As you get to know Ignite, you’ll find we place a lot of emphasis on being highly creative in the way we approach a problem whilst retaining the rigour and focus that ensures the target benefits are fully delivered. We are often asked what our secrets are for achieving this balance that ensures that innovation turns into implementation.
We begin by mobilising a client team and by really challenging ourselves and our clients around the extent and nature of the improvement opportunity and the scale of the stretch required. We then illuminate the opportunity from all angles, understanding it from numerous perspectives, ensuring we do not fall into the all-too-common trap of solving the wrong problem. We get the organisation aligned behind what we are focusing on. Then the creativity really kicks in as we use highly imaginative and exciting approaches to generate solutions.
Let’s look at an example of a construction company that plans and runs large projects and needed to triple productivity and radically accelerate the front end of the planning cycle. The challenge we framed with them was to reduce the front end of the planning cycle from ten months to ten days along with a radical reduction in cost. This was a real stretch, and it wasn’t going to be achieved by incremental means.
Having established a tightly-knit cross functional team and a burning commitment to take on the challenge, we needed to get a deep understanding of the current problem and why it took so long to plan a project. We looked at the challenge from a whole range of perspectives – not only the functions represented but also customers and suppliers. Inevitably the issues that were thrown up covered process, organisation, ways of working and culture.
To meet a stretch of this magnitude requires more than a tweak of the screwdriver. We had to completely change the way the group thought about the problem. We needed something that would allow creativity and completely fresh thinking to enter the room. So we went to the zoo!
It’s hard to imagine anywhere where you could find a greater concentration of real life case studies in leadership, development, organisation, role, accountability, multi-skilling and communication. The stimulus provided by wolves, lemurs, ants and chimps was remarkable and the team was soon on the case developing a highly focused front-end for the planning cycle. Within two days of our trip, the outline solution was in place –process, organisation, team structure, roles and communication channels – all contributing to delivering the ten day target.
What we do is interesting, but the real joy is in how we do it. What continually sets us apart is our thirst for not accepting the ordinary – working hand in glove with client teams to create extraordinary solutions that will deliver extraordinary results. In a world where the pressure is to solve problems at the earliest opportunity we take a fresh view. Solve, yes. But first, stretch thinking and stimulate imagination. Truly harness the views, opinions, experiences and talent of client teams to develop and deliver significant, sustainable benefits.
