Ditch the Handbrake: Unlocking Innovation with CEO-Led, Workforce-Powered Innovation
My new definition of “Innovation” is based on The Golden Ratio and is copyrighted on January 4th, 2025, in Sydney, Australia: “The process of solving problems and exploiting opportunities by redesigning existing processes and creating non-obvious pathways to sustainable stakeholder impact.”
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We’re now in the second quarter of the 21st century, and the call for an innovative mindset and the dismantling of traditional barriers to innovation has never been more urgent. The challenges we confront today demand audacity and adaptability. Yet, most organisations are still bound by antiquated Human Resource Management practices that impede their progress. It’s high time we confront these obstacles and welcome a fresh, innovative culture.
In the 20th century, innovation initiatives were typically handed off to expensive external consultants, assuming employees lacked the capacity for innovative thinking. This misconception persisted despite the reality that corporate policies and procedures were often the real culprits, smothering creativity and experimentation. It’s time we moved on from this archaic model. Innovation must be anchored in the organisation’s culture, led by courageous leaders, and powered by engaged teams.
Innovation, at its core, is the process of solving problems and exploiting opportunities by redesigning existing processes and creating non-obvious pathways to sustainable stakeholder impact.
This definition draws inspiration from the Golden Ratio, a timeless symbol of harmony and proportion in nature, art, and architecture. Just as the Golden Ratio balances elements to create beauty and efficiency, this definition emphasises the interplay between problem-solving and opportunity exploitation, practical redesigns and bold creativity to achieve impactful and sustainable outcomes.
The Fibonacci spiral beautifully captures this dynamic, a natural phenomenon that symbolizes growth, harmony, and balance.
Like the spiral, innovation starts with small foundational elements — incremental improvements or initial creative ideas — that expand outward in an iterative process. Each turn of the spiral reflects a new stage of solving problems or exploiting opportunities, gradually building upon previous successes to create something more significant and impactful.
The Fibonacci spiral also mirrors the balance inherent in innovation. Its perfect proportions, derived from the Golden Ratio, represent the harmony between the practical and the imaginative, the reactive and the proactive. Just as the spiral’s curves grow seamlessly from one another, so does innovation evolve through the interplay of redesigning processes and creating bold, non-obvious pathways.
As innovative concepts are refined, they progress through the Golden Ratio, moving toward increasingly smaller and more precise iterations.
This process mirrors how initial broad ideas and experimental solutions are honed over time into highly efficient, focused innovations. Just as the smallest square in the final spiral represents the culmination of perfect proportions and harmony, the refinement of an innovation arrives at a distilled essence — a solution that is both elegantly simple and profoundly impactful. This journey through the spiral underscores that innovation is not just about expansion but also about convergence, arriving at solutions that resonate deeply with stakeholders while maintaining their transformative potential.
Moreover, the expanding nature of the spiral reflects how innovation amplifies its impact over time. What begins as a modest adjustment or insight ripples outward, creating a broader transformation that ultimately drives sustainable stakeholder impact. The spiral reminds us that innovation is not a one-time effort but a continuous journey of iteration, growth, and balance.
As we leave behind the outdated, compartmentalised thinking of the 20th century, this holistic approach redefines innovation as a balance between the reactive and the proactive, the creative and the structured. It challenges organisations to harmonise short-term problem-solving with long-term vision, and to approach innovation as an integrated, dynamic process. In doing so, we embrace a model of innovation fit for the complexities and opportunities of 2025 and beyond.
Brave CEOs Proclaim a Bold New Culture
Innovation begins at the helm. A Brave CEO does more than follow the same old routine; they boldly declare a new culture that prioritises creativity and experimentation that creates long-term value. They challenge the status quo, dismantle outdated hierarchies, and champion a mindset where calculated risks and an innovation culture are celebrated.
I’ve had the privilege of witnessing firsthand the transformative power of this approach. One CEO I collaborated with redefined success for their organisation, devising a joint focus on quarterly profits and sustainable stakeholder impact. Their message was resolute: “We will redesign how we work, embrace non-obvious solutions, and measure success by the positive impact we create.” This clarity energised the workforce and laid the foundation for lasting innovation.
