Because we are in the Innovation and Idea Management space, thinking analogously about process in our day-to-day is just an occupational by-product – everything that moves or grows has some type of process associated to it. And with that comes the opportunity for continuous improvement. As we like to say in our industry, and because of Omni-present competitive forces, standing still is actually falling behind.

So as the week-end approached and a winter camping trip needed preparing for, I was packing a sleeping bag into the miniature sack it was meant to fit in (presumably inserted by a machine at the factory or my some highly-experienced hands on a production line). I was struggling to fit more of the sleeping bag into the seemingly full sack when I realized that sticking my hand deeper into the sack and pushing from that vantage point actually allowed me to jam more of the %”$”!* thing in; until it was completely packed. Whew!! Upon reflection of  a job well done, I made the link between this banal situation and some of the more common workflow process choke-points; and how typically force in its many permutations is exercised to try and alleviate the impasse - either through:

• Punitive measures such as:
• as being “outed” on a report
• having benefits taken away
• negative entry on an Annual Performance Review
• demotion
• Etc.
• Incentives such as:
• Cash
• Travel
• Merchandise
• Recognition
• ESOP
• Etc.

The sleeping bag analogy is particularly relevant to process innovation and the innovation process, as the targeted reach required to unblock resources (in this simplistic example being space), was the only leverage needed to remediate the blockage. It didn't require anything more than creating space where I thought there was none – I was counting on the pressure exerted against the portion of the sleeping bag already in the sack to do the pushing for me, when in fact, it was fully compressed already; making the chore of pushing exponentially harder. When one looks at the innovation process, this chain reaction not only creates the same resistance, but adds to it  from a human-dynamics perspective; as it produces ambivalence from very people you need engaged - because they are being pushed to do more or work harder when they already are. They`re often not the problem; rather the process is.

Without process innovation to go with your innovation process, pushing ideas down the same old channels will likely deliver the same old results in terms of quality, speed, engagement and overall success.