Publications
Publications
- Harvard Business Review
Drive Innovation with Better Decision-Making
By: Linda A. Hill, Emily Tedards and Taran Swan
Abstract
Despite their embrace of agile methods, many firms striving to innovate are struggling to produce breakthrough ideas. A key culprit, according to the authors, is an outdated, inefficient approach to decision-making. Today’s discovery-driven innovation processes involve an unprecedented number of choices, from which ideas to pursue to countless decisions about how to conduct experiments, what data to collect, and so on. But these choices are often made too slowly and informed by obsolete information and narrow perspectives.
To align their decision-making processes with agile approaches, businesses need to include diverse (customer, local, data-informed, and outside) points of view; clarify decision rights; match the cadence of decisions to the pace of learning; and encourage candid conflict in service of a better experience for the end customer. Only then will all that rapid experimentation pay off.
The article suggests best practices for these interventions, drawing on the story of the transformation of Pfizer’s Global Clinical Supply organization, which would go on to play a critical role supporting the rapid development of the pharma giant’s COVID vaccine.
To align their decision-making processes with agile approaches, businesses need to include diverse (customer, local, data-informed, and outside) points of view; clarify decision rights; match the cadence of decisions to the pace of learning; and encourage candid conflict in service of a better experience for the end customer. Only then will all that rapid experimentation pay off.
The article suggests best practices for these interventions, drawing on the story of the transformation of Pfizer’s Global Clinical Supply organization, which would go on to play a critical role supporting the rapid development of the pharma giant’s COVID vaccine.
Keywords
Innovation and Invention; Decision Making; Decision Choices and Conditions; Organizational Change and Adaptation
Citation
Hill, Linda A., Emily Tedards, and Taran Swan. "Drive Innovation with Better Decision-Making." Harvard Business Review 99, no. 6 (November–December 2021): 70–79.
About The Author
