The Unlikely Key to Innovation
Our entire world is a big, complex mess. There are so many variables and levers that play a part in even the smallest decision a person makes on a daily basis, to the point where presented with the exact same choice on any other day, or even at any other time of that same day and the same person might choose differently. Lots of books and articles claim to be able to boil this complicated and vastly nuanced world down to a single thing, and that is literally never the case. There is always a myriad of other factors that play a part and anyone who claims that something can be simplified down to one key idea is talking utter bullcrap.
I am no better than those books and articles, I’m going to do it too and I’ll tell you for why… it makes for a much more engaging story. But at least I’m aware of my own hypocrisy.
Every single day, we are informed of a new, incredible innovation which is going to change the lives of millions. Solve world hunger. Fix the carbon crisis. Eradicate disease. There’s never a shortage of innovation in the world. We are very good at finding new innovative ways of solving problems, when the problems are external. Environmental. Bacterial. Agricultural. It’s very easy to observe the problem and find a solution, when you’re on the outside looking in. But only if you actually look. The biggest hurdle to overcoming our most important challenges isn’t the challenge of actually solving the problem, it’s getting people to care enough about that problem to do something about it.
So I present to you, my one unlikely key to innovation (ignoring all other factors involved because it’s convenient to my point): Empathy.
Without empathy, those fortunate enough to be in a position where they can do something about a problem would never feel compelled to act. They’d never want to find ways of generating clean, renewable energy because why would they? The world is fine now. They don’t have to worry about the icecaps melting, they’re not a polar bear.
Luckily, the vast majority of people do have a reasonable level of empathy and as such we do continue to find ways to solve the majority of our most important problems. The challenge comes when the empathy you have, comes head to head with your own behavioural inertia.
Behavioural inertia, much like Newton’s First Law of Motion, simply put is that people will always lean towards continuing to do what they are currently, or have always done. The desire to maintain the status quo, as it’s the path of least resistance. Everybody falls fowl to this. How often has someone asked why you do a certain thing, and you have no real good answer other than; “I dunno, I just always have”. In 99% of scenarios, that’s perfectly acceptable. It doesn’t hurt anyone. You do you.
As an example. I am right handed, yet I eat as a left handed person would; fork in right hand. Now I’ve come up with many ‘reasons’ for this over the years. “I mirrored my dad who sat opposite me at the table”, “I believe the fork is the more key utensil and so want my dominant hand controlling it”. When in reality, the truth is, I don’t know why. I just always have. And that’s fine. Because the last time I checked, nobody got arrested for holding their knife and fork ‘backwards’ (but if my life ever takes a drastic change in direction and I end up in the company of royalty and dignitaries I might suddenly find that it is no longer not an issue… like that’s ever going to happen).
The issue arises, when our behavioural inertia, overpowers our levels of empathy in a situation that does matter. Something that does impact peoples lives. There is an extensive list of topics which I am not anywhere near well versed enough in to even pretend to comment on, so I’m not going to. But there is one topic which I can comment on. The workplace. The ongoing battle between individuals doing the doing, and those on high doing the telling. There are so many industries, organisations or departments that are just stuck in the dark ages. Places who do things the same way they always have, because they always have. There is a reason why in 2015 when Windows 10 came out, Windows XP (released 2001, 4 versions old) was still used by over 10% of the world. You could argue that it’s because Windows 7, 8 and Vista were all pretty garbage and that’s a fair argument. But the reality of the fact is that a huge portion of the business world made the move over to be fully computerised with the release of Windows XP as that’s when computers really could do everything they needed, which I’m sure for some organisations was forced upon them and heavily protested. But after that, good old inertia kicked in. It was simply easier to just carry on with Windows XP and dealing with the annoyances that came from that than to upgrade. The next big switch came with Windows 10 being widely adopted and only really because at that point Windows XP was so old that they had no choice but to update and upgrade. They probably did it kicking and screaming as they were dragged into the modern age.
So now we’ve accepted that there is a vast ocean of businesses out there that operate in an archaic and deprecated manner, we can look at why they do.
I believe the main driving factor is the individuals responsible for ‘enabling’ innovation to happen in a business/workplace context; think new strategies of leadership or customer focus; are so far removed from all of the problems that their behavioural inertia far outweighs their empathy to do something about it. The problems that you, in your day job experience, are so insignificant to someone several levels above you that it’s much simpler for them to just leave things as they are and do it how we’ve always done it. When books/articles/life coach guru types talk about how to influence change, they always talk about getting buy in. They’re not wrong. If you don’t get buy in from people, you’re dead in the water. But I like to look at things differently. I like to say, why should the average worker who is just simply trying to do a good job have to be the one that is learning how to influence people and get buy in. Why can’t the leaders of today just simply learn to show some empathy and put themselves in the shoes of the many, and try to understand the challenges they face. You don’t need to come up with the solutions to their problems the majority of the time, they’ll be best placed to do that. You just need to simply not get in their way, when they try to find innovative new ways of doing things.
So the next time someone, whether it’s a new starter or just an inquisitive mind at work, asks you why you as an organisation does something a certain way. If you find yourself uttering the words, “we just always have”, stop and challenge yourself. Are you doing it the best way? Or has behavioural inertia superseded your empathy to see the problem that other people are having to endure?
Thank you for coming to my ted talk.
I am available to give talks in England on how to build a culture and environment that breeds productivity and fulfilment through effective leadership. Connect with me on LinkedIn and let’s talk some more: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martyn-puddephatt-14b08757/.
Follow me on Twitter @mistermartynp. Not that I ever tweet.
