Indulgence.
I found myself recently indulging myself in black and white movies from the post war (that’s the second one) era on a wet, cold, totally miserable Sunday afternoon.
‘The Dam Busters’ and ‘The Glenn Miller Story’ were my indulgence.
The latter, being the story of an American Band Leader who inspired morale by striking a new chord with American troops serving overseas.
In both cases the stories concerned an individual with vision and passion.
But the stories also highlighted the importance of the ‘chance meeting’ with a ‘senior manager’ who could see that vision, create the opportunity for its realisation, appropriately invest and take the required risks.
Clearly, the fundamentals of these stories are not new, however they did stimulate me to question whether our organisations, particularly Pharma, really fostered innovation by having the right decision makers in place.
More Insights from Nostalgia
Dam Buster Wallis and band-leader Miller lived the creative despair but had the determination and belief to win through.
But were these the pivotal inspiring stories of triumph?
In both stories there was the lone individual who could glimpse the power of the originators vision and who was in a senior enough position to create the opportunity for it to come to realisation.
People brave enough to take the risk and back innovation.
Counter balancing and often dwarfing that individuals risk taking nerve was the organisational machine.
The bureaucracy. The tick the box – “No one ever got fired for buying IBM” brigade.
Without the triumph of vision and risk-taking over arch-conservative ‘I’m protecting my job’ or ‘I want a quiet life’ thinking, the outcome of the war may have been significantly different.
Are these stories unique?
How many great innovations, that would have solved humankind’s life-threatening problems or enhanced people’s enjoyment of life, have been lost because the right individual was not in the right place, in the right organisational position at the right time?
Human Resources have the Issue Covered
In most organisational cases, until comparatively recently, Human Resource Management, was called Personnel and dealt with ‘pay & rations’.
Human Resources Department are still considered the ‘Cinderella’ of the organisation.
‘Cinders’ often remains in the fire-grate of the organisation and is viewed as necessary but not strategic.
High flyers are unlikely to be found in HR.
In your experience, is HR where risks are taken or people who take risks are found?
Will organisational structures have put HR or its personnel in the right place to foster innovation?
Are Fast Tracking Executive Programs, Succession Planning and Behaviourally Anchored HR Systems likely to foster innovative risk taking managers?
Are innovation or creativity schemes, awards and accolades likely to reward, promote or acknowledge that person who has what it takes to be?
The Right Person, in the Right Place at the Right Time to make the Right Decision about the Right Innovation?
And As for Pharma
Pharma has a culture of innovation in product development.
But does that culture extend to all facets of its business?
Have the regulatory controls applying to product innovation resulted in a culture where a lack of innovative decision making is the norm?
Or, is Pharma an industry in which the right people can be found in the right places at the right time to make the right decisions?
Look for the evidence…………………
(Tomorrow's Post: Pharma, Greed)
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