innovation Archives - Dennis E. Gilbert

08
Sep 21
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Memorize or Look It Up, Which Type Are You?

Tags : fundamental skills innovation job skills learning memorize

Is your first action to memorize the information? Another choice is to plan to look it up again when needed. Are you one of these types or somewhere in-between?

Thirty plus years ago, it seemed the primary method of developing or honing a skill was to memorize the tactical components. This made experience so much more relevant.

The auto mechanic who knew the engine inside and out and could recite torque specifications for the crankshaft bearings, connecting rods, and cylinder head, had more value when compared with the less experienced oil-changer.

It is also true for the computer programmer who understood Control Language, Assembler, and Machine Code. Today, high-level software instructions shield most application developers from the lowest level instruction code.

It’s probably true in architecture, engineering, and even in health care, what once required deeper understanding and foundational skills is somehow replaced with higher-level, simpler instructions.

The school-age kid wonders about the need to learn the fundamentals of math when there is a always a calculator in hand.

Does it matter?

Memorize or Look It up

Like many things in life there are arguments either way.

Do you only have to learn enough to be able to look it up? Is that true for a heart surgeon, the bridge builder, or the CPA?

The most simplistic argument is, what happens if you don’t have access to look it up?

What if you don’t have the calculator, what if you don’t have YouTube, or Google? What if?

How will you learn how to do the next thing? Will creativity automatically develop, or does it only happen with those who have the curiosity to ask a deeper question?

Does history matter? What is the historical perspective?

It seems to me that fundamentals still matter. If we only know what we can look up then there isn’t much value in your contribution.

Studying, learning, and memorizing are the ground work for employee value.

Everything else might just be a robot.

-DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and culture expert. He is a five-time author and the founder of Appreciative Strategies, LLC. His business focuses on positive human performance improvement solutions through Appreciative Strategies®. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

31
Aug 21
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Moving Forward, Sticky Leadership Ideas Sell

Tags : belief change ideas innovation pivot

We’re moving on, or we’re moving forward. It’s a charge that many people have grown to expect as their team moves from obstacles, setbacks, or even failure. Is this good leadership?

Leadership requires responsibility. It requires action, effective communication, and fosters opportunity.

Change is often based on a decision. Sometimes it is based on a need, an obstacle, or an event.

Revenues falling short, you have a need.

Good momentum, suddenly halted, and you may have an obstacle.

Some unexpected force, an act of God, a stock-market crash, or a pandemic, any of these and many others might signal the start of an event that requires change.

Leaders often come to the table with new ideas. It is considered to be a fundamental part of leadership.

Are your ideas good? Will your idea work? Are you able to get buy-in?

Moving Forward

Whoever made the first donut likely did it accidentally or with purpose. Either way, the first donut, at the time, may not have seemed like a good idea.

We could probably say the same about flavored coffee, the personal computer, or built-in cameras on telephones.

Arguments against, or obstacles in the path, may have been a challenge that needed to be overcome.

It first, it may not have seemed like a good idea. Too expensive, or simply undesirable.

Creating change, or examining a product life cycle, can often be represented on a bell curve. In the beginning, not much is happening, it is hard to gain momentum. After the peak, it is much harder to grab a piece of the market or be successful.

The most difficult challenge may be that in the early moments, a good idea may be a tough sell. No one seems to know if the idea is good or bad.

Leader’s Lead

There are many components of leadership. The idea is that leaders lead forward. They help discover, create, or engage with forward movement.

Good ideas are often a hard sell at first. When a good idea gets sticky, you’ve probably achieved buy-in.

It’s more than just having an idea. Leadership includes the act of making them sticky at just the right moment.

Most ideas are just ideas until they move forward.

Long curves or short curves. Jumping on the curve early has the most advantage.

Belief often conditions what happens next.

-DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and culture expert. He is a five-time author and the founder of Appreciative Strategies, LLC. His business focuses on positive human performance improvement solutions through Appreciative Strategies®. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

30
Aug 21
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Technology Tools, Still Room For Improvement?

Tags : costs innovation leadership technology tools

Do you like technology tools? For example, do you like your navigation system in your car, or the app on your phone? What about streaming content? Netflix for example, YouTube, or Peacock?

Are tech things working for you? Have they made life better?

There are many more things you can add to the list, but this is a good start.

Yesterday, I had to drive about 80 miles away from my home. I’ve been to this location twice before in the past 10 years. The last time was 4 years ago. The location is somewhat remote, several winding and twisting back country roads in the last 10 miles or so. I know the way, until the last few miles.

Why can’t I put my destination in my navigation system, and when I need help, just ask. For example, “What exit off route 283?”

Granted my car is a few years old, and newer navigation systems (or apps) may have better features, but are they at that level yet?

What about Netflix?

