Peter Drucker once said - culture eats strategy for breakfast. That may have been true for more stable and lineair times, but it seems that in today's context, the only viable option for companies to survive let alone thrive, is a systems approach - bringing Strategy, Leadership and Culture together at one table, to have breakfast together.

Join this conversation with Cris Beswick
and John Metselaar
to discuss how we can move beyond innovation theatre and finally address the elephant in the room, culture, for good.

According to the Universal Postal Union Swiss Post is “World’s best postal service” and is one of the most innovative companies in Switzerland. However, it finds itself in a challenging environment. So it has opted for major change. This session gives insight into this transformation process and its impact on innovation culture.

Roland Keller is a member of the corporate development team and head of innovation culture at Swiss Post. Before he joined Swiss Post in 2007, he worked as an innovation manager for Siemens in Munich, Germany. He has a long track record in intrapreneurship, innovation strategy and digital transformation. Roland Keller helds an EMBA in Creative Leadership from Steinbeis University and a Digital Excellence Diploma from IMD.

Simon will share how you can unleash unlimited innovation capacity by becoming a Challenge Driven Enterprise. He will introduce the 4Ps that underpin Innovation at Scale (and 1 that doesn’t), and share examples of how this approach has enabled global organizations to reduce time from idea to value, pull risk forward and push cost back.

Stuart will talk about his role at the MOD, the role of innovation for Defence, their goal to be ‘Innovative by Instinct’, the complexity of building a culture of innovation fostering internal innovation and external co-creation, including some practical advice and lessons-learned throughout.

- Simon Hill is the co-founder of Wazoku and the author of the top selling book One Smart Crowd - How Crowdsourcing is Changing the World One Idea at a Time
- Stuart Laws, Defence Innovation, UK Ministry of Defence - Stuart is accountable for the delivery of an idea management strategy for Defence, responsible for the identification and delivery of the Defence Innovation Priorities, for the identification and support of Open Call Innovation Focus Areas and Themed Challenges delivered in collaboration with the Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA).

How can we create organizations where work is truly meaningful and where we enjoy our daily jobs, generate appropriate returns and contribute to a sustainable future for our organisation and society at large? How can we achieve both performance and purpose in times of ever greater complexity and faster change? And what is the role of leadership?

Join this session to hear Otti's lessons learned at the forefront of one of the most agile organizations in global banking.

Otti Vogt is a disruptive thought leader with over 20 years of experience in implementing strategic business change in multi-cultural, complex businesses and in crafting human-centric learning organizations. He is passionate about personal and organizational transformation.

As Chief Operating Officer of ING’s Challenger and Growth division, he is accountable for ING’s global digital transformation programme and continuous optimisation of operational service performance for more than 20m customers worldwide. Previously, Otti was a Senior Executive in BT’s Global Services division and earlier gained a wide range of experiences in Consulting, Industry, non-profit and start-ups.

Otti is associate of the Globally Responsible Leadership Initiative (GRLI), international speaker on business transformation and was recently named Top 20 Global Thought Leader on Agile by Thinkers360.

W. Edwards Deming once outlined a System of Profound Knowledge (SoPK). Had Deming lived another 25 years, SoPK may have been broadly-recognized as the foundation for problem-solving (innovation) systems. SoPK consists of 4 broad, interrelated areas: 1) appreciation for a system, 2) knowledge of variation, 3) theory of knowledge, 4) psychology. The last area; psychology, is often misunderstood by leaders and results in fear, frustration and underperforming teams.

If we take time to understand innovation and its opposite, we can leverage the diversity of an organization to overcome any problem we face. This presentation will introduce a theory and highly-validated cognitive assessment that can help you build and manage teams more effectively. Whether your team is pursuing continuous (incremental) or discontinuous (breakthrough) improvement, the team's potential won't be tapped if you don't understand the psychology of the team. Understanding your team members' problem-solving style, will enable you to put your "aces in the right places" and solve bigger problems.

He will propose a hybrid approach by borrowing principles of Jugaad Thinking, Design Thinking, and Process Thinking. One way to marry these principles is Open Innovation and Development, so he will share his thoughts on What Open Innovation should be in order to give the best ROI for the company.

He will emphasize the importance of Culture, Talents, and Diversity of Thinking as an essential for successful innovation. Join us for an open and honest conversation about a way forward for us as innovation leaders.

Siva is originally from India, has a Masters and Ph.D. in Chemistry, and has over 20 years of experience in Research Innovation and Development. Has played instrumental roles in the development as well as commercialization of products in technologies in Consumer Packaged Goods such as Beauty, Laundry, home care, and OTC healthcare in USA & AIMEA markets. He has lived and worked in these geographies and has the knack of transforming deep consumer habits and need-gaps into technical problems and come up with agile yet elegant solutions.

