5 tips for federal managers balancing innovation and execution

How do you balance the tension between managing for execution and being a catalyst for innovation?

In today’s fast-moving digital environment, failing to innovate is the fastest way to become irrelevant — both as a leader and as an organization. That’s not to say we should underplay the value of basic operations and maintenance tasks, but the work that keeps the ship afloat is, frankly, table stakes. The work that makes the ship go faster, sail farther, and do it more efficiently? That’s what makes supervisors, subordinates, stakeholders and constituents take notice.

The good news: Even innovation as incremental change can yield significant long-term positive effects that help achieve your organization’s mission.

But trying to innovate can seem like a strain on your schedule. As a government manager, you face pressure to innovate on top of operating within daily shifting policies and deadlines. While it’s important to execute against schedules, budgets, and stakeholder satisfaction, checking those boxes doesn’t often leave much time to innovate.

All this pressure may lead you to question the need to innovate or ask, “Isn’t innovation just a buzzword?”

While it certainly has become part of the daily beltway lexicon, the term refers to ideas and actions that can actually boost your ability to execute. Innovative approaches can raise team morale, do more with your resources and ultimately improve stakeholder experiences to yield better success metrics.

Think of it this way: Anything you do that’s different than what you did before and that adds value is a form of innovation.

Here are five tips to get you started:

1. Embed It: Innovation can be weaved into daily tasks. Start with small improvements to everyday to-dos. Save bigger ideas to build into future priorities so they’re part of the overall work plan rather than added work on top of your current job. For example, if team members have a difficult time staying on the same page about the priority order of tasks or often duplicate efforts, consider using a Kanban board — in JIRA, using a free tool like Trello, or even on a centrally located whiteboard. That’s an easy fix to increase visibility into everyone’s work and potentially streamline efforts.
2. Evaluate It: Implement a quick-fire process for capturing and evaluating ideas from team members. This could be through a short Web form that uses a collaboratively developed grading matrix or even a 15-minute stand-up meeting. Don’t be afraid to eliminate ideas that don’t hold water — the key is to create an environment where you can fail faster. The more ideas you capture and test, the higher the probability you will generate improvements that stick.
3. Just Do It: Nike’s well-known slogan really applies here. Too often we’re worried an idea might not be innovative enough, so we shy away from sharing it with the team or testing it out. But all improvements, regardless of size, are just that — improvements. Even smaller efficiencies in existing work free up time for the bigger thinking. This is a key part of the Three-Box Solution philosophy of innovation. If you’re not quite ready to create the future, go ahead and get started with optimizing the present! Simple process improvements are often a good place to start. For one of ICF’s clients at the National Cancer Institute, we piloted a two-week sprint process for developing and testing batches of high-quality social media graphics. The process sped up production and armed the team with valuable user data for improving performance on an ongoing basis.
4. Guide It: Coach your employees through apathy, fear, and resistance by demonstrating how seemingly inconsequential changes can help achieve things such as reduce time to delivery or make better use of the budget over time. Break out of the status quo by initiating short brainstorms based on design thinking exercises and other tools. Plan for innovation time and set the example. Try dedicating 15 minutes in a weekly staff meeting once a month to innovative thinking.
5. Frame It: Your boss and other stakeholders may also be resistant to change. Sometimes it may feel like the bureaucracy involved in surfacing a new idea isn’t worth it. Help mitigate some of these hurdles by making your recommendations data-driven. Show, don’t just tell, how your proposed innovations could address needs and have highly beneficial payoffs. Consider identifying an innovation expert to help build your case.

Incorporate innovation into your daily work — you can do it with measured, incremental improvements. What strategies have you used to tackle innovation in a manageable way so you can drive better execution?

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