All charged up

Some organisations are able to generate successful product and process innovations over and over again. An important part of their success, of course, stems from the superior management processes and organisational structures they use to bring new ideas to market. But an equally critical, and often overlooked, success factor distinguishes innovative organisations: energy. No innovation succeeds without the presence of organisational energy. But managing energy isn't as simple as plugging talent into a socket and turning on the juice. While executives recognise energy as intricately intertwined with innovation, they also struggle with how best to drive passion and enthusiasm into their work organisations. One solution is to focus a network lens on the daily interactions throughout an organisation that either energise or drain employees. Managing energy involves shaping a complex dynamic with its own internal feedback loops. Most innovative projects not only consume employee energy, they also generate it.