Canadian Government Executive - Volume 24 - Issue 07

20 / Canadian Government Executive // February/March 2019 INNOVATION Skills’ training in any these areas is useful. There is growing evidence that simply us- ing a problem-solving process like design thinking is not sufficient if participants do not have some advanced skills in the ele- ments of generating and judging ideas. I worked with the Singapore Govern- ment to help launch an innovation skills program in 2002. It introduced a skills framework called “The Hand of Innova- tion.” Each finger represents a skill need- ed by staff: 1. Generating ideas 2. Harvesting and developing ideas 3. Evaluating ideas 4. Proposing and marketing ideas 5. Implementing ideas People could take two to three days of courses in each skill delivered by the Civil Service College. I wrote the innovation guide that went to 20,000 staff. Compounding the challenge of skill de- velopment is the confusion between skills and behaviours of someone using the skill. It is useful to clarify the terms: 1. Skills: The definition of skills is fuzzy, yet skills develop over time with prac- tice, application of knowledge, and in- volve education and training. 2. Attributes and behaviours: You may read about the attributes and behav- iours of people deemed to be creative. Risk taking or thinking outside the box are often highlighted as skills. The OECD suggests “insurgency” is a skill. All of these are closer to behaviours. 3. Bodies of knowledge: Some models suggest “user centricity,” “data litera- cy” and “story telling” are skills when they are closer to a body of knowledge useful as a foundation to use skills. As a practitioner in the public sector since the 1990s (delivered over 250 workshops), it would be more effective if we designed programs to build the capacity of the pub- lic servants by recognizing these catego- ries of knowledge, and then strategizing the need for different skills and knowl- edge for different segments of public servants. To lead innovation, what do ex- ecutives need to know and communicate? What do managers need to know to en- gage teams to innovate? What specialized knowledge could benefit staff working in service delivery staff, policy, or more tech- nical scientific areas? Communicating Innovation to Engage Staff Linked to the need for clear definitions and skills training is the need to shape communication strategies to engage staff across the public sector. The Singapore innovation guide (and others from Aus- tralia, South Africa and New Zealand) was one tactic in a broader innovation com- munication strategy. Australia engages staff at the federal level through a com- munity of practice. Victoria (Victoria inno- vation strategy) and Queensland have had such programs for ten years. The lack of well-structured communica- tion tactics is blurring our understanding of two core approaches for change, im- provement and innovation. I started my career working with New Zealand Post’s “Total Quality Service” group. We crafted strategies to improve internal and external services. Later, more formal approaches to innovate services were launched. To clari- fy this issue in Singapore, public servants were offered this insight to bring meaning to both approaches: “Innovation is more than improvement. Continual improve- ment and innovation work hand in hand. Improvements are important, but inno- vations are like a quantum improvement that breaks new ground to create value in new ways.” Whether it was intentional or not, the Clerk of the Privy Council, Michael Wer- nick, clouded this issue in a speech to IPAC by suggesting: “The point of innovation is not to do something new or something cool; it’s about improvement.” The essence of change in public services requires that we embrace both improve- ment and innovation. Research from large service companies finds that 90 per cent of new ideas will be improvements focused on efficiencies or making current services more effective. Just 10 per cent of ideas are likely to be seen as true innovations. There is some irony here. One of the few innovation guides produced in Canada dates to 2004. “Organizing for Deliberate Innovation: A Toolkit for Teams” was pub- lished by the Canadian Centre for Man- agement Development (now called CSPS). (Link to download publication) It is still useful and would be ideal to update and distribute widely as a tool for staff to use. One can only wonder about the benefits of investing in a more robust innovation ecosystem to support the current challenge of reforming services for digital change. Ed Bernacki created the Idea Factory to help build people build their skills and capacity to innovate. He has worked in and with governments in New Zea- land, Australia, Canada and Singapore on public sector innovation programs. “The point of innovation is not to do something new or something cool; it’s about improvement.”