I’ve spent a lot of time, recently, chatting with folks inside and outside of the government on innovation. Inside the government, the most common topic seems to be about why so many innovation programs “fail”. I’ve been a long time fan of Steve Blank and Pete Newell, and their article “Why Innovation Dies, and How to Ensure its Survival” targeting defense innovation programs, specifically, came into one of the conversations, as well. I think it makes a lot of great points about the Department of Defense leadership structure, and I do think leadership structure is the dominant root cause driving all of the behaviors I’ve shared below. Despite that, I’d like to dive into some observations and potential pivots in execution that might save innovation programs in the future. 

As I wrote, too much came together for a single article, so I’ll be breaking it up.  As an overview, I would challenge three things over the next couple of weeks: 

1. Are we defining success appropriately? 
2. Do our expectations match our manning? 
3. Do our expectations match our resourcing?

Are we defining success appropriately? 

I would argue that, in many cases, “failure” is a bit debatable.

There is a lack of clarity on the purpose and value of innovation programs. Most organizations and leadership are focused on the single metric of transformative innovation. If the program did not produce or transition transformative innovation after a couple of years, then it failed. 

First, truly transformative innovation is, by its nature, rare. If transformative innovations were constant, our world might actually become quite volatile. 

Transformative innovations are commonly considered those which create a new market and disrupt an industry. I, personally, really like Bhaskar & Suleyman’s definition in “A Coming Wave'' as they set the stage for a discussion on responsible AI. They define such transformative innovations as those which create a cascade or “wave” of smaller innovations and drive a fundamental change in the common way of life. Changes like the automobile, airplane, computers, and so on.

Transformative Innovation Takes Time

Truly transformative innovations are generally not overnight sensations. They rarely go from discovery to adoption and disruption over the course of two to four years, which is the typical tenure of a government leader in a single position. The automobile was designed and driven in 1886 in Germany, but it was a cost prohibitive commodity. It wasn’t readily adopted until Henry Ford followed it up with the innovation of the assembly line, which made it an affordable commodity over 20 years later in 1908. In reality, the automobile didn’t really proliferate until the 1920s, 30-40 years after its introduction. 

The concept of the airplane dates back centuries. The Wright Brothers began work on their airplane in 1899, and had their first successful flight in 1903. While the first recorded commercial flight was in 1914, it wasn’t until the late 1920’s to 1930’s that it became a mainstream activity for a scaled number of passengers. Transformative innovation doesn’t happen overnight. 

Incremental Innovations Add Up

A second, and potentially more important point, is that there are other ways to win, which may not have the same impact on a chart deck, but are highly impactful in aggregate, and foundational in enabling transformative wins. 

What I’m referring to here, is facilitating incremental innovations. This is especially true inside of the Department of Defense–now more than ever. These are often dismissed, but they’re critical. There is a poem that most military members and veterans will have seen or heard at some point called “For Want of a Nail” and it goes as follows: 

For want of a nail, the shoe was lost.

For want of a shoe, the horse was lost. 

For want of a horse, the rider was lost 

For want of a rider, the message was lost. 

For want of a message, the battle was lost.

For want of a battle, the kingdom was lost.

And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.

While this is commonly and correctly interpreted as a call for attention to detail, I think it is a highly appropriate analogy for the state of the tools and resources currently available to our defense operators. We have service members working with wildly outdated resources, tools, and software products. Tasks that should take seconds to minutes, or be automated entirely, are taking hours or days and causing frustration. This scenario impacts morale resulting in poor talent and personnel retention. The impact in an actual conflict could be as catastrophic as the scenario described in “For Want of a Nail.” 

The problem is that the defense requirements system doesn’t have a standard means of handling minor upgrades that aren’t already tied to a program of record. They fall beneath contempt of an acquisition and budgeting process tailored around major weapons systems. A motivated individual can take on the pet project to get end of year funding for a quick fix, but rarely long term funds. 

As an added problem, the complexity of tools today - particularly the software component, requires customized tools for tasks that used to be standard purchases. Our funding model hasn’t updated, however, and operational teams are generally outfitted with contracting teams trained to buy, rather than build, and appropriations designated for commodity or service purchases. 

The reality is, to update these tools requires the skill set of an acquisition professional, research and development funding, and access to an accrediting official who can approve software on a defense system. Many efforts over the last 5-10 years have arisen in an attempt to fix the problem of enabling operators to resolve theses technology and tools gaps via access to funding and contracting resources. Some of these include AFWERX opening the SBIR program to operators, Army’s follow up with the xTech program and standup of Army Applications Laboratory, and the regulatory push to authorize operations and maintenance funding for software modifications. 

Even with these changes, execution requires operators to learn the career field skills of an acquisition officer and take on a program management role in addition to what is likely a more than full time job in order to execute. There’s a resourcing and skills gap, and there’s still a lack of training and understanding on how to support and scale such projects. This is all a product of lack of resource allocation to innovation programs, and overemphasis on the outreach activities common to defense innovation programs.

