HowDo

Mar 2, 2021

Liubov Levytska - stock.adobe.com Innovation is undoubtedly a buzzword these days. It's in news headlines everywhere, with companies like Apple vowing to invest $5B in its new Innovation Fund. But what does innovation mean to these companies, how do you learn to innovate and what are the ripple effects of innovation for our society - and ultimately how will innovation help us survive the remainder of the pandemic? I recently sat down with West Stringfellow to explore the topic of innovation and its impact on society and current events. West is the founder of HowDo , a free, self-guided innovation training that combines his 20 years of experience leading innovation at top companies like Amazon, PayPal, Target, Visa and several startups with 40,000 hours research into innovation best practices. Gary Drenik: Can you share a bit about yourself, your background and expertise and how HowDo came to be? West Stringfellow: I led innovation and product management teams at Amazon; led company wide product management and innovation initiatives at the executive level at PayPal, Target, Visa, Rosetta Stone and several startups; built and managed a Techstars startup accelerator and was Target’s first Entrepreneur in Residence. In those roles it was my job to quickly create a better strategic vision of a company's future, motivate large groups of people to pursue that vision and then lead teams through the operational, financial, organizational and technical processes that bring strategic visions to life. I spent the last four years building HowDo where I share everything I learned in my career. In addition, I led 40,000 hours of research into innovation best practices; this is also shared on HowDo to help everyone who wants to become an entrepreneur and innovate. Drenik: In terms of the workforce, what direct impacts do you see formal innovation training having? Does this span further than traditional employee education? And how do you see this impacting our current workforce? MORE FOR YOU Stringfellow: Like we’ve already seen with Apple, major companies are investing a lot of dollars into innovation education and programs. This is great, but innovation is something that needs to be implemented by everyone - not just the companies already leading the charge if we want to see some radical changes. That’s how I developed the mission behind HowDo. I wanted to make innovation training accessible to everyone and level the playing field when it comes to access to essential education. In a capitalist economy, I believe knowing how to innovate and become an entrepreneur is a basic human right. Access to education and online courses have also been a huge trend we’ve seen develop during the pandemic. People are wanting to level-up in their knowledge like never before. According to a recent Prosper Insights & Analytics Survey, due to the pandemic, 4.6% of surveyed adults shared they were now pursuing a certificate program to advance their career. If this trend continues, we could see it drastically impacting how our workforce operates. Prosper - Advancing Career Prosper Insights & Analytics The biggest way I see innovation and innovation training directly impacting how people work is that it creates a “work smarter, not harder” mentality. Employees want to shed the stereotypical 9 to 5 in search of companies and jobs that provide freedom, work-from-home capabilities, a culture that promotes creative and independent thinking and jobs that provide work-life balance According to a recent Prosper Insights & Analytics Survey, rates have lowered since the pandemic, with only 43.9% of 18+ adults saying they are happy with their work/life balance. This is because right now, companies are in panic mode and their employees are taking the brunt of it. Instead of being reactive to the pandemic, businesses need to continue to think about how they can be better and promote innovation and growth for their employees. Prosper - Happiness With Work Life Prosper Insights & Analytics A team of successful innovators think and learn for themselves. They dedicate themselves to just one thing: solving customer problems for profit, which is the approach companies need to take to survive the rest of the pandemic. Drenik: Taking this a step further now, how do you see this impacting the bigger picture when it comes to not only companies but our society surviving the rest of the pandemic and building beyond? Stringfellow: It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see that we have a tough journey ahead. Collectively we need to work toward change, not only just within our own companies and workforce, but beyond that. We radically need to reduce inequality, eliminate CO2 emissions, create hundreds of millions of decent jobs, re-establish confidence in our fellow human beings, include all people in progress and restore faith in badly damaged democratic systems of government. We can’t just kick the can to the next generation and leave them with a resource constrained, war-filled, poverty stricken and unhealthy world. Innovation is the thing we need to do. Existing solutions are nearly indistinguishable from solutions we had in place 50 years ago, and the average life expectancy of companies on the S&P 500 has declined from 33 years in 1964 with a forecast to decline to 12 years by 2027. We need systemic change. Which means that either we create the next generation of companies that produces the next generation of wealth that is far more egalitarian, equitable and in balance with all life on Earth, or we let billionaires and companies worth billions of dollars set the political agenda and seal the planet’s fate. I believe we should take charge and level the playing field, so I’m teaching everyone how to innovate and the importance of innovation training. My hope is that together we can build a resource that everyone can use to drive the change they want in their career, team, company, community, country and our world. Drenik: Thank you, West, for taking the time to speak with me today about the importance of innovation and innovation training, like at HowDo, and the impact it will have on not only our workforce, but society as a whole as we survive the rest of the pandemic and re-establish ourselves in a post-pandemic world. Check out my  website .