How to build high performance and great working lives

The concept of workplace innovation is a practical approach to organisational change rooted in a vast body of evidence and experience. In 2013 we created The Essential Fifth Element, an actionable approach to workplace innovation which has since helped many companies achieve significant performance gains while also enhancing the well-being and engagement of employees at every level.

Our experience of promoting fairer, more productive work dates back as far as the early 1990s. Together with our Dutch partners, we were the co-creators of the workplace innovation concept – which has now taken root in European Commission policy and in the economic strategies of several countries, including Scotland.

Workplace innovation sees organisations as systems of interdependent parts which need to be considered as a whole, leading to simultaneous benefits for businesses and their employees, and is evidence-based.

It includes:

good job design,
self-managed teamworking,
human-centred technologies,
employee-driven improvement and innovation,
flatter organisational structures,
coaching styles of management,
trust-based systems and procedures,
employee voice in decision-making,
shared & distributed (‘co-created’) leadership.

In 2013 we created The Essential Fifth Element, an actionable approach to workplace innovation which has since helped many companies achieve significant performance gains while also enhancing the well-being and engagement of employees at every level.

Here are some examples:

Pharmaceutical
Company

Reduced the impact of functional divisions to improve workflow, delegated decision-making to team and involved staff in innovation.

Significant cost reduction and efficiency gains, and major steps towards creating a culture of improvement and innovation.

Engineering
Services
Company

Greater transparency and measures to engage staff, reducing functional silos and stimulating employee-driven innovation.

60+ ideas generated by employees, The MD argues that workplace innovation has placed the company 12 months ahead of its competitors.

Packaging
Company

Leadership transparency; delegation of decision-making to frontline meetings; employee-led process mapping and improvement.

Workplace innovation played a vital role in changing work practices throughout the company, leading to a £1.4m profit upturn without capital investment.

Building
Renovation
Company

Leadership transparency and enhanced 2-way communication with site-based teams combined with good practice teamwork principles.

Significant improvements in meeting targets and an average improvement in profitability of 6% per project.

Engineering
Company

Introduction of a representative ‘Shop Committee’ bringing employee voice into decision-making and stimulating ideas for improvement.

MD claims that KPIs have all improved as a result of employee voice measures, building pride in the workplace.

“Workplace innovation has emerged as a key driver for business competitiveness. During the best of economic times, workplace innovation has become an important consideration; in these times it has the potential to be a key tool for business recovery. Corporates, Public Sector, SMEs and micro-business, Charities and Social Enterprises are facing uncertain and challenging futures; any support which will help reorient business practices to improve productivity and thus competitiveness should be examined”.

Do you want to improve performance, engagement and culture but don’t know where to start? Read more.

Book a no obligation, free, 30 minutes session call with one of our experts.

Peter Totterdill at Glasgow Masterclass 2020