Beyond Boundaries: Innovation for a post-COVID future

Innovating beyond the known limits has always been a core tenet at Lenovo. The global pandemic merely accelerated this practice.

Like much of the rest of the world, our factories and supply chains weathered an unprecedented storm. We worked round the clock to keep our multinational customers and consumers innovating as their reliance on technology increased overnight. The end goal? Create a smarter future where diversity rules, our teams are more resilient and businesses are increasingly agile.

See where we’re headed since leaving boundaries in the rearview.

Focusing on the future

The pandemic created seismic shifts in innovation. To understand how businesses were harnessing that innovation, Lenovo commissioned research among 300 leaders worldwide, mapping the strategic drivers, approaches to and challenges around innovation.

What we found: Companies are no longer satisfied with growth alone. 54% say the crisis has catalyzed their efforts to use innovation to improve their social and environmental performance – with sustainability the top innovation driver.

People became more open to change after Covid

This past year marked a new golden age of innovation. While that change may have initially been uncomfortable, 58% of businesses believe the opportunities of the post-crisis era have made them more open to taking risks.

Suddenly, new ideas were being implemented in real-time and on a massive scale. Daryl Cromer, CTO of PCs and Smart Devices at Lenovo, said “COVID drove a massive acceleration. It drove a sense of urgency. Remote medicine had been talked about for years. Suddenly it was implemented in days.”

What are the strategic drivers of innovation?

Never has “innovate or perish” felt so relevant. Still, each company’s tactic for accelerating past the mounting challenges of the past year has looked different.

According to our leaders, some key drivers of innovation include:

• Adapting existing offering to meet changing customer needs (46%)
• Evolving businesses to meet demand from new global customers (44%)
• Defending businesses from new entrants and disruptors (43%)
• Improving environmental sustainability (42%)
• Creating more inclusive products, for a diverse population (42%)
• Rethinking core business models to meet changing customer needs (36%)
• Transforming businesses to meet demand from new customer segment (32%)

Most can be categorized into one of the following future frontiers.

Diversity is key

Embracing diversity is the first step to providing smarter technology for all. 59% of businesses we surveyed prioritize diverse abilities by engaging gender, age, neurodiversity, and physical ability, as well as ethnicity, in their innovation.

Yet growth edges like gender balance often present roadblocks to diversity driven innovation. In traditionally male dominated fields like engineering and product development, for instance, companies who fail to analyze the composition of their teams may end up developing products that don’t appeal to women–or worse, alienate them entirely.

Calvin Crosslin, Lenovo’s Chief Diversity Officer, offers an example of how company policy can make a difference. “By putting checks and balances in place, we ensure we are engaging diverse voices inside and outside our organization and creating a model for accessible innovation.”

Team dynamics

Based on our research, teams that encourage “intelligent failure” and remove barriers like operational hierarchy are best at nurturing innovation.

Scott Anthony, Senior Partner at Innosight explains, “…failure is painful, it hurts, and it’s unacceptable if it’s because people have simply taken poorly thought-out risks. What you need is intelligent failure, where you failed in the right way and approached it with the scientific method.”

Pamela Mar agrees, adding that when innovation is managed top-down, it further stifles ingenuity. “What you need to do is involve people in innovation from the start and let them know that they have authority to shape it and drive it,” she says. “People should say, ‘Here is something that could be useful to you. I’m going to give you this knowledge and I will remain by your side as you operationalize it.’”

Agile working

Two in three businesses (67%) believe their response to COVID-19 has ultimately made them more innovative and agile. Many credit this to the creative inspiration their teams drew from working in remote environments.

However, remote work can also be a double edged sword. Without opportunities for spontaneous connection, it can erode company culture and compound personal pressures that thwart innovation.

To inspire creativity and prevent burn-out, leaders need to strike a balance, prioritizing consistent, transparent conversation and recognizing it as a key component of agile work.

Looking ahead, it’s clear speed alone can’t create a culture of innovation. For that, businesses must continue amplifying all voices, overcoming legacy behaviors and addressing the challenges of hybrid working in a post-COVID reality.

Content created and provided by ONEAFFINITI.