Creating an Innovative Team Culture

Name: Creating an Innovative Team Culture
Author: Donna Van Dusen

Learn how to create an innovative team culture.

Preview the first lesson free — get full access to all 5 lessons.

Course: On-Demand

(upbeat music) How do you boost team innovation? In these lessons, we'll go over how you can foster a collective team voice, promote diversity, ensure psychological safety, communicate openly, challenge ideas, and allow flexibility so you can create a team culture that promotes innovation. Focusing too much on individual members of your team detracts from the sense of teamwork that encourages innovative and creative thinking. Although individuals want to be recognized, focusing on one person's contributions when discussing ideas can be counterproductive, because doing so can encourage individualism over a team atmosphere. So, how can you and your team foster a collective voice and maintain a highly collaborative environment? You can try framing an idea as one that the team brought up, instead of a contribution from one person. This encourages the team to criticize the idea, instead of the individual team member. Relinquishing personal ownership of an idea helps the team challenge that idea without making things personal. It also helps to avoid unhealthy competition between team members. Also, referring to yourself and everyone else as "We", instead of using "I" or "You" when discussing ideas, is more inclusive and promotes a sense of teamwork. For example, saying something like, "I have all the ideas here, "So let's evaluate each one, starting with Carlos's idea" doesn't promote a cohesive team as much as, "We have five ideas on the table for consideration, "so let's shuffle them around and give each a random number. "Let's start by considering idea four." Also, when providing feedback to the group about, say, possibly missing a deadline, using the inclusive "We" creates a sense of group unity and responsibility, and fosters collaboration. High-performing teams mostly focus on accomplishing the task and communicating about work priorities. They also communicate support and encouragement to each other. Frequent communication solidifies team members' sense of belonging and inspires team spirit. You also want to promote diversity of working styles within your team. Team innovation involves members identifying ideas and exploring each one through critical analysis, resulting in an understanding of which ones are practical and workable. But the excitement of thinking creatively in a group and the energy generated through that process can wind up creating a team of exclusively innovator types. At some point, the team needs to decide which ideas provide actual solutions to problems, then respond to the issue they are responsible for. Time constraints and deadlines must be met. Innovative teams need to include members with strong analytical skills to challenge and question the ideas generated, and help the team attain its goal by shifting the focus to practical solutions. In addition, innovative ideas come from both introverts and extroverts. While extroverts get energy from interacting with others, introverts get energy from working alone. Extroverts may increase the energy level during team meetings, be more forthcoming with ideas, and inadvertently dominate discussions. In contrast, introverts may take more time to think through what they intend to share. Given these differences, building a team consisting of more extroverted types may seem desirable. It's important to keep in mind that neither type is inherently more creative than the other, and both will contribute, but with different styles. Forming innovative teams by including different personality types and showing respect for individual people is essential to building team trust and promoting creativity.

Intermediate Provider : Donna Van Dusen 5 Lessons · 13m in Arabic, German, English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Chinese

Course Description

Creating a team culture that’s focused around innovation is important to your business. In these lessons, you’ll learn to foster your team’s voice, promote diversity, ensure your team’s psychological safety, and encourage open communication. You’ll also understand how to challenge ideas as part of the innovative process.

What You'll Learn

Foster a diverse team environment and build a collective team voice
Create a psychologically safe team culture
Communicate openly within your team
Challenge ideas as part of the innovative process
Allow flexibility to support innovation

Key Takeaways

Creating a team culture focused on innovation is important to your business.
Fostering your team's voice and promoting diversity supports an innovative environment.
Ensuring your team's psychological safety helps build an innovative culture.
Challenging ideas contributes to the innovative process.
Encouraging open communication and flexibility is part of building an innovative team culture.

Frequently Asked Questions

What will I learn in this course?

You'll learn to foster your team's voice, promote diversity, ensure your team's psychological safety, and encourage open communication, as well as understand how to challenge ideas as part of the innovative process.

What topics do the lessons cover?

The lessons cover Fostering a Team Voice and Promoting Diversity, Ensuring Psychological Safety, Communicating Openly, Challenging Ideas and Allowing Flexibility, and a Test Your Knowledge section.

What skills does this course help build?

It builds skills in Team Building, Team Motivation, being Team Oriented, Teamwork, Organizational Culture Change, and Team Processes.

Why is an innovative team culture important?

Creating a team culture that's focused around innovation is important to your business.