Innovation and the Path of Least Resistance
Choosing the path of least resistance is not always popular life advice.
But when it comes to creating meaningful change in any large organisation, avoiding unnecessary fights can save a lot of time and headaches.
Never pick up a fight if you don’t have to.
The innovation journey in any large organisation is painful. You will have to go against established processes, policies, behaviour; in short, resistance.
With so much resistance everywhere, it’s easy to get caught up in picking and winning fights.
What we don’t see is that every single one of those fights is a waste of time.
A better approach
Always seek the path of least resistance.
Rewriting processes, introducing new policies, developing new training programs are essential tasks, but they can wait until you have proven the value of the product you are creating.
To maximise your chances of success (and impact), you have to learn how to read the organisation and see which paths are clear.
If you can’t find any unobstructed path, you might need to tweak your product, reducing its features so that more ways can open up to you.
Picking bigger fights is way more manageable when you have a few wins under your belt.
People will be more willing to work with a certain success (even if it’s small) than a potential one.
Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it. Connect with my on Twitter for more content related to Corporate Innovation, Design and Leadership, or if you’d like to ask any question.✌️
This article is part of a series of 30 Atomic Essays I wrote for 30 consecutive days. You can check all of them here.
