What’s keeping you from inventing the future?

By Andy Havens and Tom Storey

In 1975, a 25-year-old Eastman Kodak engineer, Steve Sasson, invented the first digital camera. He received a patent for it in 1978. At the time, Kodak was king of the photography world, which was based on film and chemicals.

Today, in the new world of digital photography, the leaders in camera sales are Canon, Sony and Nikon. Hewlett Packard, Epson, Canon and Lexmark lead the pack in sales of color printers and ink cartridges.

And the toll of the widespread switch to digital photography has been painful for Kodak, which has eliminated more than 50,000 jobs in the last decade. Its work force of 20,300 is its smallest since the 1930s, and a fraction of the 145,000 people it employed in 1988, when its brand was synonymous with photography.

What happened?

Arguably, the cause of Kodak’s downfall was its inability to innovate, even though the organization knew sweeping change was on the horizon. The company ultimately could not overcome one of the fundamental barriers to innovation: complacency. The result? Kodak is a shell of its former self and is playing catch-up in the world of digital photography.

Complacency is just one of the many obstacles to innovation. Other common gaps include: resources, bureaucracy and fascination. How important is innovation? Well-known management consultant Peter Drucker once famously remarked that organizations need one core competency: innovation. Librarians have always been forward thinkers, and have a strong track record of innovating, whether it’s a new classification system, open-shelf access or adapting computer technology to library processes. To help them remain among the best of innovators, NextSpace took a look at these innovation barriers, and how to overcome them.

The complacency gap: avoidance

In his worldwide best-seller, The Innovator’s Dilemma, Clayton Christensen explains how industry leaders get blindsided by disruptive innovations because they focus too closely on past successes—their most profitable customers and businesses. The challenges of the future are downplayed, and organizations sustain current efforts and lose their propensity to change. There is a subtle, almost unknowing shift to the status quo, short-term thinking and complete risk avoidance.

It’s human nature. Unless there is a burning reason to change, most of us are not risk takers. But progress is not made without calculated risk taking. The key is to write a short, well-thought-out proposal that describes the opportunity and illustrates the potential value received. This innovation plan will actually reduce risk and increase chances for success by adding critical detail to the skeletal elements of an idea, according to the Small Business Administration. A clear-eyed view of risks balanced against benefits can create an environment where innovation is nurtured rather than stifled.

Joe Murphy

Joe Murphy is Science Librarian, Coordinator of Instruction and Technology, Kline Science Library, Yale University and spends a lot of his spare time spotting technology trends and helping libraries and the information industry adopt those innovations. He runs the popular libraryfuture blog and twitter account and is a sought-after speaker.

To help avoid complacency, he recommends that libraries generate cultures that do not reward stasis or create leaders who do not give in to peer pressure to maintain the status quo.

“We like the idea of embracing change and we get very excited about it,” he says. “But our institutional cultures don’t catch the energy as quickly, and segments of our profession for whom fear is a stronger reaction to change than excitement can leverage a great amount of stasis momentum in ways that can even include bullying.”

“We face an almost impossible task in trying to stay current. Technological shifts and their impacts on society happen so quickly now and it is an everyday struggle to keep current. But staying with the curve, if not ahead of it, is imperative for an industry built on a need to demonstrate our ability to remain in the life/information flow and expectations of our various user groups.”

The resource gap: more than lack of funding

How often have you heard, “That would be great, but we don’t have the money to do it.” Getting the startup funds for an innovation often means either getting new money or taking money away from an established service or program. Getting money at the right time is also problematic since organizations often work on annual funding cycles that don’t match up well with real-world opportunities. And many an excellent innovation needs more than seed money to survive and is starved out of existence.

Inadequate funding is a barrier to every institution in every field when it comes to innovation. What is important is what we do with this challenge.

Gina Millsap

Gina Millsap, Director of the Topeka & Shawnee County Public Library, refuses to let funding wreck her library’s plans for innovation. A 35-year veteran of library innovation and a Library Journal Mover & Shaker in 2007, Gina insists that the imagination and perseverance of library staff can conquer the budget ax.

“Sometimes money will stop you from buying the cool, new equipment,” she says. “But then you focus on, ‘how can we still make a difference?’”

One way to remain innovative and get around a funding gap is to let employees use talents that are not part of their job description. Murals in the children’s area of the Topeka & Shawnee County Public Library were created by Digital Services Supervisor Michael Perkins.

With plans for a complete redo of children’s programs and space, the Topeka & Shawnee County Public Library was hit with a $2.5 million budget cut. Gone was the special projects line in the operating budget they were counting on for this project. Nonetheless, Gina called the troops together and said, “OK, we have a plan, and how do we get it done?”

“Even with the cuts, it never occurred to us that we would not do this project,” Gina says. “It was amazing who stepped forward and the ideas they had.”

The library’s Digital Services Supervisor, Michael Perkins, who is also an artist, is creating murals that grow with children’s learning interest. One week each month, painting the mural will be his job. And one of the library’s art gallery curators, Zan Popp, encouraged a blown glass artist to create the planets of the galaxy to hang over the nonfiction books about astronomy. The artist is donating his time and charging only for his materials—less than $800.

