Employer Perspective and The Fifth Element

Overview

Workplace innovation is highly relevant to your co-op experience and future career.

Strategically considering how your values, strengths, and interests can meet operational needs through workplace innovation can create a more relevant and engaging experience that can advance your career. Considering you typically spend 40 hours a week at work, leverage this opportunity to make this experience as beneficial to you as possible.

On this page, we will discuss:

• Employer Perspective
• Case Study: Arginta Engineering
• Case Study: UK Met Office
• The Fifth Element: Organizational Capability of Workplace Innovation

Employer Perspective

An understanding of the employer's perspective regarding workplace innovation is important given your upcoming work term. Additionally, many of you will go on to hold leadership positions within your respective industries where you may be able to create the conditions to foster innovation within your workplaces.

Let's review two case studies that consider the important role employers play in fostering workplace innovation. These case studies will be followed by a quick activity to check your understanding.

Please review both case studies before continuing.

Case Study: Arginta Engineering

This video explains how Arginta Engineering Links to an external site., a European integrated manufacturing company based in Lithuania, incorporated workplace innovation practices at the individual, organizational, and process levels to improve their workers' engagement and commitment, as well as the quality of their offerings.

This content is also available in the form of an article from EuroNews Business Planet: Workplace Innovation: How Changing the Way You Work Can Transform Your Business Links to an external site.

This external video has auto-generated captions, which may contain errors. Download the transcript (PDF Download PDF | DOC Download DOC).

Case Study: UK Met Office

The video from European Workplace Innovation Network (EUWIN) Links to an external site. explains how the United Kingdom's Met Office (Britain's central weather agency) initiated a culture of innovation Links to an external site. within their workplace.

This external video does not have captions. Download the transcript (PDF Download PDF | DOC Download DOC).

Activity: Innovation Success Factors

A closer examination of the two cases (Arginta Engineering and the Met Office) reveals that different approaches have been adopted for engagement with workplace innovation. In the case of Arginta, a top-down approach to implementation of workplace innovation practices has been adopted, whereas in the Met Office, a group of innovative employees decided to initiate a culture of innovation within their workplace.

The approaches were different, so why did they both work? What was the key to success?

Instructions:

1. Read the question and click on your answer.
2. Click the blue "Check" button.
3. If you see a "Retry" button, click on it to try again.

The Fifth Element: Organizational Capability of Workplace Innovation

Here we shift focus from employees' role in engaging in innovation within the workplace to the organization's role to support workplace innovation.

At this macro level of focus, a number of elements are needed for the organization to encourage, support, and leverage innovative work by employees. The following framework from Workplace Innovation Europe Links to an external site. identifies four components of workplace innovation that must come together for workplace innovation initiatives to pay off for the organization:

1. Jobs, teams, and technology
2. Employee-driven innovation and improvement
3. Organizational structures, management, and procedures
4. Co-created leadership and employee voice

The second component above, employee-driven innovation and improvement, is the focus of this module and your work term. However, the capability you develop in this course can only create value when the organizational context encourages, supports, and recognizes innovative employee behaviour, which we will discuss in more detail later in the module.

Activity: The Fifth Element

The four components of organizational capability for workplace innovation create a synergy that results in what is sometimes referred to as the "Fifth Element". Let's explore indicative practices and associated outcomes for each of these components.

Instructions:

Click on each of the five question mark hotspots in the image below.

OPTIONAL Video: The Fifth Element - Workplace Innovation Europe

When integrated together, these four components will lead to effective workplace innovation for organizational and employee value.

5th Element Links to an external site., a short animated video by the UK Work Organisation Network (UK WON), explains how these components fit together, an integration that Workplace Innovation Europe (EUWIN) labels the "Fifth Element" of employee workplace innovation, where all four components align to mutually reinforce each other. The key part begins at timecode 0:50.

This external video does not have accurate captions. Download the transcript (PDF Download PDF | DOC Download DOC).

References

Euronews. (2015, September 18). Workplace innovation: How changing the way you work can transform your business. https://www.euronews.com/next/2015/09/18/changing-the-way-the-workplace-works-business-planet-looks-at-workplace Links to an external site.  

euronews Business. (2015, September 19). Workplace innovation: How changing the way you work can transform your business [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3od6vux7bfA

Euwin. (2014). Met+Office+short+EDIT2-HD [Video]. Vimeo. https://vimeo.com/90292861 

UK WON. (2015, May 18). 5th element v2 [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hxehwu9TZh0 

Workplace Innovation Europe. (n.d.). The European workplace innovation network (EUWIN). https://workplaceinnovation.eu/euwin/ Links to an external site.  

Workplace Innovation Europe. (n.d.). Workplace innovation. https://workplaceinnovation.eu/ Links to an external site.