He currently leads the Domains for Hair Color & Repair and Actives and Materials USA in L'Oreal Research & Innovation at Clark New Jersey. He has previously worked in Procter & Gamble in the US, Singapore, India as well as Godrej Consumer Products in India in various capacities. His passion includes Green Economy, Jugaad (frugal) & Process Innovation, and Culture.

During this fireside chat with Cindy Soo, Global Innovation Lead & Co-Creation Matrix Manager at IKEA, we will explore:
1. What is Co-Create?
2. Why Co-Create? What value does it have?
3. The Journey in creating the movement
4. Lessons thus far
5. Paradigm needs and opportunities

An Innovation leader with over 20 years professional experience working with boutique brands and Fortune 500 companies, Cindy leads multi-disciplinary teams to deliver world-class strategies to foster innovation. Her passion for Humanity-Centred Systems Thinking has fuelled her drive to lead companies in creating sound strategies in enabling for engaging, meaningful, and innovative experiences.

She has extensive knowledge in the Connected Living arena, most notably in Connected Spaces (the Home, Retail, Automotive, City etc) and Wearables. Presently, her focus is on empowering others to define their Innovation Agenda in New Business, Innovation Competence, and Transformation and Development.

Cindy is currently consulting in Strategy and Business Development. She is an international speaker, leads workshops and seminars in Innovation, and Experience Design, and is a guest lecturer at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. She guides C-suite when preparing for growth and transformation. Cindy has been called a "Fusionist" - bridging the gap between Design, Engineering, Human Behaviour, Science & Technology, the Person, the Business, and the needs of our Planet.

There are more than 20 different adjectives to describe organizations where decision-making is shared at every level, departing from your usual pyramid structure. Where does their inspiration come from? What does "shared governance" mean? What does it take to bring the decision process to lower levels? How does it help innovation? And any other question you're willing to ask about empowerment for real!

During the session, we will explore concrete examples of companies in different countries and various industries. We will see what they have in common and the impact of their approach on their results.

Lorraine ("Loren") Margherita is a consultant in collective dynamics: her role is to remove the barrier between decisions and actions, using collaborative methods. Her clients are large corporations with an international presence in a variety of industries: engineering, pharmaceutics, aeronautics, automotive, luxury and banking mostly.

For an organization to find success, it must be able to adapt to changing circumstances and innovate to stay ahead of the curve. And to be able to innovate, a workforce with high levels of mental flexibility and adaptability is needed. People that can see something that doesn’t exist yet, and understand the future that they are trying to build.

But what do mental flexibility and adaptability look like? And how do you know if your company may be struggling with both?

Join Ross Thornley, Co-Founder of AQai, and Jason Slater from Unido in a webinar about developing a flexible mindset, increment skill-building, and improve your team’s adaptability to increase their ability to find creative solutions to problems and shift their thinking to new ways of problem-solving while being comfortable with change and uncertainty.

Some people are naturally more open to embracing change and finding opportunities, which makes them potential transformation catalysts in a company. The challenge lies in identifying these catalysts, empowering them with the right tools, skills and mindset, and connecting them to each other to drive lasting change in an organization. But it doesn’t have to be difficult.

In this session you will learn through real-life examples how you can tackle these challenges with education to facilitate company-wide transformation.

You will gain new insights on topics such as:
- The value of identifying the right people for the right training
- The main elements contributing to one’s innovation abilities and how those can be empowered through education

Alan Cabello holds a PhD from the Swiss Institute of Technology on Strategic Innovation, having been a Visiting Researcher at Stanford’s d.school. He also holds a M.Sc. in Management and a Dip.Eng. in Mechatronics. His latest previous professional experience includes positions as General Manager at Adjoint, a blockchain fin tech, and as Innovation Manager for Allianz corporate insurance. Currently Alan is the CEO of Sparkademy, a partner and co-founder of Spark Works, is an associate and lecturer at ETH Zürich, a business angel and sits on the board of a different start-ups.

Remote teamwork is here to stay. However, the multiplication of communication channels and collaboration platforms won't bring much to the team if they aren’t used effectively and if the team itself is not taken care of.

Stefano Mastrogiacomo, lead author of High-Impact Tools for Teams (Wiley, Strategyzer Series, 2021) will present his lessons learned coaching remote teams during the pandemic.
- How to boost teamwork efficiency when working remotely.
- How to maintain a high-level of alignment between team members with the Team Alignment Map.
- How to nurture a positive working atmosphere and increase psychological safety with the Team Contract.

The presentation will end with a live demonstration and collective exercise on the Miro platform.

"High-Impact Tools for Teams" is #1 New Release in Business Project Management on Amazon since its launch in February and for the 3rd consecutive week.

