The 3P's To Mindful Innovation

Innovating can be complicated and confusing, this meditation helps drive focus on how we can innovate more mindfully by exploring the 3P's of Innovation. Matt is an innovator, author of the book The Mindful Innovator and columnist from Innovation Leader that will help drive clarity and purpose to your innovation strategies.

Transcript

Hello and thank you for joining me today.

My name is Matt Muller.

I am a seasoned corporate innovator and I know firsthand how easy it can be to miss the mark on innovation objectives.

Between the overwhelming amount of content that is available to read on innovation and the mantras that we use like innovator die,

Disrupt or be disrupted,

And fail fast,

We can be easily overstimulated.

And when we are overstimulated,

It gives us a feeling that we need to make a decision without having a chance to fully think about what we are actually doing.

I call this aimless innovation.

And once you begin innovating aimlessly,

Fewer people in your organization will want to work with your team.

Expectations will become unclear and confusing.

And you'll find yourself working on tangents that don't relate to the initial work that you started.

Aimless innovation is a downward spiral.

It makes you feel like you're not making any progress.

Using the three P's of mindful innovation,

You can correct the trajectory of your team.

Okay,

So find a quiet place where you can be understerved for the next few moments.

And we can focus together on your innovation initiatives.

And before we get into the three P's,

Let's just focus in on the breath.

We're going to use the four to four count here.

So I want you to breathe in through your nose for four seconds.

Hold it for two,

And then out through your mouth for four seconds.

So breathe in four seconds.

Hold and out for seconds through your mouth.

As you breathe,

I want you to feel the breath.

Feel the breath as it passes the tip of your nose.

And as you breathe out,

Feel it passing by your lips.

And then again,

Breathe in through the nose.

Hold it and out through the mouth.

If you find your mind wandering,

That's not a problem at all.

Just begin again.

And punish yourself.

Don't wonder why you were thinking something else or anything like that.

Just get right back to the breath and just tell yourself to breathe in and breathe out.

It's as easy as that to get right back into the swing of things.

And I just want you to focus now on the breath.

Say to yourself,

Breathe in and breathe out using the four to four count here just for a moment.

And then we're going to dive into these three P's.

Now I want you to think about an innovation project that you've been working on.

It might be something that you're about to do today or something that you have done recently in the past.

Okay,

Let's dive into the first P.

That first P is purposeful.

Now I want you to think about what you are about to do today.

What is that next innovation project that you're going to work on?

And ask yourself,

Is the project we're about to work on purposeful?

Now there's three different ways to evaluate this.

And the first is really understanding where are we going?

What is this project actually about?

What are we doing?

And then once we understand what we're doing,

Why are we going there?

And your answer here should always be that you are aligning with the purpose of your company,

The mission,

The vision.

If your company is about sustainability,

And that is top notch,

The most important thing for your company,

Does this project support sustainability?

And if it doesn't,

We really should be asking ourselves,

Why are we doing this?

And the last thing we want to think about in being purposeful with our project is to really understand who is going with us.

A lot of times in innovation we work on a project,

We have a strategic goal and objective,

And then we forget to think about who we should be taking along with us to help drive the project forward.

So we really need to get purposeful on what we are doing,

Why we're going there,

And who's coming along with us.

I want you just to take a moment to think about those three lenses under the first P here of purposeful.

Okay,

Now our second P is practical.

I want you to ask yourself that same project that you're about to work on,

Whether it's today or sometime in the near future,

That next innovation initiative,

Is it practical?

I get it,

It's fun to be disruptive,

It's great to think about what is the next five,

Six years going to look like,

And we want to add in crazy technology and be disruptive.

I mean,

That's what we learned in innovation is to disrupt or be disrupted.

But if none of that helps the organization tomorrow,

It's going to be very hard to get others to follow your initiative,

Your purpose.

That doesn't mean we shouldn't be working on disruptive projects,

But just think about how do you make your project practical?

How do you ensure that you have tasks along the way within this disruptive concept that can be practically used tomorrow?

Think about it as what are the short-term wins that this project can deliver to your organization quickly?

And I'll just leave you here for a minute in the breath to think about how you make that innovation initiative practical.

You you Okay,

Now just come back to the breath for just a minute here and just the four to four count real fast here breathe in hold and breathe out And again through the nose breathe in hold and out through the mouth Now we're gonna explore the last P participatory Innovation cannot be done alone So we need to think about who we want to participate and be Really mindful about who we're going to include because it's not about just including everybody We need the right people involved And a lot of times that goes unchecked So we're thinking about participatory we need to think about Who are the executive sponsors that we need involved with this project?

Who are the top leaders of the company that without their commitment without their involvement?

Our project is not going to see the day of light As you're breathing just think mindfully about who you're going to include as some of your executive sponsors you Alright just think about you know what that communication looks like whether it's a Email a text message a conversation in the hallway Is it just updates along the way?

How do you get them involved with the project?

It's of course.

They're not going to be involved all the way through They will not be in the weeds,

But just what information do you need to get to them?

Just so they support you along the way The next group that we want to get involved in the project is going to be the cross-functional partners We don't want to be an innovation team on an island with nobody else involved other than other innovators This project if successful will move on to other parts of the organization it will be launched and a Operations team may take over a sales team may take over It's important to get them to participate much earlier than we usually involve them so just think for a moment about Who do you really want to get involved with this project?

Departments and people and What does that engagement look like what are the conversations you're having?

At what points in a project do you bring people in?

Think purposely about who is participating And the last group that we want to Get to be participatory is our consumers Right just think about that innovation initiative that you are focused in on and Who is your target your consumer can be?

An end-user it could be another business it could be an internal client within your organization,

But just think about who is using your innovation and How are you getting them to participate?

See a lot of times we think we know what the consumer needs what's best for them And we just make that assumption and run But if we forget to actually have the consumer participate be involved in the process We could be innovating just to innovate again innovating aimlessly So it's very important that we remember to bring them along the journey with us and Plan out When do they get involved?

What are those checkpoints?

And I want you to think here just for a moment about who is that target consumer that needs to get involved And what touch points you should be having with them along the way You Okay,

And one last time I want you to just come back to the breath again So please breathe in through your nose for four seconds Hold it and out through your mouth for four Great one more time in through your nose Hold and out through your mouth Great So innovation can be overwhelming confusing complicated if you let it be Consuming an excessive amount of content while you're learning to innovate can cause aimless innovation And if you feel that happening use the three P's to make sure that you're applying mindfulness to your innovation initiatives Remember that's being purposeful being practical and being participatory So I challenge you today to think about your initiative and every decision that you make and Which P doesn't follow?

And if it's not following one of those piece I Challenge you to not do it and get back to the three P's And anytime that you have a another innovation initiative I Recommend coming right back to this meditation To start the project mindfully Run it through the three P filter If we think mindfully about these three areas our innovation initiatives Will be a lot more successful a lot more purposeful a Lot more mindful and successful a lot more purposeful a lot more mindful Thank you for joining me today,

And I hope to see you again next time

Reviews

This meditation creates a mindful space to have a clearer perspective of what your underlying path towards innovation could be.