Here's Why Employee-Driven Innovation Works

In today's fast-paced business landscape, the significance of innovation cannot be overstated. It's a game-changer that can make or break a company's success. In fact, companies that champion innovation are shown to average an 11% higher revenue compared to their counterparts, while organizations that resist it will run the risk of being left behind. To unlock the best outcomes, however, opting for an employee-driven approach is the ultimate solution.

Top-down, company-focused innovation can still yield some positive results but here’s why employee-innovation should be at the heart of your strategy.

Employee-driven innovation builds a company-wide strategy

Research has shown that a company-wide approach to innovation statistically yields the best results. When employees are at the forefront of innovative strategies through a bottom-up innovation approach rather than being dictated to by top-down endeavors, your company gains a full perspective by encouraging voices to be heard from all levels.

KICKBOX is a fantastic tool to help companies achieve this goal, with Implenia stating that it allows them to “reach out to all employees regardless of what their job is” and has been central to its ongoing development. 

Employee-driven innovation actively supports creativity

Innovation shouldn’t be viewed as a task that you schedule for a set two-hour window in the week. Employees will have a far better chance of working effectively on their innovations when the ideas are still fresh in their minds. KICKBOX allows users to begin to work on their innovations immediately from home or the workplace.

However, it only works if the company has the right mindset. Atlassian allows employees 24 hours to work on anything they want while many innovation leaders let employees dedicate 20% of their time to work on ideas. Supporting creativity in this way helps unlock success.

A framework for employee-driven innovation creates psychological safety

The harsh reality is that over 70% of products fail while even success stories like Infravista prove that an iterative approach is often needed to strike gold. In fact, even the makers of Angry Birds had over 50 failed concepts before finally finding a game that would disrupt the mobile gaming industry and subsequently become a global media franchise.

Employees need to feel comfortable with failure as everyone faces it. The fear of failure is often cited as the enemy of creativity and it becomes more noticeable when decision-makers need to be impressed at each stage. An appropiate framwork for employee-led innovation, helps to overcome this challenge.

Employee-driven innovation rewards every success

79% of employees who quit their jobs do so due to a lack of appreciation. It is particularly noteworthy in relation to innovation. While traditional setups are geared towards exclusively celebrating the big ideas or the person that put the final puzzle piece in place, employee-driven innovation celebrates triumphs at every stage.

Implementing reward pzograms is statistically shown to have a positive impact. You can take the success to even greater heights with tools like KICKBOX as every step on the journey of innovation is recorded, allowing the company to reward individuals appropriately.

Employee-driven innovation breaks restrictive habits

Encouraging a growth mindset is shown to boost ownership to the company by 34% and trust by 50%. Unfortunately, many traditional approaches to innovation limit the opportunities for employees to challenge outdated ideas or identify new ways to innovate. This can see companies get left behind while employees become disengaged from their work.

Employee-led innovation gives individuals a chance to take extra responsibility and try new ideas to disrupt an industry. Whether it’s using customer-centric ideas or collaborating with other teams, encouraging employees to discover solutions will create a winning culture. Furthermore, it can also result in significant revenue and ROI benefits. When employees are empowered to take ownership of their ideas, they are more invested in the success of the project and can generate innovative solutions that improve business outcomes. By embracing employee-led innovation, businesses can unlock the full potential of their workforce and achieve sustainable success.