THE CHIEF INNOVATION OFFICER (CINO) TRAITS AND MISSION

THE CHIEF INNOVATION OFFICER (CINO) TRAITS AND MISSION

Large companies need a Chief Innovation Officer (CINO), a powerful executive who can counterbalance the natural killing instinct of a company’s business units and design a more innovation-friendly organizational environment. The CINO’s key role is to constantly “bang the drum” for innovation, being essentially responsible for identifying and proposing areas where technology, company structure and day-to-day practices can be combined and refined to drive a business towards its corporate goals. A great CINO must be multi-skilled – a requisite that will often prevent traditional CIO or CEO job roles from absorbing this responsibility. Key roles in the Chief Innovation Officer (CINO) traits and mission:

1.    A HIGH CREDIBILITY FACTOR

It's not enough for a CINO to be respected by the employees in the company (though, certainly, that goes a long way). A CINO has to get the respect of all of the other officers in the company, as well. This is a leadership role, not a “boss” role—and that means that a CINO should ideally have already proven their innovative abilities when they join a company. Having a track record of past successful innovations will add credibility to a CINO’s recommendations and make it easier to bring other leaders to their vision. The CINO must be strategically aware and able to operate tactically in the short-term, but be equally comfortable in long-term strategic planning. They will believe in the benefits of innovation, but may not be the creative, innovative thinker.

2.    THE ABILITY TO BUILD AND BRIDGE CONNECTIONS

CINO need to prioritize building connections, both within your organization and between it and other organizations. The CINO understands that innovation is needed to solve the organisation’s biggest problems, and tends to be far more comfortable with seeking input from others, knowing that the best ideas can come from anywhere. A CINO should be willing to set aside ego and not worry about who gets credit for an innovation, but rather foster openness and transparency to drive collaborative change. Many innovative companies crowdsource product ideas and seek out the expertise of partner organizations. It’s about giving and sharing in order to create the best possible innovation by using all available resources.

3.    SUPPORTING BEST PRACTICES

This involves scouting and standardizing market research methods for novel ideas and insights; strategic innovation; promoting open innovation; and introducing group tools and processes that encourage creative thinking. Their key role is to create the environment that values, allows and enables the innovators to operate for best effect. Finally, today’s CINO is very organisational-savvy; they understand how to best operate and who holds the power to get things done.

4.    DEVELOPING SKILLS.

This is about training company personnel on the skills they need, and developing and applying measures to track improvements in innovation and the skills underpinning them. The combination of people skills, technological wisdom and a greater business understanding isn’t a natural marriage, and is the reason why innovation executives are becoming increasingly sort after.

5.    SUPPORTING BUSINESS UNITS IN NEW PRODUCT AND SERVICE INITIATIVES

This means acting as methodology expert and facilitator for the most critical innovation teams across the company, supporting them in “raising the bar” of their aspirations. Training other managers to perform these roles also allows them to support innovation in business units.

6.    IDENTIFYING NEW MARKET SPACES, ABILITY TO SEE AND COMMUNICATE THE FUTURE

This includes analyzing trends and market disruptions and searching for emerging new market opportunities. Innovation isn't just about coming up with the most original ideas, or recognizing an original idea when it’s presented. The success or failure of an innovative idea is often about timing. In some cases, they’ll need to be developed at the corporate level when they do not fit into the current business units’ boundaries. That means it’s crucial for a CINO to have a good predictive sense based on their experience in the market, and be able to see where a market might be going, identify future product needs, and contemplate how those needs will be filled. Not only that, but the CINO must be able to communicate those predictions in ways that make sense to others within an organization. They should be able to explain how they reached their conclusions and map out how the organization might go about adapting to those new realities

7.    THE ABILITY TO DRIVE IDEAS AND ACTION AROUND HIS OR HER VISION HELPING PEOPLE GENERATE IDEAS.

As a CINO, you have to have the power to drive ideas and actions around that vision to make it a reality. Setting up and running ideas generation platforms and formats like jam sessions, hackathons, and internal or external crowdsourcing for the benefit of the corporation. Put simply: it's not enough to have a vision. Forbes notes that a CINO doesn’t just need to be able to ideate, prototype, and launch a product, but do so in a team environment and in a way that plays on each team member’s individual strengths. As a CINO, you're a team leader first and foremost, and you need to know how to communicate your vision to a variety of people in such a way that it becomes their vision, too.

8.    THE ABILITY TO IDENTIFY, AND DISARM, THE INNOVATION ANTIBODIES

Innovation antibodies are the forces within an organization that fight against anything that threatens the status quo, much like how the antibodies within our own bodies fight against outside invaders. While they mean well by trying to protect the stability of the whole, they can end up doing a lot of damage by shutting down positive change.

One of the most important traits that a company can have is the ability to grow and adapt to change. Being resistant to change is anathema to innovation—no good ideas were ever born out of fear. As a CINO, you have to have the ability not only to function as the leader of a team, but also to identify those team members who are resistant to change and figure out why, and what it will take to disarm them. Whether they just need further education to understand the necessity for change or they simply aren’t suited to work for an innovative company, it will be up to you to decide how to handle these antibodies.

9.    DIRECTING SEED FUNDING

Owning and allocating a yearly budget to fund “homeless ideas” that are either too risky for the business units, or outside their existing business boundaries, which might not otherwise get funded. This provides an organizational home to nourish and protect new ideas.

10. DESIGNING SHELTER FOR PROMISING PROJECTS.

Designing resource allocation processes (portfolio, stage-gate, budgeting) to take potentially disruptive innovations forward from the seed stage to the market without getting killed on the way by managers who are invested in the status quo.

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Reading & References

·      https://hbr.org/2014/11/a-chief-innovation-officers-actual-responsibilities

·      http://philmckinney.com/the-top-5-skills-a-chief-innovation-officer-needs/

·      http://www.information-age.com/rise-chief-innovation-officer-leading-way-transformational-innovation-123457889/