Innovation, and particularly Innovation Management, is a common buzzword these days. A recent article on the subject asserted that innovation is something that can’t be put into formal processes. While it makes sense that you can’t say, “we need 50% more innovation by the next quarter” it does not follow that it isn’t part of goal-setting exercises.
Goals aren’t usually innovative but the means to achieve them certainly have lots of room for novel processes. For example, the first people who thought about using twitter to get the word out about their product or service would have done so as an action-item set to achieve a goal such as “increase awareness of product by 10%” or “sell 100 more widgets this month.”
When I started blogging and tweeting I thought about what my main messages would be. I wanted to get the word out about my books, primarily, but to achieve that goal I figured I had better follow a lot of the advice I had written about in the book. A big part of GIS Cartography: A Guide to Effective Map Design centers on creative approaches to map-making, so I figured I had better have some creative things to say and show. One of those attempts to show creativity was the geoglitter map I made a few days ago. So, while that was an innovation that certainly wasn’t put into a management plan for my business, it helped to meet the goal of illustrating creative map ideas that fits in with the goal of promoting the ideas set forth in the book.
To be honest, I am extremely happy that creativity was a big part of the book and that I now have to “prove” that I can be innovative within the context of GIS and cartography. Being innovative and creative makes for a happy work day. I hope it is part of yours.
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