Stifling Innovation

Innovation is one of those words that I can scarcely type in here without shame. It has got to be the most hackneyed, consultant abused term that there is. The fact remains though, that innovation is critical to an organization's success. I could go on about the role and application of innovative thinking and behaviour in effective meeting design, but let's stay a little higher this time.


The role of meetings in innovation.


First, let's define "meetings". And by define, I mean let's acknowledge that a meeting can be anything, and so we won't really define it very narrowly at all. We'll call it any situation where more than one person is contributing to a challenge/opportunity. So an obvious function of meetings in innovation is people meeting to respond to an opportunity to innovate.


Having a discussion today with some leaders of MaRS Discovery District, we were expressing frustration with large and established organization's inability to innovate. Why do they seem to be so much less agile? There are many paradigms and bureaucracies that clearly stand in the way of fresh thinking, but I also believe that declining meeting practices are a massive contributor to stifling innovation.

As processes become standardized and routine, they lose visibility. Even core competencies like innovation get delegated (at some levels), are no longer assumed by groups, and eventually evaporate into procedure. Approaches to innovation also become stagnant as groups fall in love with a particular method, or fear the risk of new approaches.