strategy to make it happen
• Capture: Ensure a gain in achievable benefits from innovation

• Social innovation

• Not driven by profit, but aims to improve wellbeing in society

• Disruptive innovation

• New industry with innovative products or products that perform less well but are affordable, simpler and more convenient

The individual: Promoting Critical Thinking –

IN YOUR OPINION, WHICH IS THE MOST IMPORTANT TYPE OF MOTIVATION? DISCUSS YOUR ANSWER BY USING RELEVANT EXAMPLES.

Understand individual creativity

Individual creativity:

• Creative behaviour is not only affected by personality factors, but it is also the outcome of a complex interaction between an individual and his/her contextual and social influences
• An individual’s cognitive style and abilities, personality traits, relevant knowledge, and motivation are required to innovate and be creative

Appreciate the relationship between personality and creative achievement

Characteristics of creative individuals:

• Risk taking
• Self confidence
• Tolerance of ambiguity
• Need for achievement
• Autonomy and non-conformity

Explain the cognitive factors that predict creative achievement

Cognitive features relevant to creativity:

• Mental flexibility
• Ability to link remote associations
• Suspension of judgement
• Originality of thinking

Examine the basis of knowledge and its contribution to individual creativity

• Acts as a store of building data for novel combinations, which means that without ‘input’ there can be no ‘output’ because there is nothing to ‘build upon’ (Whitfield, 1975)
• Makes you aware of current thinking in your own field or discipline
• Is considered as a source of opportunity to be further exploited
• Enhances creative individuals’ morale, as it enables them to add more interesting perspectives to what they are doing
• Knowledge can be a double-edged sword (Andriopoulos, 2003) – there is a hidden danger of conditioning in the sense of previous patterns of thoughts or knowledge providing the individual or team with an easy solution to current problems
• Haragdon and Sutton (2000) describe four processes to create and apply knowledge towards innovation – knowledge brokering cycle:

• Capturing good ideas
• Keeping ideas alive
• Imagining new uses for old ideas
• Putting promising concepts to the test

Differentiate between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation and understand how they both influence individual creativity

• Apart from achieving personal goals, there are two other motives that mobilise individual creativity (Ford, 1995):

• There are motives related to expectations regarding personal capabilities
• There are emotions that directly influence motivation

• Two types of motivation (Ambile, 1997)

• EXTRINISIC MOTIVATION: Comes from outside a person
• INTRINSIC MOTIVATION: Refers to one’s internal desire to do something

The Leader: Promoting New Ideas at Work –

IN YOUR OPINION, HOW ARE MANAGERS DIFFERENT FROM LEADERS? BE AS SPECIFIC AS YOU CAN AND SUPPORT YOUR ARGUMENTS.

Define the characteristics of leadership

• Ingredients:

• Power
• Understanding of people
• Ability to inspire
• A specific style (Weihrich and Koontz, 1993)

• “The social influence process in which the leader seeks the voluntary participation of subordinates in an effort to reach organisational goals” – Schieshiem et al, 1998
• “The ability of an individual to influence, motivate and enable others to contribute toward the effectiveness and success of organisations of which they are members” House et al, 1997

Clarify the differences between a manager and a leader

• Managers are usually chosen and appointed to their positions, while leaders are more likely to emerge from the working group (Robbins and Coulter, 2002)
• Managers influence and direct others due to their recognised power, while leaders go beyond that
• Although leaders anticipate change while setting direction for operations, managers focus more on generating results than on forecasting and dealing with change (Kotter, 1990)
• Managers are interested in how things are organised and implemented, while leaders are more concerned with what inspires and motivates people (Bennis, 1989; Kotter, 1990)
• Effective leaders need a ‘followership’ (Heller and Van Til, 1982
• There is a great difference in the way leaders and managers perceive and make use of their human resources

Understand the trait, behavioural, contingency, and contemporary theories of leadership