Building a Culture of Innovation While Running a Legacy Business (DeveloperWeek Global 2020)

Learn how to build a culture of innovation within a legacy business while still driving growth and staying competitive in this real-world example of experimentation and collaboration.

Key takeaways
  • Innovation is important in the workplace as it gives companies an edge and challenges the old ways of solving problems.
  • Experimentation is hard with mature products due to the risk it poses, but it’s necessary to stay competitive.
  • To create an environment that fosters innovation, it’s necessary to set aside time for hackathons or 20% time for teams to work on something they’re passionate about.
  • Designing continuous feedback mechanisms and acknowledging the challenges that come with innovation are crucial to its success.
  • The effectiveness of innovations like Beehive relies on the ability to quickly iterate and validate results.
  • The ideal innovation lab should have a dedicated researcher, product owner, and developers to ensure the project’s success.
  • It’s essential to have a rotation model where resources from home teams move to the innovation lab and vice versa to share knowledge and best practices.
  • The benefits of Beehive significantly outweigh the challenges it posed, with successful experiments leading to new products like WorkWise.
  • To make innovation an integral part of the organization, it’s necessary to establish a culture of experimentation and continuous improvement.
  • The most effective innovation labs have a mix of design, engineering, and research expertise to ensure that ideas are tested and implemented quickly.
  • Failure is an essential part of the innovation process, and it’s necessary to be open to exploring new ideas and discarding those that don’t work.
  • Innovation is not a replacement for BAU (Business As Usual) activities, but it should be an integral part of the organization’s culture.