Innovation has an image problem.
When a new idea fails, organizations are quick to blame the tech, the budget or the customer.
It’s a pattern Phédia Gottot sees constantly.
“If we’re trying to create something new, we can’t claim to know in advance what will work,” says Gottot, an innovation strategist and co-founder of Kainos Conseil. “That’s why innovation processes need to be approached differently, with more time devoted to understanding the problem before jumping to a fix.”
Gottot has seen the value of that approach firsthand. In one project with a municipality, residents, construction companies and municipal employees were interviewed about the permitting system. The goal was to gain a fresh perspective on the situation, identify the challenges and barriers, and better understand the experiences of the stakeholders involved.
In the project, the organization chose to develop an outward-facing platform better suited to users, while also improving internal collaboration and how files were tracked.
“They discovered new things about how they operated, and they also introduced solutions that were almost administrative or operational rather than exclusively technological,” Gottot says. “There was a technological component, but they didn’t begin with the assumption that the answer would be technological.”
That distinction is at the heart of her approach to innovation: start with a clear intention, but don't decide on the answer before you understand the question.
Gottot will explore that approach this October when she hosts the one-day course Making Innovation Happen at the John Molson Executive Centre.
“The idea was to better understand the problem and look at it from a different perspective, without taking for granted where the problem actually lay,” Gottot says.
Real innovation, Gottot believes, starts with the need — not the fix.
Phédia Gottot, innovation strategist
“If we already know the solution, we’re not innovating,” she says. “We have to understand the need and its context so solutions can emerge that truly respond to that need.”
This means understanding both what users are experiencing and what is happening within the organization that is contributing to those experiences.
In innovation, governance and organizational dynamics are rarely part of the conversation. Yet, more often than we think, the real opportunity for change lies there, not just in the solution itself.
“If you provide a public service, you want the population to be satisfied with it,” Gottot says. “You always innovate for the user at the end of the line. Bringing them into the conversation and co-creating with them can be a game changer.”
Once an organization accepts that it doesn’t have the answer yet, it can begin to explore.
Instead of committing significant resources to one idea, teams can build a rough version, put it in front of real users and learn from what happens.
“Innovation relies more on mindset than on tools because you have to accept that you don’t already have the answers,” Gottot says.
That approach can be particularly valuable for smaller organizations and public institutions that don’t have large research-and-development budgets. Testing an idea early can prevent an organization from making a costly investment in something that doesn’t work.
“You create an imperfect version and test it with the people who will use it,” Gottot says. “What works? What doesn’t? Then you improve it and keep working through iterations.”
Making mistakes early means they’re less expensive to fix. By the time an organization commits to an implementation, the idea has already been tested and refined with the people who will use it.
It takes more time upfront, but from both a risk management and change management perspective, it’s a win. You gain that time back during the implementation phase.
Leaders also have to accept that they may not have the answer. That means questioning their own assumptions and allowing people to experiment without punishing every mistake.
“Leadership is afraid of failure and of wasting money,” Gottot notes. “Which is understandable, nobody likes to fail, especially when public money is at stake. But if leaders don’t overcome that fear and act on their beliefs, nothing will happen.”
Training only goes so far if managers continue to expect work to unfold in the same way.
“Leaders often invest in training for their teams, but may spend less time reflecting on their own practices,” Gottot says. “Teams can develop a much broader perspective, but putting those new perspectives into practice can be challenging when leadership practices remain unchanged.”
When leaders participate alongside their teams, real change can happen. It creates the conditions for a new culture to emerge, builds confidence, and turns new ways of thinking into new habits and practices.
“It starts with saying, ‘My teams need training, but I also need to grow as a leader,’” Gottot says. “That’s when leaders experience the process alongside their teams instead of expecting change from everyone else.”
Organizations under pressure want fast results. But discovery and testing take time, and rushing them can lead to the wrong conclusions.
“We often try to innovate urgently,” Gottot says. “We expect a miracle solution and assume that speeding things up will produce an answer. In reality, we just burn our projects instead of setting them up for success.”
Going slow doesn’t mean waiting for perfection. It just means testing before committing and often leads to catching problems before an organization has invested heavily in them.
Schools and workplaces have long rewarded people for having the answer. Gottot sees another possibility: accepting that you don’t know everything can relieve some of that pressure and leave more room to ask questions, listen, learn and adapt.
“In my training, one of the ground rules is to be open to changing your mind,” she says. “If you enter that space without being open to changing your mind, you won’t learn. You don’t have to change your mind, but you have to remain open to the possibility.”
For organizations, that shift can change the entire process. Instead of rushing toward a solution, they can spend more time understanding the problem, testing their assumptions and learning from the people affected by it.
And sometimes, the first step toward innovation is just admitting we don’t know yet.
© Concordia University
