Mark Hickman is the managing director for Sage in Canada, a leader in accounting, financial, HR and payroll technology for small and medium-sized businesses.
In addition to the operational benefits, innovative cultures can help businesses attract and retain top talent. Unfortunately, fostering an innovation-first culture can be difficult for many organizations. Cultivating a culture of innovation through programs that empower workers with digital fundamentals is a good place to start.
For example, at Sage we approach product development through the lens of ‘Marketecture’, which involves taking solutions and adapting them to meet market- or vertical-specific challenges. We do this to bring together multiple perspectives from across our teams, as well as our customers, to understand how we can help businesses within a specific market address their distinct situations.For many employees, their days are consumed by tedious and repetitive administrative processes.
Businesses should consider implementing clear guardrails that lay out roles and responsibilities across teams and simplify the ideation and approval process to move ideas to the next stage of development. Likewise, teams should adopt in-person or digital forums where employees can share feedback and brainstorm ideas to accelerate the development of innovative ideas and solutions.