I like Netflix on some level, but why does it show me little kids movies in the top 10? I don’t see myself ever watching them. Ever.

Why can’t the filter features be better or easier? In my search, I haven’t seen a filter to remove movies that are dubbed over from another language. It may be there, but I have haven’t noticed it.

Why can’t Netflix be smarter? It should know by now that every time I play a movie that is dubbed over, I only watch the first 5 minutes.

Flying (air travel) was much better in the 1990s than it is today. More flights, better service, fewer delays, less crowded planes. Why isn’t it better in 2021? There are a lot of reasons, but some of it comes down to cost.

Technology Tools

This is not intended to be a rant session. It is intended to illustrate that while we’ve come a long way, there is still room for improvement. Why haven’t there been more improvements?

It may be simple, improvements in technology cost. The price is something that not everyone is willing to pay.

Seen through a different lens it is about profit. The other side of cost for the consumer is profit for the business.

How much pain will the consumer accept before rejecting the offer?

I like my navigation system, I like Netflix, air travel is really taxing me lately and I definitely can’t say that I like it much right now.

There is a chance for improvement, yet it is a scale with a slippery slope.

In society, business, or personal habits, things often don’t change if the people do not see a compelling enough reason to do so.

Some things will stay the same.

For now.

-DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and culture expert. He is a five-time author and the founder of Appreciative Strategies, LLC. His business focuses on positive human performance improvement solutions through Appreciative Strategies®. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

18
May 21
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Adaptive Change Is Different From Innovation

Tags : adaptive change innovation new normal pivot

You recognize things are changing. Have you been experiencing adaptive change?

Many people, likely most people, realize that change is always happening. There are technology advancements, societal shifts, and even history that becomes understood in a different way.

Is there a status quo? How long does a status quo last? It is minutes, hours, a year or more?

There are pockets of people who want life exactly the way it was years ago. There are groups of people, the Amish come to mind, who believe the ways of the past are the pathways to the future.

In a world of constant change the riskiest place to be might be staying in the status quo.

What do you do? Do you adapt or do you innovate?

Adaptive Change

Many people are on the path to adapting. Change is happening. Sometimes too slow and sometimes too fast. In some cases, the expectation is to go back to the old way of doing things. It suggests that perhaps there isn’t a new normal.

Think of the cars of the 1990s, or older, on one hand, it seems not that long ago, on the other, the technology in newer automobiles is drastically different.

Is different better?

It may depend on who you ask. If you’re driving a brand-new car, as compared with one manufactured 20 or more years ago, you’ve adapted to change.

Sure, it’s still an automobile with four tires, but many things about its movement, suspension, comfort, and onboard tech are very different. Perhaps, you didn’t even notice.

It is true for your computing devices. From mechanical storage drives to static storage, to the cloud. As an end-user do you even realize where your data is being stored? If you are a smartphone user, probably not. You’ve just been going with the flow.

If you engage at nearly any level in society, your community, or your workplace, you’ve probably changed recently.

Adaptive change doesn’t make you an innovator. Yet, innovation is something someone is doing.

There is always a new normal.

-DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and culture expert. He is a five-time author and the founder of Appreciative Strategies, LLC. His business focuses on positive human performance improvement solutions through Appreciative Strategies®. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

26
Feb 21
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Process Matters, You Can’t Afford To Skip It

Tags : client requirements innovation process system workplace

In a rush, I pulled my thumb drive from my tablet device and the data got scrambled. It doesn’t even look like the same device in file manager when I plug it now. This is evidence that sometimes, process matters.

Innovation matters too. New ways of doing things, exploring for the best results. Taking some risk, trying something new. All are important yet you can’t really escape process.

You can’t wear a jacket before it is sewn together. You can’t really eat a slice of cherry pie before it is baked.

Some things just don’t work or are otherwise not possible until the process is complete.

The challenge for many innovators and product creators is to understand what happens when it’s mandatory that step A, happens before step B.

In haste to transform from an idea to a product, people sometimes try to skip a step.

Often, you can’t.

Process Matters

It is a challenge for everyone in the workplace. Following the guidelines of the build, the assembly, or navigating the structure for packaging a service requirement.

It is hard to forecast the schedule beyond the scope of the current funnel.

Client requirements flex, shift, and are impacted by their own unforeseen events. Supply chain interruptions, severe weather, and a missed deadline all impact stops and starts.

Waiting always feels like a big time-waster. Fear of waiting may cause the overly anxious to attempt to skip a step. Patience is a competency that cannot be overlooked or underestimated.

Process matters for everything you do. It can change, but it usually doesn’t mean it can be skipped.

-DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and culture expert. He is a five-time author and the founder of Appreciative Strategies, LLC. His business focuses on positive human performance improvement solutions through Appreciative Strategies®. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

28
Jan 21
-

Popular Isn’t Always Immediate In The Workplace

Tags : culture innovation popular systems workplace

Much of the work people do is an attempt to make it popular. It is desirable for ideas to become popular. The same is true about workflow, energy, and the secret formula that every business believes they have.

