THE IGNITER PROFILE

What challenge are you looking to solve with innovation right now?

I think our biggest challenge is the readiness of the organisation to innovate, particularly when things are going well, why change things? We do change a lot but often the change is operationally focused and not innovation driven. Yet, if we don’t generate new ways of doing things, even when business is good, we will become complacent and our competitors will pass us by. A big part of our strategy is business model innovation in the area of service transformation. We are traditionally a product- and sales-led organisation that has provided networking and communication infrastructure as our core business. A lot of that is non-recurring business. Our goal is to double our sales revenue, over the next three years, in the area of recurring business, such as services and software. This is going to take a lot of new ideas and a commitment to doing things differently.

Looking at your Six ‘I’s^® results, you’re an igniter. How does this knowledge impact or change the way you work?

As an igniter, I enjoy and see the relevance of generating new ideas. I also see my role in creating a team environment for others to do this as well. This does require managing the tension between delivering what the business needs today, and what it will need tomorrow, but I am willing to do this. I believe it is important. There can be reluctance amongst others to lead this way, probably because they are worried that it will distract their team from focusing on immediate business results. There is always a fine line between these two elements, and keeping them in balance is difficult to achieve, but I am more aware of it now.

How do you play to your strengths? What advice would you give other people who want to get better at igniting ideas?

If I am not playing to my strengths, I get bored, so I seek new ways to give expression to this strength by contributing and volunteering to be part of work groups and task forces that are outside my core work environment. I read a lot. I learn from others who are innovative. My advice to others is to do the same. Broaden your horizons from what is immediately important to you. Talk to more people inside and outside your organisation. You will then start to make connections between different ideas that are unrelated and this will help to spark new ideas.

What steps, if any, would you take to improve the areas where you are not so strong, or that are important to you and how?

I don’t think one can, or should be, good at everything. I manage a global team with members in Asia, Europe, Australia and the USA. I have made a conscious decision to recruit for diversity in skills and experience. What is important is to have a team where people can complement my skills as well as each other’s. I also learn from those who are good at investigating to see how they approach things and how they do things differently from me. This helps me grow my awareness and skills and helps me see my blind spots.

How has The Six ‘I’s^® helped you and your teams/business? What examples, if any, can you share?

We have been working with The Six ‘I’s^® over several years now and have applied it on a variety of business challenges. These have ranged from increasing our margins by improving relationships with colleagues in our IT call centres about how we allocate project roles and responsibilities, to creating new ways of engaging customers in our key accounts through quarterly business reviews and other practices. It gives us a structured process. A lot of people think that innovation is just about sparking a new idea out of the blue, and they struggle with being able to do this. The Six ‘I’s^® has broadened this concept and helped my team see that they can all contribute to creating value for the organisation.

Have you produced something you would consider innovative?

Currently we are working on new business model innovation in service delivery. We realise we lack the capability to develop and deliver managed services through a channel partner framework. This is an exciting space for the company to explore. Applying The Six ‘I’s^® has helped us to realise what our own limitations are as well as identify the external opportunity for driving new sources of growth and igniting new solutions. It has given us a step-by-step approach to think things through, get clarity and investigate our ideas more thoroughly to see if they will work before we invest more time and resources.