Oftentimes these minor innovations are deemed too small. They’re interesting good news stories, but leadership and critics grow stale of these types of wins and begin to belittle their value as they stack up in the absence of a major success story. I believe there is a lack of understanding of the criticality and impact that a wave of incremental innovations could have on operational effectiveness. 

The celebrated success of these wins is also crucial in spreading a culture of innovation. Innovation culture is the final major success factor that is often overlooked or not considered at all in the standup and measurement of innovation success.

A Culture of Innovation is Foundational

If we want to be able to capitalize on the big technology wins, we need to embrace, celebrate, and reward the smaller cultural wins. There is a reason it takes time for major innovations to spread. Infrastructure is, of course, critical. The speed with which infrastructure shifts is often tied to cultural acceptance and technology adoption rates. The infrastructure shifts move faster as the masses accept the change. Geoffrey A. Moore’s book, Crossing the Chasm, outlines the lack of incentives for innovators and the mass public to collaborate in driving technology adoption. This should be where the heart of resourcing for innovation programs are aimed. In defense technology adoption, we refer to technology transition and valleys of death, which can often be philosophically boiled down to a “chasm” issue. 

One major way to ease the challenge of reducing the gap is to build an innovative culture. A starting point is to celebrate and empower the small wins across these programs, rather than calling a program that only produces incremental innovation a “failure”, which creates the opposite effect.

We should be creating innovation programs focused on creating a culture of innovation–and in a two year time frame, the aggregation of small wins that indicate this shift is a big win! One reason it’s often dismissed is that it is a success that’s hard to quantify and communicate (especially in a performance system that has a strong preference for quantified success). 

How do you measure such a thing? You can certainly point to the rate of incremental innovations.  The real wins are subtle and can be hard to quantify on a chart. You KNOW when you’re surrounded by an innovative culture.  A few key characteristics of innovative culture include:  

• Largely optimistic and focused on the opportunity any situation presents, rather than the problem or frustration
• The overall language used is positive 
• Teammates bond and connect over ideas and successes (rather colluding over shortcomings…like discussing why innovation programs all fail)
• Conversations are creative and collaborative and often lead to natural brainstorm and ideation
• Process improvement and change in execution tactics are common and celebrated 

All of these things are great ways to assess the success of your innovation efforts. While difficult, they can be measured. You may also consider more anecdotal moments, like when a colleague who is historically a follower or late adopter of new technologies and processes, comes up with an idea for how to improve a process or product on their own! 

There is, of course, another way to drive mass rapid adoption of transformative technologies, and that is through crisis. Frequently I hear the argument that everything is fine, and if things got bad enough, we’d change. I find this sentiment confusing because it actively acknowledges that we need to change to succeed. In the context of national security, waiting for a crisis may be too late. There are, in fact, some interesting anecdotes tied to this mindset in the downfall of major past civilizations, but we won’t go down that rabbit hole today. 

Alternative Means of Measuring Success

I’d like to bring us back to the first question I’ve asked - are we defining success appropriately? Many innovation programs were pitched for what they were — activities and practices that would largely lead to process and cultural innovation. Are we assessing them against the right metrics? Have we captured and appreciated the positive? 

While there are pockets where this is not true, overall, the Department of Defense is in a poor cultural state, such that we approach even the best programs with a negative bias - innovation or otherwise. This is palpable to me now that I’ve been away from it, when I step back into military duty, or join a government dominated call - even with the most innovative organizations.

Further, we’re impatient and undisciplined, and as a result, treat innovation programs like a fitness fad. We’re looking for the magic diet pill, and view every program as the quick fix, forgetting to read the fine print proclaiming “this product works best with a healthy diet and exercise!” The many positive impacts are quickly dismissed as too small and the cumulative value of those impacts are not appropriately considered or understood. We then have a tendency to cancel, defund, and dismiss such programs prematurely. Because we are constantly starting over, we yoyo in our enthusiasm, and don’t gain lasting progress. 

Instead of starting over I propose leaders consider the following approach: 

1. Gain clarity on your programs objective outcomes
2. Assess the metrics your using to measure success and make sure the more subtle wins are appropriately captured 
3. Reassess with a focus on what’s going right - capture it and celebrate it! 
4. Review the things that aren’t working with focus, and think through resolution with the following questions in mind: 
   • Is my resourcing aligned with my goals? 
   • Are the individuals and personalities on the team aligned with my goals? 

To my federal market colleagues - I’m rooting for you too - on my days in uniform and out! As someone who has put everything I had on the table for defense innovation, and found both successes and failures along the way, I share these thoughts for consideration and as a call to action. 

In the words of Atul Guwande, I believe that “Better is Possible.” Dr. Guwande spoke these words in the context of the impact of bureaucracy in the life-or-death environment of the medical community. They are equally applicable in the life-or-death environment of national security. I like to end every conversation with hope. Despite my criticisms, I do still have it, and I’m still here fighting for it. So I’ll close out with his words: 

“Better is possible. It does not take genius. It takes diligence. It takes moral clarity. It takes ingenuity. And above all, it takes a willingness to try.”  - Dr. Atul Guwande, Better. A Surgeon’s Notes on Performance. 

Your Fan,