When it comes to workplace culture, it is unique. To the same extent so are the individuals who make up the culture. Each person is bringing a slightly different perspective of their own values and beliefs.

Culture isn’t immediate. It takes shape across time.

Slow Starts

Many great ideas aren’t popular at first. They take time, some proof, a story, and examples.

Umbrella’s, coffee, and even personal computers had many moments of not being popular. While it sometimes seems hard to believe, often great things require time to become great things.

Businesses, organizations, and groups of all sizes and styles experience new ideas. Some of those aren’t original, and most haven’t been tested or stood the test of time.

It doesn’t mean that those ideas, systems, or strategies are without value.

Becoming Popular

What may be required is consistent effort, devotion, and an undying level of persistence to bring them to life.

If the people involved care enough and demonstrate their commitment others will often jump on board. For every idea, there is an associated journey. Some are longer than others. Some flash in the pan and are then dismissed just as quickly.

The biggest ideas, those of great value, often aren’t catchy at first.

Being popular, or not, often has little to do with long-term success.

Not immediate almost never means, not worthwhile.

It may some day mean popular.

-DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and culture expert. He is a five-time author and the founder of Appreciative Strategies, LLC. His business focuses on positive human performance improvement solutions through Appreciative Strategies®. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

18
Dec 20
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Navigating Mistakes Is Part Of The Process

Tags : customer expectations innovation mistakes perfection

How are you at navigating mistakes? Do you get hung up on them? Do you get stuck or worry about how things might look?

Some mistakes are catastrophic. Launching a rocket for a rendezvous with the International Space Station may not have much room or tolerance for a mistake.

Trying your skill at a new Excel formula or launching a new test marketing project may be about trial and error. Mistakes are easily overcome, and may even be considered part of the process.

You have a chance each day to decide how you will navigate mistakes you encounter. Certainly, not all mistakes have the same consequence.

The Slinky, Penicillin, and potato chips all originated from a mistake of sorts. Created by accident but later showing an unsuspected high value.

Every time you are trying to blaze a new path. Whenever you explore the previously unexplored, or you may simply be on a mission to lead, you have to realize that mistakes are part of the process.

Navigating Mistakes

You draft the important email message and review it twenty-five times.

Why?

It is a draft and you expect mistakes.

Yet the worry of imperfection often delays the process. Procrastination may set in, or you may decide to skip it altogether.

What happens when the effort is for the customer?

When the customer expects perfect, it is probably an assumption that the mistakes have already been made. The bugs or kinks have been worked out and the trial-and-error period is over. A warranty helps ease the risk.

Most great outcomes develop from a series of previously poor decisions, mistakes, or accidents.

Learning has both a cost and a value.

-DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and culture expert. He is a five-time author and the founder of Appreciative Strategies, LLC. His business focuses on positive human performance improvement solutions through Appreciative Strategies®. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

13
Nov 20
-

Unrealized Change is Always Connected to Opportunity

Tags : change innovation pivot technology workplace

“What’s new?” is a common way to strike up a conversation. A common answer, “Not much.” Yet unrealized change is happening all around you.

Thirty years ago, on or around this same calendar date, I got up, went through a brief morning routine of hygiene and breakfast, drove to my office, grabbed some coffee, and started writing code.

At that time, there wasn’t the internet as we know it today. We didn’t have cellular phones, at least not enough to speak about. And if I wanted to read something it probably started with a newspaper, magazine, or book. A real-to-life book, not a digital version.

This morning I got up, walked and fed the dog, popped a K-Cup in the Keurig, grabbed a cookie, and reported to my home office.

My home office is much more like a studio than an office of thirty years ago. Three high-definition cameras surround my workspace, complete with professional-grade shotgun microphones, three lights on tripods, and two-monitors plus one flat-screen TV all surrounding my workspace as I type.

Today I’ll visit one of my university partners while wearing a protective mask, sign some certificates of completion for the participants of an online leadership development training program, and return to my office by Noon.

My afternoon will be spent developing more programs, catching up on some accounting work, and preparing for the delivery of five programs across four days next week.

What’s new?

Not much.

Unrealized Change

I can’t imagine life without change.

People feel strained by what they refer to as information overload.

Many people who are under thirty years of age, the place where this story started, don’t plan to read anything other than the gibberish coming across their 3-inch by 4-inch cellular phone screen.

Much of the workforce won’t go to what might be referred to as a traditional workplace. A human virus plus technology collided and changed things nearly overnight.

More and more people are paid to interpret and dissect information and make decisions or take action based on what they’ve discovered from a digital device than ever before.

Cable television and digital streaming services pour content into homes and workplaces at speeds barely imagined just a few short years ago.

