Innovation is a buzzword these days, as everyone strives to stand out and leverage the latest tech. But by applying innovation properly, you can gain commercial rewards, including advanced efficiency, better product IP and competitive edge.

At Infinity Group, we have the Innovation Lab, which is unsurprisingly all about innovation. They’re the team responsible for identifying new ideas and ways of working. They also turn these ideas into IP for our products and services that genuinely benefit our customers, while being commercially successful.

We explore how our Innovation Lab promote forward-thinking and collaboration across our business and ensure positive outcomes. We also share our top tips to encourage innovation in your own operations.

What is the role of innovation within the Innovation Lab?

The Innovation Lab isn’t just innovative in name. Every day, they dedicate time to reviewing new ideas across our business and understanding the value for our clients.

The Innovation Lab team will leverage Microsoft technology, user feedback, client conversations and external trends to come up with proposals for our future products and services.

Many of these ideas will come from colleagues across our business, including sales and service teams who spend the most time working with our clients.

This enables us to identify market needs and deliver products that genuinely fill market gaps, address challenges and overcome obstacles.

By coming up with ideas which add value, we also enable our clients to be innovative by improving their processes with technology and keeping their competitors at bay.

Balancing innovation and risk_

A core part of the Innovation Lab is ensuring that the ideas we come up with as a business make sense for both us and our clients.

Like most business functions, the Innovation Lab only has so much resource. So, they need to be selective about the ideas they choose to take forward. This means balancing the potential benefit versus cost.

They determine this through a prioritisation process. Every idea is scored against a range of components: market need, competitiveness, ability to generate revenue, the impact on future projects and alignment with our business strategy. They’ll also measure the predicted costs, effort and complexity associated.

When considering the workload associated with an idea, the Innovation Lab weigh this up across business areas. That includes how sales and marketing can promote and sell it, how technical teams will create it, the service levels required and so on.

The Innovation Lab will then record every idea and its score in a product backlog. The highest scoring ideas will be researched more thoroughly, with careful examination of the market needs, audience considerations and competitors already on the market. When we have this, we know we’re ready to turn it into a project that can be feasibly achieved.

How do we encourage everyone to be innovative_

The ideas that filter into the Innovation Lab come from people across our business. Everyone is encouraged to share ideas, regardless of their role or experience.

Everything gets added into the product backlog and goes through the same scoring process. This means that every idea is treated equally and never judged based on opinion alone.

By scoring each idea, it also makes it easier to have open conversations with people. The Innovation Lab can discuss honestly why a suggestion hasn’t been taken forward, in a way that doesn’t discourage them from raising new ideas later.

Any suggestions will stay on the backlog, even if it isn’t relevant right now. It may still be used in the future as market needs evolve. This gives us a constant backlog of potential projects, while allowing people to keep their ideas in the ring.

By ensuring everyone’s thoughts are treated equally, more people feel confident in sharing without fear that it’ll be discarded or ignored.

The Innovation Lab collaborates with and coaches teams to foster innovation and creativity in their thinking and work methodologies. By leveraging Agile and other cutting-edge methodologies, the lab helps teams develop new and effective ways of working.

How do we measure innovation?

When an innovative idea turns into reality, we believe it’s crucial to measure the impact. This enables the business to truly understand the value of innovation and learn lessons that shape our strategy.

The Innovation Lab will run regular retrospectives to review products. This gives them a chance to discuss performance and gather key takeaways.

When the Innovation Lab launch a new product, there are a few metrics they review:

• Revenue generated
• Number of sales
• User feedback
• Feedback from internal teams delivering the products to clients

These metrics allow us to uncover whether the desired impact has been achieved and the commercial results. It can also support the team in refining future products to better suit client needs.

Seven tips for driving innovation in your business_

Every business needs to be innovative to thrive in an increasingly competitive landscape. Based on the Innovation Lab’s experiences and processes, these are some tips to follow to drive innovation positively:

1. Have a clear purpose_

You should never innovate just for the sake of it. It needs to have a clear benefit for your business and customers for it to be worthwhile.

Start by defining what innovation looks like for your business. Ask what you want to achieve by being innovative, as this will drive your strategy.

You should also determine how every idea you have adds value. This will give your ideas clear purpose and stop you pursuing them for no good reason.

2. Actively push innovation_

At Infinity Group, we have an entire team dedicated to innovation. This clearly shows the rest of our business how important it is, encouraging them to embrace innovation. It also gives them a clear place to share their ideas.

While you don’t have to have an innovation team, you do need to visibly show your commitment to innovation. This might include making it part of your company ethos, launching internal initiatives to promote it or ensuring leaders communicate why it matters.

3. Remember everybody and anybody can be innovative_

The best ideas can come from unexpected places. So, it’s crucial to encourage everyone to offer ideas, regardless of their role or experience.

Do this by allowing open communication where everyone feels comfortable. This might include holding regular sharing sessions or dedicating an email inbox to people’s suggestions.

4. Have a feedback loop_

For people to feel comfortable being innovative, you need honest feedback. These includes allowing staff to share their thoughts and customer conversations to drive innovative ideas, while the business needs to openly discuss which ideas will be taken forward or not.

By sharing good and bad feedback, everyone will get on the same page about what you want to achieve and how, improving collaboration.

5. Have some sort of threshold_

The Innovation Lab have a scoring mechanism that allows them to validate every idea and balance potential benefits against the business cost. By having this threshold in place, it prevents the team taking forward any idea without being assured it is feasible and valuable.

Ask yourself how you are going to decide if an idea is worth the effort. By placing a threshold in place, you will ensure that the projects you pursue make sense for your business and drive positive outcomes.

6. Measure results_

Once you pursue an innovative idea, be sure to track the results so you can understand its success. This will allow you to see the true impact of innovation and pinpoint its value for your business.

The exact measurements you take will depend on your project. Remember the original purpose of the innovation. If it was to streamline processes, you’ll want to look at efficiency metrics. If it was to bring a new product to market, you’ll want to track things like sales and user feedback.

Then, begin monitoring and recording the results until you have enough data to tell if it’s been impactful or not.

7. Share success stories_

When someone has shared an idea that’s great, show it off! This is especially important when the idea has had proven success, through your data monitoring.

By sharing good news stories, it encourages others to contribute and collaborate too. It’ll also set a benchmark for innovation, which can drive your long-term approach.

Learn more about Infinity Group’s innovation_

We’re committed to exploring innovation, with an emphasis on making cutting-edge solutions accessible for businesses of all shapes and sizes.

Utilising the latest technology from Microsoft and our own research, we offer a range of products and services covering the likes of cyber security, AI adoption, modern work, business apps and beyond.

By offering these, we empower our clients to be more efficient, agile, accurate and innovative.

Find out more about the Innovation Lab and our products here.