Cross Functional Teams (CFT)

These teams help break down turf protection. However, they need to be carefully managed. Just including people from many departments does not automatically make a CFT more effective. Too much information can just confuse everybody. Clarity of goals and top management support as well as recognition and rewards are critical to the process. Managing cross-functional teams is one of the challenges of new product development. Yet, how members from different functional areas come together, interact, and arrive at consensus, is a poorly understood process.

Cross Functional Teams (CFT)

These teams help break down turf protection. However, they need to be carefully managed. Just including people from many departments does not automatically make a CFT more effective. Too much information can just confuse everybody. Clarity of goals and top management support as well as recognition and rewards are critical to the process. Managing cross-functional teams is one of the challenges of new product development. Yet, how members from different functional areas come together, interact, and arrive at consensus, is a poorly understood process.

Save the Oceans

That Mount Kailash the home of the Gods and even Everest, is littered with plastic garbage, is common knowledge. But unseen, in the depths of the beautiful blue ocean, more than 8 million tonnes of plastic is dumped, every year. This is fuelled by our ‘disposable’ life style. Everything including throw away wedding gowns have ensured that most plastic items are thrown away after just one use. It is estimated that more than 1 million plastic bags are used every minute, many of them ending up in the ocean. ‘No water, no life. No blue, no green’, writes Dr. Sylvia Earle. A plastic bags average ‘work life’ is just 15 minutes. Plastics are not bio-degradable. In the ocean, plastic doe not dissolve or disintegrate. They remain to affect human health. The movement of waves tears them into tiny pieces which are eaten by fish and sea mammals who slowly choke and die a lingering painful death. They are then eaten by birds and human. The chemicals are also released into air and water. Plastics contain lead, cadmium, mercury and carcinogens like DEHP and BPA. An average person produces half a pound of plastic waste every day. How can we be more responsible about cleaning up after ourselves? Huge plastic islands have been created because of ocean flows. The great Pacific Garbage Patch is larger than the State of Texas. Five such patches have been discovered. What can we do to protect the oceans? • Buy a cloth or paper bag • Choose products packaged in bio-degradable materials. • A predominantly fish diet is a hazard • Be responsible for disposal of your garbage • Recycle plastic God gave us the infinite oceans. Let us save them before it is too late!

Flexibility and adaptability is key to Innovation

Adapting to change and proactively responding to opportunities are daunting tasks. Top management needs to handhold teams through these risky processes. Failures need to be dealt with in a way that protects and encourages risk taking. Only CEOs can provide the time and resources required for companies to be outwardly focused, scanning the environment of competitors, customers, academicians, suppliers and even different industries. Such companies have a better chance of becoming innovation stars. CEOs can provide courage, zest, enthusiasm and speed to the whole organization. It is this energy that will drive an Innovation Initiative. Large, traditional companies have a tendency to become more bureaucratic. Bureaucracy produces politics, red tape and power struggles. People find a hundred rules to protect themselves from acting. This can repress the natural energy and enthusiasm of the organization. CEOs can prevent this deadening disease.

Consistent Innovation

Once the returns from an innovation start to pour in, the organization may begin to focus on maximizing the returns through routine implementation. Harvesting is a mechanical and essential process. Perhaps every organization requires a section of its people to focus on creativity and innovation. An Innovation Center could provide the foundation for a long-term initiative. Large, tradition bound, successful organizations, tend to prefer the stability that formalized procedures provide. Older organizations tend to become more bureaucratic. Large companies may have more resources, while smaller companies may find it easier to change course. Even though most companies accept the idea of innovation being important for success, most are not committed enough to practice it on a long-term basis. Most are not aware of the underlying process required to make it work on a consistent basis. In the Innovation Movement itself, there are not enough clearly defined structures and processes that a company could follow. There are few consultant organizations, which can handhold and support long-term innovation initiatives. There is a feeling that innovation and creativity is for intellectuals or geniuses. Innovation as a concept needs to be demystified for use across the organization. Management is bottom-line driven. They are extremely result oriented in the short term and lose faith in concepts very fast. Innovation is a concept that requires a long-term buy-in and takes time to be fully ingrained in the organizational culture.

YOGIC HARMONY

Innovation champion

An innovation champion, accredited to be a Four Ace MindsPower trainer with the necessary training and attitude, is critical to the success of the Innovation Initiative. The champion should have Innovation facilitators in every department. In addition, leaders of innovation spirals hold together the structural network required for the process to work. Top management support and empowerment of the champion are needed to provide autonomy and delegation, which are key to innovation.

Hold back desertification

It is said that early civilizations around the Nile, Tigris, Europhrates, Indus and the Yellow river were all destroyed due to soil degradation and soil erosion, leading to food scarcity and starvation. In the first Sahara African drought, 2,00,000 people and millions of their animals died. China grew a Great Green Wall with 66,000,000,000 trees to prevent the desert from advancing. American farmers did the same in the 1930s to stop the advance of the Mid West Dust Bowl. Jojoba plantations, have played a role in combating the effects of desertification in the Thar Desert, India. Green belts are the best way to protect fertile land and prevent desertification My city Chennai should be called the ‘Blue City’ because it is on the sea coast and blessed with 134 lakes and three rivers. Unfortunately, all these water bodies are polluted or drying up. On June 17th the world celebrates World Day to Combat Desertification and drought. It is no surprise that this year, all 32 districts of my state, Tamil Nadu have been declared drought striken. In our case, this problem has arisen because of human activities. Desertification as a process has become a global ecological problem. Deserts appear as a result of natural processes. But many times desertification is man made. This leads to the loss of water bodies denuding of vegetation and the death of wildlife. It happens as a result of greed and misuse of natural resources... So plant at least 12 trees a year. Get involved in the protection and cleaning of a water body. Refuse to consider living in building being built on a reclaimed lake. Promote sustainable agricultural practices. Buy food from those who promote such practices. Invest in helping people continue to live in villages, instead of triggering large scale migration to cities, due to poverty. The success of Rajinder Singh India’s water man, also called ‘Water Gandhi’ in the deserts of Rajastan prove that these processes are reversible through proper practices of water management. Much of this happens due to human induced land degradation. He leads villagers in the footsteps of their ancestors to bring dormant rivers back to life. The key is participatory community action, empowerment of women and linking indigenous knowhow with scientific technologies.