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You never try, you never know, right?
Wrong!
As leaders, we are often faced with the dilemma of supporting new initiatives versus maintaining the status quo.
Without innovation, we risk becoming irrelevant. But with innovation comes the risk of failure. Some leaders adopt a “you never try, you’ll never know” approach and allow unfettered experimentation. To me, this is foolhardy as you don’t need to touch every hot stove to know that you will get burned. You already know that from past experience.
As resources are finite, as leaders we need to deploy them responsibly. Thus, even as I encourage the intellectual curiosity to challenge the status quo, I balance that with the discipline to leverage lessons learned from past experiences and the application of rigorous thought leadership.
In short, before I sign off on an initiative, you need to have a plausible “theory” of why your new way will work better. A justification of “you never try, you never know,” only proves to me that you are trying your luck.
While I cannot argue that serendipity does not play a part in innovation, it is just one of many ingredients. To me, successful innovation relies more on “structured” experimentation and the call to innovate is not carte blanche to go out and do whatever you want.