For the internal innovation ecosystem of Bayer our innovation Community, the “Innovation Network” plays a crucial role. The members connect all employees, who would love to engage with innovation with the offerings and opportunities Bayer offers.

We share the story how we created the Networks and got its members engaged as well as the other core elements of the ecosystem that enable us to drive innovation on an incremental, breakthrough and transformational level.

In this fireside chat with Robert Skrobe, owner, operator and principal consultant of Dallas Design Sprints, we will be discussing the current state of virtual design sprints, where the methodology is going any why you should be considering other processes to improve both your efficiency and execution with the original recipe.

Robert Skrobe is the owner, operator and principal consultant of Dallas Design Sprints, an innovation and consulting company for startups. He also hosts the Global Virtual Design Sprint, an international event bringing professionals and practitioners together for open innovation challenges and small group networking. Robert resides in Irving, Texas.

In this session Florine will share her experience and best practices with regards to creating the right culture for corporates to innovate, and for teams to perform. Her vision is to look at things holistically: there is no leadership without authenticity, there is no entrepreneurship without psychological safety, and there is no teamwork without empathy.

Florine has a background in engineering and design. Yet - she always has had an interest in people, psychology, and culture. After working as a Service Designer for several years, Florine started working at ING. She has set up Accelerator Programs in Germany, Poland and the Netherlands. During this time, she learned that next to the usual innovation processes, governance, and capabilities - team and culture are key. She found that most of her work lies in helping teams and managers with adopting a new mindset. She worked as a freelancer in New York (AB InBev) and Basel (Roche) and joined forces with Corporate Rebels.

Since 2020 she has taken on the challenge of building Innovation Capabilities and Culture at ABN AMRO. Her vision is to look at things holistically: there is no leadership without authenticity, there is no entrepreneurship without psychological safety, and there is no teamwork without empathy.

Innovation is crucial for the future of your company but innovation is also complex, risky, slow & with an uncertain outcome.

Recent research identifies having the right people with the right skills as one of the 4 main challenges for successful innovation.

Based on the scientific research done together with the University of Ghent (prof. dr. Frederik Anseel) Peter will explain how you can innovate faster and more efficiently together with your people.

Since February 2020, Peter is the managing director of INNDUCE.me, a unique assessment mapping the innovation skills of people in an objective & scientific manner.

Peter holds a Master in Applied Economics from the University of Leuven, Belgium (KUL) & worked over 10 years in maritime & logistics industry before acquiring a market research company. During this period he studied the behavior of customers & employees in a B2B environment.

He strongly believes that People take a central role in this technology-driven world.

Herb Kelleher, who built Southwest Airlines into one of the most successful airlines in the world, said, "The business of business is people—yesterday, today, and forever." . There is no innovative organization without engaged, energetic, enjoyable people. And how to set your teams on fire and develop an innovation culture through a powerful intrapreneurship framework?

During the past years 200+ experts from 70 countries worked on a referential to make any organization intrapreneurship friendly. They had an obsession: make you succeed. Here's how to foster intrapreneurship with the new ISO 56000 Series on Innovation Management.

Alice de Casanove is in charge of innovation culture in Airbus North America (4000+ employees across the USA), where she fosters the relevant mindset to accelerate future businesses, and she leads the cultural roadmap for digitalization and innovation.
In 2018, Alice was nominated as Woman in the innovation of the year by l’Usine Nouvelle for her innovation project of beehives monitoring by satellites.

Alice plays a determining role in the publication of the ISO referential on good practices in innovation management (ISO 5600 series). Since 2013 she has chaired the international committee gathering 52+ countries in close coordination with WTO, OECD, WIPO, and the World Bank.

Alice has started her career in a video deep-tech start-up then she joined Sagem to manage and develop the value of the Innovation portfolio of the French telecom manufacturer. She has joined the entrepreneurial adventure of Actimagine to develop video technologies on handheld devices (video games consoles and smartphones). Actimagine became the Nintendo Europe R&D center after being bought by NINTENDO. Alice graduated from Telecom Paristech and holds a Ph.D.

The VUCA reality is upon us. We are living in a time of Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity. We can no longer deny this characterization of our reality. The question is: How should organizations respond? Or perhaps more importantly, how do leaders identify the employees who aren’t just ok with change but actually thrive in ambiguity and complexity? You have those employees in your organization, and they’re called Catalysts. Do you know how to find and support them?

In this session, Tracey Lovejoy and Shannon, who wrote the best-selling book, Move Fast. Break Shit. Burn Out. The Catalyst’s Guide to Working Well, will discuss the VUCA world we find ourselves in today. Then we’ll explore the skill sets companies must identify and cultivate to evolve and survive in this high velocity of change world.

Shannon and Tracey will guide you through the characteristics of Catalysts, how to find them, and how to create the practices to best engage these wicked action-oriented problem solvers. Organizations need empowered Catalysts now more than ever!

