INNOVATION LEADERS - HOW SENIOR EXECUTIVES STIMULATE, STEER AND SUSTAIN INNOVATION

Innovation leaders promote and address the innovation agenda in their company. Through personal conviction or competitive necessity they are obsessed with providing superior value to customers through innovation. They know how to mobilize their staff behind concrete innovation initiatives and do not hesitate to personally coach innovation teams.
For innovation to occur leadership has to be collective. To create a momentum for innovation in their company, leaders from different functions need to team up, to build innovation networks. Innovation leadership is not just an innate talent that can be selected at the hiring level. It can be developed within an appropriate company culture through careful leadership development, typically achieved through career management and coaching. Innovation leaders also need to stay on board and it is the responsibility of the top management team to create an attractive climate to develop and keep its innovation leaders.
There are plenty of books that deal with innovation, or with new product development, or with leadership; this is different in its focus on the specifics of innovation leadership – that particular form of leadership that stimulates and sustains innovation.
This book maps the broad territory of innovation leadership and contributes new thinking on the focus of the emerging leadership role of the CTO; distinction between ‘front end’ and ‘back end’ innovation leaders; the concept of aligning leadership styles with strategy; and the chain of leadership concept.
Combining practice-based and empirical research-based observations with simple conceptual frameworks, illustrated by many company examples and case stories from a broad range of industries in the US and Europe, this is a systematic presentation of innovation drivers and their implications in terms of what leaders need to do to make it work.

Jean-Philippe Deschamps is an innovation management practitioner with 40 years of international consulting experience. At IMD, which he joined in 1996 as professor of technology and innovation management, he focuses his research, consulting and teaching on the role of leaders in innovation. Before IMD, he was a vice president and practice leader with consulting firm Arthur D. Little. He co-authored the best-selling book Product Juggernauts: How Companies Generate Streams of Market Winners (Harvard Business School Press) and has given seminars and lectures throughout the world, including twice at the World Economic Forum in Davos. He graduated from HEC, INSEAD and Harvard Business School.

Preface: Mapping the Innovation Leadership Territory
Acknowledgments
Part I: Defining and Characterizing Innovation Leaders
1. A Special Form of Leadership for Innovation?
The Leadership Factor
Facing the Innovation Imperatives
Defining and Characterizing Innovation
Innovation Leaders: A Different Breed?
Mapping our Journey
2. What’s Special about Innovation Leaders?
Innovation Leaders Share Six Attributes
Innovation Leaders Tend to Focus on a Stage of Innovation
Innovation Leaders Work on Process and Culture
3. Stimulating Bottom-Up Innovation
Encouraging Bottom-up Innovation: Classic Approaches
Building an Innovation Culture: Four Drivers
4. Steering Innovation Top Down
Seeing Innovation as a Competitive Necessity
Setting up a Process, Governance System and Organizational Mechanisms
Mobilizing People on Innovation-Enhancing Campaigns
Getting Involved in Innovation Searches and Projects
5. Appointing an Innovation Conductor
CTO or CIO?
The First Mission of CTOs: Technological Innovation
The Changing Role of CTOs: From Managing to Leading
The Emerging Role of Corporate Entrepreneur
Facing the Challenge as Part of the Top Executive Team
Part II: The Leadership Imperatives of Innovation Strategies
6. Recognizing the Leadership Imperatives of Your Innovation Strategy
Formulating an Innovation Strategy
Aligning Your Management Efforts with Your Strategy
Activating Specific Change Levers to Support Your Strategy
7. Leading the Development of New/Improved Products or Services Required: Team Sports Coaches to Foster Innovation Discipline
Innovation Leaders as Tough Team Sports Coaches
Straightening Out Medtronic’s Innovation Process
Limits of the "Team Sports Coach" Leaders
8. Leading the Creation of a Totally New Product or Service Category Required: No-Nonsense Sponsors to Steer the New Venture
Innovation Leaders as No-nonsense Sponsors
New Business Creation at Tetra Pak: Reinventing the Food Can
Evolving Leadership Imperatives in New Business Creation
9. Leading the Creation of a Totally New Business System or Model Required: Pragmatic Architects to Put All System Elements in Place
Innovation Leaders as Visionary but Pragmatic Architects
TiVo: A Business System/Model Innovation
Lessons from the TiVo Story
10. Leading the Development of New/Improved Customer Solutions Required: Conductors to Deliver an Enhanced Customer Experience
Innovation Leaders as Orchestra Conductors
Senseo: An Innovative Customer Solution
Building and Leading an Innovation-Focused Partnership
Part III: Developing a Cadre of Innovation Leaders
11. Building an Innovation Leadership Environment: The Logitech Case
Logitech: Ordinary or Extraordinary Company?
Logitech’s Innovation-stimulating Drivers
Logitech’s Innovation-enhancing Culture and Values
Logitech’s Pragmatic and Effective Innovation Process
Logitech’s Future Challenges
12 Attracting, Developing and Keeping Innovation Leaders
Assessing Your Innovation Leadership Resources
Selecting and Hiring Innovation Leaders
Developing Innovation Leaders
Retaining Innovation Leaders
Innovation Leadership in a Nutshell
Appendix A Innovation in Leadership and Organizational Culture Models
Appendix B Guidelines for Using the IDEO Video for ‘Idea Management’ Training
Appendix C Factors Affecting the Innovation Climate of a Company
Index