'Met Innovatieve Ideeën naar Voordeel.' Mooi, maar: 'Hoe krijg ik ze dan mee?'

Ondernemer Henry Ford zei het al: “Why is it that whenever I ask for a pair of hands, a brain comes attached?”. Voor menig manager lijkt het er op dat zijn medewerkers hem beperken bij de uitwerking van zijn innovatieve ideeën. In een recent artikel, 'From Innovation to Advantage' citeert Gary Hamel Henry Ford. Hamel c.s. vroegen zichzelf af waarom de realisatie van innovatieve (nb: Amerikaanse) ideeën achterblijven bij die van Aziatische ondernemingen. Zijn conclusie: 'Asian success is based on a wholly different set of principles—about the capabilities of its employees and the responsibilities of its leaders.'

Dat klinkt goed en begrijpelijk maar helaas laat Hamel ons niet zien zien wat 'het' dan is. Of zoals voormalig CHRYSLER CEO Lee Iacocca eens zei: "You can have brilliant ideas; but if you can't get them across, your ideas won't get you anywhere." Een risico dat ook voor Aziatische ondernemingen reeël is.

Ford en Iacocca waren & zijn niet de enige managers die een uitdaging zien in het geaccepteerd én uitgevoerd krijgen van hun (al dan niet) innovatieve ideeën. Dat lukt niet altijd, of altijd niet, maar gelukkig is er nu het boek 'The Art of Woo' Selling Your Ideas to the Entire Organization, One Person at a Time.

"Woo": It's the ability to "win others over" to your ideas without coercion, using relationship-based, emotionally intelligent persuasion.' Zo beginnen G. Richard Shell en Mario Moussa hun boek 'The Art of Woo, Selling Your Ideas to the Entire Organization, One Person at a Time.

Het voorbeeld waarmee zij beginnen is: 'Bono's visit to then-Senator Jesse Helms' Capitol Hill office to enlist his help in the global war against AIDS. Bono had all the facts and figures at his fingertips, and launched into a detailed appeal based on this data. He was, in essence, speaking to Helms the same way he had recently spoken to executives and technical experts at the many foundations and corporations he had approached about this issue. But within a few minutes, Bono sensed that he was losing Helms' attention, and he instinctively changed his pitch. Knowing that Helms was a deeply religious man (and drawing on his own born-again Christian values), Bono began speaking of Jesus Christ's concern for the sick and poor. He argued that AIDS should be considered the 21^st century equivalent of leprosy, an affliction cited in many Bible stories of the New Testament. Helms immediately sat up and began listening, and before the meeting was over had promised to be the Senate champion for Bono's cause.'  Bono verstond blijkbaar the art of persuasion, the Art of Woo.

'The Art of Woo' presenteert een eenvoudige 4-Stappen benadering voor het Proces om je Ideeën te Verkopen, het proces om je ideeën geaccepteerd én uitgevoerd te krijgen. Deze stappen zijn:

1. First, persuaders need to polish their ideas and survey the social networks that will lead them to decision makers. Het voorbeeld dat de auteurs aanhalen is dat van Charles Lindbergh: 'Lindbergh started with contacts at the local airport who could see why his plan made sense and eventually worked his way up to the most influential businessmen in the city, using each person along the way to leverage an interview with the next.'
2. The second stage of the Woo process is confronting "the five barriers" -- 'the five most common obstacles that can sink ideas before they get started. These include unreceptive beliefs, conflicting interests, negative relationships, a lack of credibility and failing to adjust one's communication mode to suit a particular audience or situation.'  Voorbeeld: tijdens het Beleg van Toulon, 1793, wilde Napoleon zijn mannen posteren op een plek die binnen de vuurlinie van de vijand viel. Collega officieren betwijfelden of hij ook maar iemand gevonden kon krijgen die deze gevaarlijke post wilde bemannen. Maar: 'Napoleon demonstrated his social intelligence by switching to the visionary channel and creating a large placard that was placed next to the cannons. It read: "The Battery of the Men without Fear." The position was manned night and day.'
3. The third stage is to pitch your idea in a compelling way. Voorbeeld: 'At Google, employees selling ideas to upper management are given a challenge: to distill their business concepts into short, punchy presentations that get right to the essence of what they are proposing. This discipline forces them to figure out exactly what problem their idea addresses, how their idea will solve it and why their idea is better than both the status quo and available alternatives.'
4. The final stage of Woo is to secure both individual and organizational commitments. Commitment, dé essentie om Organisatie Ontwikkeling en - Verandering tot een succes te kunnen maken. "One of the most common mistakes people make in selling ideas," al dus Shell, "is to think that their job is finished once they succeed in getting someone to say 'yes' to their proposal. That's only the beginning. Research shows that in most organizations, a minimum of eight people will need to sign off on even simple ideas. The number goes up from there. So after you move the individual, you also have to move the organization."

The Art of Woo, ik veronderstel dat dit voor menigeen een handzaam boek kan zijn, zeker voor degenen onder ons die rondlopen met innovatieve, of andere, ideeën en die zich afvragen: 'Hoe krijg ik de Rest mee?' Weet dan dat dit boek ook nog een 2-tal diagnose instrumenten heeft:

• the "Six Channels Survey", which is designed to help people learn which of the key channels of influence they feel compelled to use most often at work and which they would prefer to use if given a choice
• the Persuasion Styles Assessment, helps readers determine the degrees of assertiveness and natural social intelligence they bring to the idea-selling process

Binnenkort zijn er weer Feestdagen, misschien is dit iets voor uw verlanglijstje?