PUBLIC SECTOR
INNOVATION
WORKSHOP
Designed and delivered by
Dr. Irena Yashin-Shaw
If your unit (ministry/team) was an
animal – what would it be? Why?
Australia
“Increasingly governments are recognising that
innovation is not a tangential activity with
limited relevance to their mainstream work,
but an activity that is core to being able to
achieve key public sector goals”
“Empowering Change: Fostering Innovation in
the Australian Public Service” (2010) .
CHALLENGES
Public
Sector
• How to deliver
improved services
• in better ways
• with tighter budgets
• in a risk averse
culture
• to citizens with
increasingly higher
expectations.
What’s the difference?
Nine dots
•
•
•
•
•
One right answer
Static
Predictable
Single approach
Simple
Many dots
•
•
•
•
•
No right answer
Slippery
Unpredictable
Multitude of possibilities
Complex
“We choose to go to the moon. We choose to
go to the moon in this decade and do the
other things, not because they are easy, but
because they are hard, because that goal will
serve to organize and measure the best of our
energies and skills, because that challenge is
one that we are willing to accept, one we are
unwilling to postpone, and one which we
intend to win.”
President John F. Kennedy, September 12,
1962, at Rice University, Houston, Texas
Creative thinking has become a core leadership
competency!!
The complex challenges facing the public sector can only be solved
through creative thinking.
Some Questions
What is Creativity?
What is Innovation?
What’s the difference?
• How can
creativity and
innovation thrive
in the public
sector?
• Is it possible to
innovate in a
risk-averse
context like the
Public Sector?
Why do we
need to find
ways of doing
it?
How innovative is your organisation? P 8.
What are the barriers to innovation? P.9
INTEGRATED INNOVATION
(An Innovation Ecosystem)
Technological
Advancements
Mindset
• Thinking for
innovation
Channels
Climate
• Routes
through which
innovation can
flow
• Organisational
culture where
innovation can
flourish
Search and Retrieval /
Brainstorming
Synthesis
What ideas/ things/
services/ functions/
policies can I blend to
come up with an
innovative:
• Service
• Service delivery mode
• Product
• Solution
Contrast
What would happen
if I did the opposite
of what I should
do?
Simplification
How can I make this
situation / process/ idea /
approach /procedure
really simple and basic?
Knowledge Treasure Hunt
Where do I
usually go for
information?
Where else can I go
for additional
information that
I have never
tapped into
before?
Strategic Thinking
Generation
• Goal-setting
• Search
• Switching
• Retrieval
• Goal-monitoring
• Association
• Cognitive awareness
• Contrast
• Strategy formulation
• Transformation
• Synthesis
• Perspective shifting
• Analogy
• Simplification
Evaluation
• Analysis
• Assessment
Exploration
• Verification
• Knowledge application
• Trialing
• Experimentation
• Criteria fulfillment
• Changing context
• Elimination
• Attribute finding
• Selection
• Acknowledging limitations
• Comparison
• Collaboration
• Pitch
KNOWLEDGE
BASE
The StrateGEE® Model
for Creative Thinking & Innovation
NURTURING A CLIMATE OF INNOVATION
A system for
generating,
collecting,
progressing,
recognising &
rewarding ideas
Trust among
staff/team
members
Dedicated resources
allocated to find,
develop and
implement new
ideas
People who are
innovation
drivers
Climate
A commitment
to innovation by
the leaders
Tolerance for
calculated risktaking
A culture
where
innovation
can flourish
Innovation is an
integral,
delineated part
of business
strategy
Consistently welcoming innovation as a natural, embedded, systematised
part of working life throughout an organisation
Case Study 5
Department of Environment and resource management
2011 Set up an Innovation Reference Group
Wanted Innovation champions!!
What is innovation?
Why is innovation encouraged in DERM?
Why do we want your ideas?
What will be do with your ideas?
How will the innovation ideas be reviewed?
Collecting
ideas
Selecting ideas
Implementing
ideas
Innovation
Top Down
(Revolutionary)
Bottom up
(Evolutionary)
Centrelink Palm Beach
OPENING THE CHANNELS FOR INNOVATION
Regularly seek
input from
external
stakeholders/
clients
Engage with
the local
community
Network with
people internal
& external to
the organisation
Common places
where people
can share ideas
- physically and
Project
collaboration
opportunities
on-line
Strategic
vision shared
with all
employees
Channels
Routes through
which
innovation can
flow
Input from
outside
experts
Ensuring that the information and ideas that lead to innovation can flow
throughout and among agencies.
Collaboration
AusIndustry
Dept. Of
Innovation
Industry,
Science and
Research
Enterprise
Connect
Austrade
Hierarchical structure where
ideas filtered down from the top
Interface across the organisation
where ideas can come from any level
Major case study
Governance innovation in TMR
Prior to 2007
• Silos – small groups working
in isolation across the state
• Resources trapped and
unable to be deployed
• Lack of strategic thinking
• Lack of skilled staff (only 12
people with tertiary quals)
• Lack of thought leadership
• Limited professional
development
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Currently
Restructured on a state-wide
basis
Flat management hierarchy
Working groups formed from
personnel across the state
Must commit to on-going studies
on recruitment
Leaders appointed to oversee
multiple facilities
Mechanisms for communicating
Ideas shared across all the groups
Outcomes
Mindset
Holistic and big
picture
Climate
Strategic Leadership
Channels
Flat management
structure
Expectation that
everyone contributes
to innovation
Lifelong Learners
Improved morale
Effective
communication – no
‘silos’
Producing
innovative
solutions
Succession
plan
Thought
leadership
Strengths
Easy
deployment
of resources
A more
flexible and
qualified
workforce
Key Challenge
The Evolution of Approaches to
Public Sector innovation
20th Century
• Ad hoc
• Random
• Silos
• Bureaucratic
• Managing human resources
• Running projects
• Administering
21st Century
• Systematised
• Conscious
• Collaboration
• Entrepreneurial
• Building innovation capacity
• Co-creating solutions
• Leading
"The skills of an entrepreneur are the skills of the 21st Century worker."
Queen Rania. Address to the World Economic Forum Oct 2011
Where to?
Innovation
Inertia
Institutionalised
Innovation
Newton's Law of Inertia
An object at rest stays at
rest and an object in
motion stays in motion
unless acted upon by an
unbalanced force.