Most Transformations start at changing perception. All you need to change perception is changing the focal point.

Take the example of business in general, what makes a business successful? Is it money, profit, revenue, or market share? Unfortunately some of the successful entrepreneurs have different opinion.

In a recent interview, when Business Week Senior Writer Steve Hamm asked Narayana Murthy, “did you ever imagine that Infosys would become such an important company in the worldwide tech industry?” this is exactly what he replied

We were certain of one thing, and that is our value system. In fact, when we sat down in the bedroom of my apartment in 1981, we discussed for four hours what our objective should be. Should it be revenues, profits, market capitalization?

No, we said it should be none of those. We will seek respect from every one of the stakeholders. My view was if we sought respect we'd automatically do the right thing by each of them. We'd satisfy our customers, be fair to our employees, and follow the finest principles with respect to investors, we would not violate laws, and, finally, we'd make a difference to society.

And then, I said, automatically you'll get revenues and profits and all that

The process, culture, system, which they have built over the years, is the result of focusing on their vision and values.

In a same way, bringing innovation needs a change in where we focus.

The model we follow in software development, especially in the offshore model, is build around what we call ‘Delivery’, it works as long as you are just a ‘Coding Shop‘, not tuned for running an innovative organization. Trying to trying to use this model for innovation is almost like focusing on 'Money' to build an Insofys.

The only way to bring innovation is, changing our focus from

1. Delivery to Wow
2. Software to Solution
3. Manger to Leader
4. Contract Negotiation to Collaboration
5. Customer Satisfaction to Customer Success

‘If life is journey, then business is hiking’ - Henry Jacob (of course me)

Business is a constant process transformation, we always taken that extra mile in order to differentiate ourselves in the crowded market place.

Whether we like it or not, these transformations are inevitable. Not just to differentiate, even to serve our customers better, and to improve the way we work. Quality Initiatives, CMM, Offshore, Outsource are just few of them.

Since it is inevitable; we simply follow. Today every Indian IT company is CMM certified, all consulting companies have their Indian presence (IBM, Accenture, Gap Gemini, etc).

Since everyone follows, there is no other option than moving ahead.

Moving ahead is not simple. Sometime, we need to break rules, unlearn, and even change the organization from the ground up.

Brining Innovation is such a transformation and recognizing this is the first step to win this game.

Innovation is everywhere; soon every company in the plant is going to claim, even someone will be there to certify you as an innovator.

Often, I get calls from Indian based IT companies to train their employees on innovation, though I am glad that someone in those companies recognized the value of innovation.

But the real question is ‘is it that simple?’

When we faced similar situation in the name of Quality, many IT companies missed the opportunity and fooled themselves in the name of certification.

Let’s not make the same mistake,

This is a great opportunity, an opportunity to correct our mistakes, an opportunity to transform every organization and individual to their highest potential, and an opportunity to make difference.

Whenever I talk about design, many, especially the agile community, mistake it with what they call “big upfront design”. So here is my answer.

Design is not a phase, not even an activity. It is an ability to select the best possible option for the current problem.

Doing design as a big upfront activity is same as developing software using waterfall methodology. You are going to face the same issues like communication, lack of feedback, wasting time on unwanted features, etc.

In fact, the main intention of creating the D3 is, making the design process as simple as possible and brining the benefit of agile to the design. If I put it simple words, D3 is an iterative process to do the design.

I received a wonderful story today, I don’t know how authentic it is, but it’s conveying a great message “why we should focus on solution instead of problem”.

When NASA began the launch of astronauts into space, they found out that the pens wouldn't work at zero gravity (ink won't flow down to the writing surface). To solve this problem, it took them one decade and $12 million.

They developed a pen that worked at zero gravity, upside down, underwater, in practically any surface including crystal and in a temperature range from below freezing to over 300 degrees C.

And what did the Russians do...?? They used a pencil.