The bureaucracy gap: overcoming inertia

Bureaucracy can kill innovation. By nature, most organizations seek to protect their identities and sustain themselves, even when innovating is to everyone’s advantage. Organizations create boundaries, assign responsibilities and put rules in place. No matter how artificial the divisions and processes are, they are usually defended.

Immovable bureaucracies and a culture of inertia are major obstacles in the library world, Joe says.

“Just as explorative and risk-seeking personalities can drive innovation, staff prioritizing resistance as expressions of tension and fear can restrict change,” he says. “Librarians are ready to invent the future, but our colleagues who inject negativity into the dialogue, or whom are not encouraged to explore and address their emotional reactions to change, are working to slow our ability to meet the future.”

Gina says the solution to the bureaucracy barrier is leadership. “The key to fostering innovation is great facilitation skills, and this is not something learned in library school. When you sit down with people and call on the collective wisdom of the organization—draw on the expertise of staff—great ideas emerge. You create a culture of continuous process improvement.”

Gina created an easily understood, concrete process for staff to feel free to be creative and innovate. For lack of a better term, she calls it process improvement, but it is structured. “That almost sounds like an oxymoron–structured innovation. But it’s the way we integrate good decision-making into all the great creativity and brainstorming staff does. Innovation is research and data-driven and based on the continuous environmental scanning we do. Creativity can’t just be ‘I think, I feel …’ It has to draw on research and data and take into account the context of the environment you’re in to ensure that you’re doing something that will have a significant, positive impact.”

When Gina first began meeting with groups of employees, the reaction at first was, “Oh boy, here comes the director.” Now, though, people love it. “Staff care and want to do good. Everyone wants to be part of a Big Hairy Audacious Goal and use their skills to make the library better and blow users out of the water.”

The fascination gap: finding focus

If you’re not deeply engrossed in what you do, odds are you aren’t going to make a positive change in your environment. A failure to innovate may stem, initially, from a simple lack of interest.

Mitch Ditkoff

Mitch Ditkoff is the Founder and President of Idea Champions, a management and consulting group that has helped companies like GE, A&E, Merck, NBC, AT&T and dozens of others go beyond business-as-usual. He believes that any organization’s most valuable asset is the collective creativity of its work force. Mitch has published several books on creativity, including Awake at the Wheel, Banking on Innovation and Free the Genie.

Mitch says that the origin of innovation and creativity is simple: fascination. “It’s not about ‘an innate impulse to find a better way,’ or ‘pressure to be more competitive,’” he explains. “That’s corporate-speak. In other words, hogwash. Innovation begins when we are intensely interested in something. Enchanted. Spellbound.”

He believes that libraries are a vital resource for just that kind of single-minded absorption, especially when it is recognized (and encouraged!) for what it is.

“Deep, concentrated research isn’t often seen as a fundamental part of innovation,” he continues. “It’s not as sexy as drawing boards, blue-sky ideas or shouting, ‘Eureka!’ at the top of your lungs. But research is what fuels and ignites new ideas. And libraries are a natural place for that kind of empowerment.”

But how do you transform the object of your fascination (or that of your users) into a personal innovation plan? Mitch suggests doing the following:

1. On a piece of paper, create three columns labeled, “What fascinates me,” “People I admire” and “What I would do if I knew I couldn’t fail.”
2. Jot down at least five responses beneath each headline.
3. Look for new connections between your responses.
4. Jot down those connections and any other new ideas that occur.
5. Circle your favorite idea and share it with a friend. Then talk to anyone whose influence might help you bring the idea to life.

For people who manage others, Mitch counsels that,“A person who is fascinated needs much less external motivation. Just give them time, some resources, a chance to collaborate and periodic reality checks.”

He also recommends that libraries focus on encouraging innovation around those subjects that intrigue funders, supporters and community leaders. “Nothing will cement your reputation as a valuable partner like helping to take someone’s idea from‘fascination’ to fruition.’”

The narrative gap: telling your story

Once you have a subject that fascinates you and a plan, what opportunities exist for creatively getting your story “out there”? While there are many traditional avenues for personal, creative exploration, looking to entirely new modes of communication may provide the final push your idea needs to move forward. And putting your ideas into a narrative format helps make them real while, at the same time, communicating them to a wider audience.

Bryan Alexander

Bryan Alexander, Ph.D., is a Senior Fellow at the National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education (NITLE) and was chair of the “2010 Horizon Report,” a collaboration between The New Media Consortium and EDUCAUSE. He also is author of The New Digital Storytelling.

Bryan believes that new technology opens the possibility for learning and innovation, and that libraries can play a crucial role in helping people reach their creative potential.

“Digital storytelling, for example,” he explains,“opens up manifold possibilities for expression and recollection, which also means multiple spaces for informational innovation.”

Bryan says that digital storytelling involves deep personal engagement, a reduction in technology anxiety and a reconsideration of narrative. Because of this, using new storytelling modes can actually make you more creative while you develop your innovation message.

