How to Deliver an Innovation Program From Distance? Lessons From PRASU

Abstract

We provide our experiences at PRASU as we sought to deliver innovation consulting services to our customers during the COVID-19 pandemic. We had to adjust our delivery modes while making sure to meet client needs. We provide some insights for other managers and companies. We also learned some lessons that will be applied to our services when normalcy returns.

We are executives in an innovation consulting company. Our work is to help some of the largest companies in India build an innovation culture—using our novel innovation model. But what happens when our consulting has to be completed at a distance? In this case due to the COVID-19 pandemic. What lessons can we learn from this crises and the activities we have to complete?

Our organization is based out of Bangalore, the Silicon Valley of India. It is a hub for both government and private technology and innovation centers. Our interaction and our customers are with these technology centres, working on cutting edge technologies in diverse domains to create world class innovations, and also developing world class Innovators.

The critical success factors of our business include working directly with people in these technology centres, mentoring them and supporting them to develop business relevant innovations. Obviously, for coaching and mentoring these highly skilled professionals, face-to-face discussion and in-person activity are crucial and necessary.

In addition to meeting customers, meeting the senior management and leadership team of these organizations regularly is another key element of our process. A typical engagement of PRASU with a technology center begins with an innovation workshop that typically lasts two days.

Workshop participants are grouped into teams and every team is taken through a process of coaching and mentoring to develop the innovation skills and to ultimately aid in initiating intellectual property development. We have conducted over 100 such engagements over the past few years.

But the Coronavirus has disrupted a key aspect of our process. The face-to-face coaching and mentoring—about 70% of the entire program—the entire program was impacted.

We could not physically meet key stakeholders or workshop participants. We were actually in the midst of a major client service offering when a lockdown to the virus was announced.

For some clients—who had scheduled a project—postponing the entire workshop program was needed. However, for clients with whom we were in process, we decided to go forward with the program.

To do this, we had to put in new processes and policies to make this happen—a “new” environment of with no face-to-face option. The adaptation was needed for both PRASU and the client.

An intermediate plan was needed for the company. Essentially it came down to—“The WHAT will not change, but the HOW will change.”

This motto set up the spirit for the way forward.

A series of discussions were held between the leadership team of the client and PRASU to arrive at identifying the list of key concerns. We identified a number of key issues to address the following.

• 1)Our clients—with whom we continued the program—had deadlines to meet.
• 2)The client's business had planned several innovations to be delivered.
• 3)Business plans required intellectual property as part of the deliverables.
• 4)Career progression was at stake—this program is also part of professional development requirements for several individuals
• 5)The absence of meeting colleagues as usual was considered an issue too, since this could lead to discontent, discomfort, and even loss in productivity

The client was very specific that while the uncertainty due to the pandemic is real, the absence of camaraderie between the team members could worsen the situation. The lack of face-to-face events or visually meeting colleagues was a key issue for the client.

This last and critical point was addressed innovatively with this program. The client leadership decided to go ahead with this workshop program. Their conviction and hence the pitch to the team was to use this program as a binding force and a method to maintain contact with the team members—and their colleagues. PRASU laid down some new process rules to deliver the program to the client in the new environment. These new rules included the following.

• 1)All calls will be with video.
• 2)Every team member will mandatorily switch on the video for at least 50% of the meeting time.
• 3)Every session starts with a funny or interesting icebreaker to ease stress and tension.
• 4)Interruptions were allowed and in some cases welcomed—many participant had young children or in some cases babies. Lightness was made of a difficult situation.
• 5)Although professional standards were maintained, this light attitude was critical throughout the workshop.

Our innovation program involved regular video calls for the coaching and mentoring sessions. These regular calls improved the camaraderie between team members.

The worry of what would happen to their jobs reduced significantly as they saw the company investing in their future and the people were directly involved in it. Thus, an important lesson here for many companies is to pay particular attention to professional development of workers when there are crises or interruptions in regular work practices. It improves morale, which, in turn, helps maintain organizational productivity in difficult times.

This exercise also helped employees to understand that need to work with second-best options or in imperfect and new environments. Technology played a critical role. Sharing videos, links, and content became key to maintaining interest and building knowledge. Several tools were tried to find what was comfortable to most participants. Security aspects of the tool were also deemed important before the communication tool was finalized.

We did encounter difficulties. At times, the internet speed made it difficult to have the session in a seamless manner—although camaraderie and showing progress on a regular basis helped people to maintain a positive outlook. Building camaraderie was to interject some personal humor—to also make sure that not all the time was spent “working.”

We encouraged teams to make group presentations using videos supporting collaborative efforts in between calls when the program and workshop continued. This fostered regular collaboration between the people and they enjoyed it as it made them to look forward in creating something for the future. The bolstered participant morale further enhance their productivity.

While the current crisis has caused great tension and uncertainty, coping tools are necessary. A positive visual presence is a key element. Maintaining a common purpose and common goal was also seen as important. Additionally—a sense of security–the teams felt they were supported and given a reason to stay positive by the leadership team.

When we return to normalcy or pre-COVID-19 status, some of these practices have helped us to redesign our workshop program—and manage in general—and be productive when we have distributed global teams.

Biographies

Sudeendra Koushik (Senior Member, IEEE) is the Chief Innovator and Cofounder of PRASU, a unique consulting company. He advises major companies, such as Bosch, Continental, General Motors, Mercedes Benz, and Volvo, on delivering innovation by developing innovators. He also mentors many start-ups and advises several incubation centers. Koushik links academia and industry through workshops and technical talks on innovation and has developed a syllabus for academia. His research is in a unique area of linking innovation and innovator skills and has published several research papers and conducted numerous workshops on innovation in India and abroad. He has been a passionate and practicing innovator and technology professional throughout his career of 26 years, with more than 20 national and international patents in various stages. He has served in Philips Global Development Centre, Singapore, Philips Advanced Systems Laboratory and Philips Innovation Centre, Eindhoven, The Netherlands, Philips Innovation Centre, India, HCL as Practice Director Innovation, and TTK Prestige as the Vice-President and Head of Innovation.

Pragya Dixit is the Cofounder of PRASU. She received the triple master's degree in computer, management, and arts, is a serial entrepreneur. She has specific interest in intrapreneruship and has written articles and papers on the same. She is also a successful entrepreneur in diverse sectors, such as education, luxury services, and jewellery, which is an international business today. She has coauthored a book on innovation along with Dr. Koushik.