Innovation is merging into the larger trend of workforce transformation.

The key to long-term organizational viability is to renew yourself continuously. Covid only reinforced this lesson: Today organizations need a workforce that is agile, creative, that can thrive - not just survive - in uncertainty.

This is why organizations from NASA to Johnson & Johnson are using Swarm to drive workforce transformation. In this fireside chat, learn how Kenneth Wright from NASA and Laurence Halimi from Johnson & Johnson are using Swarm to strengthen teams, measure and improve their innovation cultures, and drive workforce transformation across their organizations.

In this session Natalie Nixon will share insights about the critical role of creativity for the future of work. Content areas will include creativity’s business ROI; leveraging creativity for ideal collaboration; and future-friendly transformation while navigating uncertain terrain.

You will leave with an alternative lens to view the trajectory of their work as well as creativity techniques to shift mindset and stretch thinking. In advance of the conversation, download a free sample chapter of Natalie’s award winning The Creativity Leap at bit.ly/tclfree.

Natalie Nixon changes lives through ideas so that people build their creative confidence for years to come, get paid their worth and make an impact.

As president of Figure 8 Thinking, LLC she advises leaders and executive teams on how to achieve transformative business results by applying creativity and foresight. Clients have included Comcast, Citrix, Living Cities, VaynerMedia and Bloomberg.

A hybrid thinker, Natalie consistently applies her background in cultural anthropology and fashion. She began her career in education and as a hat designer. Later, Natalie worked in global apparel sourcing for a division of The Limited, Inc. Previous to Figure 8 Thinking, she was a professor for 16 years. Natalie is an early-stage investor at two social impact ventures. She's valued for her ability to work at the intersection of commercial value and stakeholder equity.

Natalie has lived in Germany, Brazil, Portugal, Israel, and Sri Lanka and is proficient in Portuguese and Spanish. She is a member of the Forbes Coaches Council, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and is certified as a Foresight Practitioner by the Institute for the Future.

When she's not dancing up a storm in hip-hop class, Natalie is fine-tuning her foxtrot, salsa, and tango on the ballroom floor. She lives in her hometown of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with her husband, John Nixon, and is the proud stepmother of Sydney.

In an earlier session this week Ivan addressed the need to build an inclusive culture that combines innovation, business case justification and delivery to realize the full value of ideas. This session explores what this looks like in practical terms with the edison365suite, our end-to-end innovation and delivery platform built for Microsoft 365.

In this live product demonstration, expect to gain an understanding of the key features and functionality of the edison365suite and how our tools can act as the enabler of an inclusive culture that supports end-to-end innovation from strategy to benefit realization.

In the session you will learn:

- How edison365ideas makes innovation accessible for all, whilst helping to manage and expand your innovation portfolio that is aligned to your strategy.

- How you can use Open Innovation to draw on the expertise of all your stakeholders and deliver impactful innovation.

- The benefits of justifying and assessing the impact of your ideas in a transparent and repeatable way with edison365businesscase.

- How the edison365suite integrates with Microsoft 365, supporting collaboration and adoption.

Ivan Lloyd is the Chief Executive Officer and Innovation Evangelist at edison365, with over 25 years of consulting experience in both Innovation and PPM, and has been an adviser to Microsoft since 2003. Ivan is the global leader of our business and is a major respected expert in innovation delivery, project management excellence and business benefit realization. Ivan helps our clients drive innovation into their core business processes and helps them make ideas work for their organization.

DSM is a purpose led global materials and nutritional products company with around 21000 employees, approximately 3000 of which are in innovation related roles (R&D, M&S, corporate).

Like many large corporates, innovation is carried out in bubbles such as specific business groups or units, or regions/countries. As such connection between innovators between these bubbles is challenging - although the recent advances in digital connection is making this more feasible. We have many best practises and talented innovators with experiences and skills that would be of value to the total DSM innovation community if shared.

We are now looking to connect all innovators across DSM, to share, learn and inspire each other - building on the right innovation toolset, skillset and mindset. The question is, how to build such a community, what should it address, how can we share content, how can we get the right engagement, are there any examples from other companies we can learn from?

Join this Challenge Call to share your feedback and learn from others as well.

Tim Kidd works in the Innovation center at Royal DSM, a global, purpose-led, science-based company active in Nutrition, Health and Sustainable Living. In his role as Innovation Excellence manager, he works with innovators across DSM’s business groups to help support and facilitate cross functional project teams to deliver impactful results and realize the full potential of their innovations in the market. Tim has almost 20 years of experience working in innovation at DSM, starting off in R&D and then subsequently moving on to new business development. In his current role, he’s looking to build a community of practice around innovation best practices that engages innovators and facilitates peer-to-peer networking and the adoption of the right innovation mindset, skillset and toolset.