“These new kinds of storytelling,” he continues, “require finding and using multimedia files ranging from personal content swarms to the full spectrum of licensed and open Web content. It teaches creators about copyright, identifying legitimate open content sources, explaining the use of licensed material, and handling files to maximize integration.”

These are all, clearly, themes that are important to librarians. “Information professionals are experts in this domain,” he explains, “as well as in the subsequent field of how best to share finished stories.”

This is a process that, in many ways, builds on reference librarians’ strengths, identifying what a user wants to accomplish, and the best route through a vast, dynamic digital landscape. Focusing on communicating your innovation ideas as a story that uses new, connected and interactive elements will help build your case, and prepare you to better help others express their creative ideas.

Reflection fuels innovation

In 1997, author and consultant Linda Stone coined the term “Continuous Partial Attention” (CPA) to describe a new type of multitasking that she had observed in her 20+ years as a high-tech executive at companies such as Microsoft and Apple.

“To pay continuous partial attention is to pay partial attention—continuously,” she explains. “It is motivated by a desire to be a live node on the network … We want to effectively scan for opportunity and optimize for the best opportunities, activities and contacts, in any given moment.”

“We pay continuous partial attention,” she continues, “in an effort not to miss anything. It is an always-on, anywhere, anytime, anyplace behavior that involves an artificial sense of constant crisis.”

She stresses that CPA isn’t always bad—that, in small doses, it can be helpful, functional behavior. In large doses, though, she believes that it contributes “to a stressful lifestyle, to operating in crisis management mode, and to a compromised ability to reflect, to make decisions and to think creatively.”

What to do about this trend? Stone suggests that we move from simply managing our time to managing our attention. “We are evolving beyond an always-on lifestyle,” she says. “As we make choices to turn the technology off, to give full attention to others in interactions, to block out interruption-free time, and to use the full range of communication tools more appropriately, we will reorient our trek toward a path of more engaged attention, more fulfilling relationships and opportunities for the type of reflection that fuels innovation.”

Closing the gaps: make innovation a priority

Despite its recent struggles, Eastman Kodak was born from innovation. Until the advent of Kodak, photography was extremely complicated, and only professionals could own and operate the expensive equipment. Then Kodak changed everything. George Eastman’s simple ‘point and click’ Brownie camera allowed consumers to take their own photos and then mail the film to Kodak, which would develop it and return the pictures by mail. The company continued to innovate and advance to stay on top of the photography industry, until it missed the digital wave.

How are libraries doing with innovation today?

“Are we successful with innovation? Not on the whole, though we are making remarkable efforts across the board,” says Joe Murphy. “We are actually quite good at reacting to major demands for innovation in the form of external pressures. However, it seems difficult for us as individual professionals and as institutions to make the changes needed to meet pressures to shift and change on a regular basis.”

“We talk about innovation a lot, but it’s not really a value we hold,” Gina Millsap says.

How can libraries overcome the obstacles to innovation?

By infusing trend-spotting as a rewardable behavior and fostering professionals who stand up to the downward pressure aimed at innovators, Joe says.

“Institutional cultures need to weigh future patron needs and expectations as high as those of current patron groups,” Joe says. “The culture also needs to provide incentives for the adoption of modern technologies, habits and lifestyles into staff life flows.”

What are the best opportunities libraries have over the next couple of years to innovate?

“This is the key question,” says Joe. “If libraries consider futures in this context, we can be ensured of creating centers for innovative success.”

Joe says the area of content is an opportunity. “Embrace changing models of discovery, access and payments. Formats will continue to change; libraries can stay relevant if we can provide content to contemporary format preferences.”

He also thinks that librarians need to break the boundaries of what libraries do and what role they serve. “Skills may become a more important commodity for libraries than content.”

Other opportunities for innovation include using mobile and social tools for discovery, capitalizing on the increasing socialization of information, and leveraging proximity as a discovery point.

The question that Joe uses when wrestling with innovation: “We need to replace questions of ‘do our patrons use this new tool’ with ‘what will this tool’s entre mean for how our patrons expect to engage with information or services.’”

Gina says that the opportunity for public libraries is to become the ‘People’s University’, in line with Andrew Carnegie’s vision nearly 100 years ago. Carnegie wanted free libraries, where you didn’t have to have a lot of money or social status to use them. You could go there to improve yourself and improve your life.

“That’s true today more than ever,” Gina says. “We have a key role. We have a clear understanding of our role and mission as a major community asset. Topeka & Shawnee County would not be the great place it is without us. That’s not meant to sound egotistical, but to acknowledge that we offer people the opportunity to transform their lives in big and small ways. How many people have we helped find jobs, get computer skills, learn e-mail, write a resume, build a deck, prepare their kids for kindergarten, be a better cook, be a better parent, decide what to do in retirement? We tell people you do have control, you can do something, you can be educated, you can be marketable.”

“We can help with every aspect of your life. All you need is a library card.”

President’s Report | Perceptions of Libraries, 2010