There are a number of ways innovation
plays a role in my organization, the United States Air Force. After reflecting
for quite a bit, I’ve been able to pin point some specific ideas of innovation
that I’ve seen within the USAF. Introduced are some formal processes for
innovation, informal processes, what can be done to better leverage the
effectiveness of the innovation process, comments on usefulness of innovative
ideas, and finally an example of an innovative idea that failed within my
organization.
My organization has a number of
formal processes for introducing innovation. The first formal process is what’s
called the Airman Powered by Innovation program, where Airmen go to a website
and can submit their ideas for review by higher leadership. (Spencer, 2014) This is a very mechanistic in
the sense that the “top-down hierarchy decides and prioritises tasks.” (McKeown, 2014) Innovation can be anything from
a new widget to a new process that could save the United States Air Force time
and money. Not only that but the Airman Powered by Innovation program could
also be used to identify waste within our organization. As my Wing commander
likes to say, his favorite innovations are those that allow him to kill widgets
(stupid rules) that are out dated and prohibitive. For example, while “working”
a specific squadron building was inaccessible to those without a flight line
driving license however while “off-duty” the building was perfectly accessible
without a flight line driving license. There were absolutely no dangers
involved with going to this building (with regard to aircraft), so this was one
of those stupid rules the commander was talking about. This was just one idea
that was submitted.
There is
also another formal process that exists with what’s known as the ECLIPSE
program. This program is a special program designed at creating innovative new
test sets within a very specific realm of maintenance. This is a program that
I’m trying to join as it includes everything I’m passionate about, creating
things, troubleshooting, and programming. The program is very autonomous in the
sense that “members of the team are transferred outside of their functions –
with their own project management and processes.” (McKeown, 2014) If I get accepted, I would be
taken out of my work center to work as a member of the ECLIPSE team. In a
sense, this program is similar to a Research and Development department that
seeks out ways to save the organization money by creating products that reduce
time and money spent fixing problems.
It can also
be said that my organization has an informal process as well, especially when
it comes to troubleshooting some of the more difficult problems that fixing
aircraft might present. Every day my organization is creating functional teams,
a group created on a non-permanent basis that acts as the “resource authority,
assignment of team members and approach stays with the functional power
structure and processes.” (McKeown, 2014) In other words, a group is
created of sudo-random individuals that tackle a problem on their own. It’s up
to the group to come up with their own innovative and creative ways to tackle
the problem.
So what else
can be done to better leverage the effectiveness of the innovation process
within my organization? Well interestingly enough Airman Leadership School, the
first step in professional military education training for enlisted Airmen,
teaches the PDCA (Plan, Do, Check, Act) process when it comes to new processes.
I say this because our reading in John Canfields book, Imagine, also makes
mention of the PDCA cycle when it comes to implementing something new. (Canfield, 2011) The idea is that if a seemingly
useful new idea comes to fruition, to first test out the idea in a sample
before implementing it in full force. For example, if a new computer system is
expected to increase efficiency of an organization, to first see if there is the
need for the system, to implement the system in a small section of the
organization, see if the purpose of the system has been successful, and if so
then to implement the new system organizational wide. This is just one of the
ways to better leverage the innovation process into the organization.
The second
way to better leverage the innovation process is to create a culture that is
more accepting of innovation. Soon I will take my first steps in the leadership
position as a non-commissioned officer. I will be able to slowly better the
culture within my organization by creating a culture that is at least
idea-friendly, but ideally idea-hungry. In my current organization I can be
open-minded about ideas brought up my Airmen, however if I join the ECLIPSE program
I’m going to have to be idea-hungry to constantly create new innovative test
sets that save the overall organization money. It’s hard to change the culture
of an entire organization from where I’m at, but at the very least I can try to
change the culture of those around me.
So what
about this idea of usefulness and why is it important in innovation? Well, if
the idea isn’t useful then it can turn out to be a waste of time and money.
This is why it’s important to try the PDCA process first to determine early on
the usefulness of a new idea. Ultimately the idea of innovation, at least
within the context of my organization, is to change or create something that
saves either time or money in the long term of the organization. This is what
defines its usefulness.
One idea
that failed, or is currently failing within the organization is with our
electronic technical orders, or electronic tools (laptops). We use to be able
to log into them using a username and password, however someone decided to
disable that and force people to use their Common Access Cards for login. To
log into a computer normally is a 10 seconds process, which can be done
anywhere in the physical world, however with the new system we have to connect
one of two specific and working LAN cables to the computer which creates a huge
line of people trying to log into their computers at the same time. If the
computer ever shuts off, we have to go back into the building (from the flight
line), log in, then run back out. Lots of time is actually wasted with this new
system. No one seems to know why the new system was implemented or what it was
supposed to do.
Talked
about were some of the formal processes within the United States Air Force for
bringing up innovation, some informal processes, what can be done to better
leverage the effectiveness of the innovation processes, comments on innovation
usefulness, and finally an example of a failed innovative idea. The United
States Air Force is a very large organization with a lot of sub organizations
and sub cultures and every organization is different and run in their own way.
There are some macro-level methods for extracting innovation and there are some
micro-level methods for extracting innovation. There are a number of ways
innovation plays a role in my organization and these were just a few of them.
References
Canfield, J.
(2011). Imagine. Holland: Black Lake Press.
McKeown, M. (2014). The Innovation Book. London:
Pearson.
Spencer, L. O. (2014). Commentary: Airmen Powered by
Innovation program launches new site. Retrieved 2015, from U.S. Air Force:
http://www.af.mil/News/ArticleDisplay/tabid/223/Article/554085/commentary-airmen-powered-by-innovation-program-launches-new-site.aspx
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