Brave HR Managers Enable Vision into Reality
Even the most visionary CEO cannot drive cultural transformation alone. This is where the Brave HR Manager steps in, the co-pilot who turns bold aspirations into actionable frameworks. Traditional HR practices — rigid job descriptions, outdated performance metrics, and siloed organisational structures — often stifle innovation. A Brave HR Manager replaces these with systems designed to empower employees and encourage creativity.
Consider the impact of introducing “Innovation Impact Statements,” where roles are defined not by tasks but by the problems employees aim to solve and the opportunities they seek to exploit. This shift unlocks creativity and aligns every team member with the organisation’s mission. HRM must foster psychological safety, ensuring employees feel supported in taking risks and learning from failure — key components of an innovative culture.
The Handbrake of Traditional Practices
The handbrake analogy fits traditional HR practices. Legacy systems often focus on compliance and efficiency rather than adaptability and growth. They prioritise routine outputs over creative contributions, rigid hierarchies over cross-functional collaboration, and risk avoidance over experimentation. These practices create an environment where even the most talented teams struggle to innovate.
Breaking this cycle requires courage. The Brave CEO and HR Manager must work together to dismantle traditional barriers and replace them with structures that encourage fluid roles, teamwork, iterative learning, and a shared commitment to sustainable stakeholder impact.
Groundswell Innovation: Empowering Staff
True innovation flourishes when employees feel empowered to contribute their ideas and expertise. A staff-powered approach harnesses the organisation’s collective intelligence, creating a groundswell of innovation from within. This is not about token gestures or suggestion boxes; it’s about embedding innovation into the organisation’s daily fabric. The impact goes beyond operational improvements — it transforms the organisation into a destination for top talent. Employees thrive as they realise their full potential, and the organisation builds a reputation as an employer of choice, where creativity and ambition are nurtured and celebrated.
Imagine a CEO declaring, “A prosperous future lies in our hands. Your ideas, creativity, and willingness to challenge the norm, combined with my unwavering support, will drive our success.”
The morale boost alone can be transformative. More importantly, this approach unlocks solutions deeply informed by the organisation’s unique challenges and opportunities — solutions that external consultants could never fully grasp.
Cultural Upheaval is the Hardest, Most Necessary Step
Cultural change is the linchpin of innovation but also the most challenging part. It demands more than policy changes; it requires a shift in mindsets, behaviours, and values. Organisations must move from fearing failure to celebrating it as a critical learning opportunity. They must break down silos and flatten hierarchies to enable cross-functional collaboration and faster decision-making.
This upheaval is not a one-time event but an ongoing process. It requires leadership at every level, from the CEO modelling vulnerability and openness to HR creating systems that reinforce these values daily. Success comes when employees feel ownership of the organisation’s mission and are empowered to contribute meaningfully.
The 180-Degree Pivot to Sustainable Impact
Organisations willing to embrace this cultural shift unlock a new level of agility and resilience. They pivot from traditional, risk-averse practices to dynamic, opportunity-driven approaches. They move from asking, “How do we avoid failure?” to “What can we learn from this?”
The result is not just incremental improvement but transformational change. Products and services become more innovative, customer relationships deepen, and the organisation’s reputation for leadership grows. Most importantly, the positive stakeholder impact becomes a sustainable source of value.
Building a Legacy of Innovation
Innovation is not a task to be outsourced or a project to be completed. It is a way of thinking and working that must be woven into the very fabric of an organisation. By redefining innovation as solving problems and exploiting opportunities to achieve sustainable stakeholder impact, we anchor it in purpose and action.
CEO-led, staff-powered innovation is more than a strategy; it’s a cultural revolution needed in every organisation. It requires bravery, from the CEO who proclaims a bold new culture to the HR manager who brings it to life and the employees who drive it forward. Together, they create an organisation that continually adapts to change, leaving a legacy of creativity, resilience, and positive, sustainable impact.
My new definition of “Innovation” is based on The Golden Ratio and is copyrighted on January 4th, 2025, in Sydney, Australia: “The process of solving problems and exploiting opportunities by redesigning existing processes and creating non-obvious pathways to sustainable stakeholder impact.”
About the author: Greg Twemlow, Founder of XperientialAI©. Read more of my 300+ articles at: https://gregtwemlow.medium.com/
Greg Twemlow: Sharing what I’ve learned from my career of 35 years as a citizen of the world, parent, corporate executive, entrepreneur, and CEO of XperientialAI, focused on experiential learning for maximum impact with AI. Contact Greg: greg@xperiential.ai
