The ability of organizations to innovate and create value is inseparable from their overall objective. Ideally, they should include all their stakeholders in the equation, taking into account the impacts of their activities on their environment (ecosystem). Nor should the spiritual dimension of the value chain be neglected: as a manifestation of our creativity, innovation can indeed be considered one of the noblest human functions.

• Remember that your goal is to create value. Before thinking in terms of innovations, try to understand your customers: what are their activities, their concerns (e.g., superfluous costs, unpleasant experiences, unwanted risks…), their aspirations, etc. In short, think about what would make them happy. Don't forget to constantly return, with your team, to this question: how will what we are doing right now create more value for all our stakeholders?
• Link your development initiatives to the organization's purpose and strategy. Strive to maintain an overall view. Regularly remind teams that their efforts serve the general interests of the organization and that this will make a difference for the end customer.
• Use a varied set of tools and methodologies to stimulate team creativity. During the ideation phase, brainstorming and free association techniques are recommended. Afterwards, you can employ a more structured approach – typically the Business Model Canvas developed by Alex Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur – to map out value creation in accordance with the needs of your stakeholders.
• Use a prototyping technique to quickly launch new products, accumulate experience, and gather usable data for improvement purposes. For example, I recommend Eric Ries's Lean Startup model, which relies on a build-measure-learn feedback loop. You can use it to test new products or services at this early stage; this will allow you to verify the soundness of your investments.
• Appropriately allocate available resources. Evaluate your assets (human and financial) and use them intelligently to serve your strategy. Balance risks and potential returns. On this point, many organizations rely on the 70-20-10 rule, according to which resources should be allocated as follows: 70% to core activities, 20% to ancillary initiatives, and 10%

• Thinking that innovation stops at new products. In his book titled Ten Types of Innovation, Larry Keeley and his colleagues show how inventiveness and value creation in general branch out into varied and interdependent areas (such as the supply chain).
• Relying exclusively on the R&D department to generate innovative ideas. It is better to rely on interdisciplinary teams belonging to various sectors likely to influence the customer experience (e.g., products, services, sales, marketing, and logistics).
• Creating a culture that encourages «playing small» or punishes failure. It is extremely difficult to find an example of an organizational or commercial project that has not encountered a single obstacle. Unfortunately, initiatives that «fail» often receive negative feedback. As a result, people stifle their momentum. Some even fear for their careers.
• Asking teams to have ideas, without planning anything to bring them to fruition. This is the best way to end up with a multitude of projects that will never come to fruition. Needless to say, it's demotivating. Cynicism rears its head.
• Believing that innovative ideas are the exclusive result of cognition, forgetting the role of intuition and experimentation. Generally speaking, organizations should take a greater interest in the drivers of creativity (individual and collective) and provide people with the necessary support (space, equipment, materials...). Most innovations are not born in a meeting room. Practical experimentation is a much better breeding ground.
• Basing your entire innovation strategy on customer feedback. The opinion of people who buy your products or services is obviously valuable. But it should be weighed against your own perceptions and knowledge. Processing hundreds of comments would undoubtedly slow you down, even though you probably have good ideas to fuel your innovation process!