Innovation Culture: #2 Skills

Continuing on from my last post exploring the cultural behaviours you’d want to see in an organisation in order to drive maximum value from its portfolio, I want to now turn to the expertise and skills required.

There are 4 key skills which stand out and are frequently sighted by studies and literature: 

1. Creativity: Sourcing new ideas and questioning why, what and how an organisation can work differently to drive value. 
2. Customer-centricity: A human-centred approach, applying methodologies such as Design-Thinking (see Kelley & Littman), observing and engaging with customers throughout to ensure the outcome will drive the most value and best align to their needs. 
3. Data Analysis: Customer and market data interpretation to support incremental change, and associating skills to draw conclusions from potentially unrelated issues as well as the ability to thinking strategically in ambiguous situations in order to support transformational change. 
4. Experimenting: Iterating, testing and gathering feedback on products and services with a diverse group, increasing the likelihood of meeting the customer need and delivering value. 

Does your organisation have these skills - what impact are they having and how are you encouraging and developing them?

What others do you think are important?