By Fernanda Arreola and Pierre Pezziardi
Bureaucracy is important. It makes our life comfortable, because it guarantees that rules will be in place to ensure that we all act according to plan. They are “designed to maintain uniformity and control within the organization1.” Bureaucracy ensures that trains get on time and at the right destination. But as we know bureaucracy disincentivizes innovation.
Innovation as an act of disobedience
Innovation involves challenging established norms and conventional thinking to find answers to emerging problems. This concept is often referred to as “intelligent disobedience,” meaning that breaking or bending rules is necessary to stimulate creativity and foster business transformation.
But who is most inclined to break the rules? In large organizations, innovation is traditionally driven/carried out by established teams working under the umbrella/under the aegis of an R&D unit or an Innovation Directorship. The members of these teams are likely to be engineers or managers that come from top-level universities. And they all have something in common: they are not concerned with the problem they are solving. They are neither the direct consumer nor the personnel facing them at the front of the organization. They are not what we will refer to as « makers ».
The Rock and Roll method
There is however a less conventional model that has been proven to be successful. The particularity of this method is that it has been introduced in the most bureaucratic organizations we have ever heard of: government structures.
This method consists first of all of in transmitting empowerment to the “makers” of highly bureaucratic organizations (which could be public or private), granting them the resources they need to produce a digitized answer to a problem they have been faced with. These makers are the people on the front line, struggling with the situation that requires an innovative solution. These are the people who, sometimes sadly, receive insults because the process is slow, who feel the loneliness of not having the right answer to repetitive questions, and who know exactly what could be done to provide a solution.
This method is inspired by agile methods and the “lean startup” movement. It was conceived by one of the authors of this article, Pierre Pezziardi, advisor to the interministerial director of digital directorate (DINUM), and observed by the other author, Fernanda Arreola, as part of an academic research project. During this research project, we have witnessed the particularity of this approach and how it has led to outcomes other than innovation. It has enabled the organization’s personnel to adopt new management tools, recruit new talent, develop new capabilities, offer new careers and provide positive media coverage for an organization often viewed as “obsolete”.
The six commandments of “rock and roll” innovation
(or how to build up intrapreneurial projects in bureaucratic organizations)
To undertake this type of innovation within a bureaucratic organization, it must follow six commandments and adhere to three key ideals. The first is that it is possible to innovate with very few resources. In the end, in 1950, it took more than thirty farmers to feed one hundred people; today, it takes less than five. The second key principle is to trust the people who will become project holders. The third is that the problem must use a digital solution (or any scale mechanism operating at very low marginal cost). Once these principles are set in stone, the organization can launch an open call for intrapreneurial projects for which it must implement the following six commandments.
Look for an Innovator, Not an Innovation
Only an intrapreneur genuinely outraged by an imperfect that he or she systematically deals with will dare to undertake a radical innovation.
Write it in one page
The person concerned must be able to answer the questions: Why are we here, what is the problem, what is the pain for the stakeholders? Which metric best describes this problem (delays, errors, violence, school failures, etc.)? What will people say when the product is available? By answering these questions in a just few lines on a single page, the project owner will constitute the product specifications.
Invite an Open Working Group
The person who has the idea may or may not be the right project manager. Help him or her figure it out, and have him or her to recruit an open working group the very next day: clients/customers and partners of the future product will meet every 1 or 2 weeks for a demonstration and discussion of the directions to take.
Guarantee Strict Autonomy
The team chooses its technologies and their hosting solutions. It does not depend on any cross-functional department, such as: procurement, IT, HR, communications. It can go into production without any further authorization, as long as it adds “beta” to its product, if it is not initially a nation-wide supported public service.
Design to Cost (vs Cost to Design)
To avoid Parkinson’s law, according to which “work expands to fill the time available for its completion,” set strict deadlines. Whatever the subject, the innovation team must be composed of a maximum of four people and have 6 months to complete a first version of the innovation. The team usually includes a product manager, a digital coach and two senior developers. This represents less than 200,000€ over 6 months for a market launch.
Give it 6 months
An innovation team that does not find its market in 6 months should be disbanded. Conversely, the product team that finds its market should be preserved by receiving another round of funding. Finding a market means that the solution is undertaken for a pilot program within the organization. Afterwards, there will be a development phase and a consolidation phase, often followed by formal integration into the organization. The whole process takes between 18 and 36 months after launch.
Does this work?
Today, more than 100 government startups have been created following these principles. Some have been listed in the “50 Govtech Gems”: PIX, mes-aides (now the National Social Rights Portal), Signaux Faibles, LaBonneBoite, Pass Culture, the Public Service for Integration, Démarches Simplifiées (20,000 online procedures, 500,000 files processed per month), and other less visible, such as API Entreprise, a digital pipeline that saves companies tens of millions of supporting documents every year.
More resources: beta.gouv.fr
About the Authors
Fernanda Arreola is a Professor of Strategy, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship at ESSCA and a researcher focusing on service innovation, governance, and social entrepreneurship. Fernanda has held numerous managerial posts and possesses a range of international academic and professional experience.
Pierre Pezziardi is a French entrepreneur and essayist. He is known for his work in the digital sector and has made significant contributions to technology and startups. Pierre Pezziardi currently works with the Direction interministérielle du numérique (DINUM), the French government’s digital services department. Pierre is an advocate for the promotion of digital solutions that help empower individuals and foster collaboration. His entrepreneurial ventures include involvement with OCTO Technology, OpenCBS, and Kisskissbankbank. More recently, he was responsible for the inception of BetaGouv, the Frech government’s incubator.
