Between Colin's response, prototyping some measures and the rich discussion in the comments, I think we've arrived at a really great answer.
We don't know the one thing we'd measure for innovation.
But I'm glad we tried to answer it.
First, let me say I like Colin's idea of measuring personal experimentation. It's a good innovation measure that would likely lead to improvement.
Experiments require action. Innovation loves action. Experiments are fun. Innovation loves playfulness. Experiments, unlike tests, are designed for learning. Innovation loves learning. Experiment has a nice "tone" to it. Unlike "test," "experiment" takes some of the pressure off of being right and lets you work your way to what's right.Many small experiments often get there faster than big initiatives or projects. Innovation loves velocity. Colin's measure implies an ongoing process that starts at human scale and also scales to an organization. Innovation loves it when everybody can see themselves in it.
It would be important that such a measure not feel like a quota, otherwise you'd likely not get the variance in experiments - the process learning that's so critical. However, if an organization simply said, "we want you doing a lot more personal experimentation and we're going to tell you the kind we want, let you do it and support you in it" that would probably have a big cultural impact.
From the comments, Gabe's idea of an index says a lot. An index tries to bundle disparate factors into a predictive or explanatory telling of the whole. It's like Prego, it's in there.
In a sense, an outcome measure is an index. I hadn't thought of things like that before. There are myriad factors that lead to an amazing (or terrible) outcome. The challenge with indices is that they perform at a level of abstraction that is hard to affect as an individual. It's hard to grab hold of and change the Prego. Contrast a broad index with a concrete outcome measure and you'll see what I mean. For example, "we need to improve our 'open innovation score'" vs. "50% of our ideas need to come from the outside."
OK, if we don't know exactly what to measure, yet it's worthwhile, then what?
Simple. Design measures. (Or at least simply stated.)
Innovation measures, just like an innovation strategy, can and should be designed for a company's given situation, culture, brand and people. When designing innovation measures, I assess organizational readiness, approaches and outcomes of the process itself. Diego and I were tossing this around a couple of years back and described this as being considerate of what happens before, during and after the process or a project.
So, here's a list of some design principles for innovation measures. Innovation measures should:
- Be concrete, otherwise we won't connect to them- Scale, ideally from human-scale to organization-scale, so we see ourselves in them and can impact larger goals
- Be designed to improve, not to solely prove
- Encourage action, inspiration, intuition and feelings of safety, excitement and joy
- Have an expiration date; what you need to improve will likely change
- Have a bias towards experimentation, breaking things and learning
(Photo courtesy of Leo Reynolds and Creative Commons)