What is known is online shopping is a booming business while traditional retail largely struggles in decline. Thirty years ago, it was called a mail-order company, today its a staple of the economy.

Things are still changing.

Opportunity in Change

What is most useful may not be realizing the number of people you can touch in a single day. The distance that your message, your voice, or image can travel as you work with people in real-time across town, or across the country.

What may be most useful is to recognize the value of change and to determine how you will use it to improve the scope of your life and your work.

Arguably, the pace may have been slower thirty years ago.

So was the opportunity to make a difference.

-DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and corporate trainer. He is a five-time author and the founder of Appreciative Strategies, LLC. His business focuses on positive human performance improvement solutions through Appreciative Strategies®. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

20
Oct 20
-

Mismatched Expectations Will Get You Every Time

Tags : expectations experiences innovation strategy

Disconnects in customer service happen all the time. It happens for new hires, and it happens for the project. Mismatched expectations don’t mean that everything is lost.

As a young boy my son always loved my mother’s pot-pie. She had a special home-made recipe of beef pot-pie that seemed like the best comfort food on the planet.

When my son was in his early teenage years, we visited a restaurant and on the menu was pot-pie. Much to my surprise, instead of a burger and french fries my son ordered the pot-pie.

After the meals were brought to the table, I noticed him picking at his dish. He seemed displeased. It wasn’t the pot-pie that his grandmother made. It was a poor imitation.

The restaurant was very popular and served fantastic food, but to him, the dish seemed barely eatable.

Similarly, in high school, I had some friends who loved the boxed macaroni and cheese that their mother often prepared. What they didn’t realize that she often bought a low-priced generic brand. One day she splurged and bought a well-known and popular brand. My friends hated it.

In life, or in food, what you experience is often embraced or rejected based on your previous best experiences.

Have you ever had mismatched expectations?

Mismatched Expectations

It is true for the food you eat. It’s true for the new marketing plan, the process improvement, and even your job.

It is also true for everyone else, only sometimes in the opposite manner.

Often there may be room to compromise, negotiate, or allow for a fluid process. Of course, the level of satisfaction will always be compared to what was the previous best experience or taste.

Thus, the saying, “Those are big shoes to fill.”

Navigating your job, career, or the customer may not always be easy. It is a dance between your best delivery and the expectations of someone else.

When they align, everything feels like the right fit. When they don’t, the impulse is to discard it.

Keep in mind though that the right fit for someone may be the rejected mismatch by another.

Sometimes the best option is just on the other side of your expectations.

The challenge then is breaking the cycle.

It is a test of sorts. A test for the reliability and authenticity of the disambiguation, what you see is what you get.

-DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and culture expert. He is a five-time author and the founder of Appreciative Strategies, LLC. His business focuses on positive human performance improvement solutions through Appreciative Strategies®. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

14
Oct 20
-

Project Details Bring It All To Life

Tags : buy-in details innovation strategy

Are you working on a significant project? Have you revealed the project details?

In the seventh grade, it wasn’t okay to only have the correct answer on the Algebra exam, the teacher insisted that you show your work. On the vocabulary test, you had to express the exact verbiage. Skimpy answers didn’t show comprehension.

In your workplace, giving answers, much like giving your statements about your beliefs, is not always enough. Proving the concept or theory behind the work justifies its validity.

Bringing your ideas forward in the product development meeting, marketing meeting, or the strategic planning session may be more factual and justified when you provide the details. Sometimes the vision for the finished work is hard to believe unless you know the details.

Certainly, there are many situations when it is important to only provide the highest level. Details take time, require energy, and of course, comprehension.

Project Details

When you present the details, you’ve proven your work. Others can follow the logic and get committed because they see what you see. Once they understand, they believe.

Sometimes it isn’t always about history. Sometimes it has never been done before. When you help others follow the logic it brings the picture to life.

Logic often develops from best practices. Components that can stand on their own, and when combined, create a new end result.

Standards apply too. Standards have been proven and feel safe. Outcomes feel more certain and less like an enthusiastic guess.

In many cases the new project isn’t rejected because it was a bad idea or simply won’t work. It is rejected because no one believes in the outcome.

-DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and culture expert. He is a five-time author and the founder of Appreciative Strategies, LLC. His business focuses on positive human performance improvement solutions through Appreciative Strategies®. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

Tag Archives: innovation

Sep 21

-

Memorize or Look It up

Aug 21

-

Moving Forward

Leader’s Lead

Aug 21

-

Technology Tools

May 21

-

Adaptive Change

Feb 21

-

Process Matters

Jan 21

-

Slow Starts

Becoming Popular

Dec 20

-

Navigating Mistakes

Nov 20

-

Unrealized Change

Opportunity in Change

Oct 20

-

Mismatched Expectations

Oct 20

-

Project Details

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