How to set your mindset to innovation in your business

If you are in business, you have likely heard the word innovation. It gets thrown around a lot and often discarded as a ‘buzzword’. What most people don’t know about true innovation is that it can be the life or death of a business and is crucial to the continuing success of any organisation, writes Access Consciousness founder, Gary Douglas.

Think of innovation like nature. Nature will find a way to grow and thrive, using whatever it has available at the time, to create the greatest result. If you leave a building undisturbed for a year, nature takes over and starts growing things everywhere.

This is what innovation can be like in business. It can grow everywhere.

4 tips on creating an innovative business

1. Stop concluding

Conclusion kills creation and innovation. As soon as you come to a conclusion, you stop receiving the information of everything that doesn’t match that conclusion.

For example, if you conclude that your business can only exist in one country, you have cut off every other possible country that your business could expand into. You might be getting offers from offshore buyers, but you dismiss them because of your conclusion.

When you notice a conclusion such as the one above, say, “Interesting point of view. I have that point of view.” Keep saying it until you notice the solidity of that point of view lessening. When your points of view are simply interesting rather than real and true, you can let them go.

2. Ask questions

Businesses fail when they stay the same, while everything else changes. Kodak is a great example of a business that did not innovate quickly enough for the changes that were occurring with digital photography.

To stay ahead of the changes, you have to ask questions. When you ask questions, you open the door to possibilities that you never knew existed before.

A true question does not lead to an answer. It leads to more questions and more possibilities. This is how a business stays in constant creation and innovation.

A few questions you can ask are:

• What else is possible that I have never considered?
• What does my business require today?
• What choice can I make that would allow my business to grow and expand beyond anything I have yet imagined?

Asking questions is like developing a muscle that you may not have used for a long time. The more you use it, the stronger it gets. The more you practice, the easier it gets. It might feel different and maybe even difficult at first, but keep going. You will quickly notice the change that occurs when you ask questions.

Listen to the Flying Solo podcast for more tips on small business innovation:

3. Step outside your comfort zone

If you are going to be innovative in business, you have to be willing to go beyond your comfort zone. This can be challenging because you will be stepping into uncharted territory. But if you stop trying to get it right and not get it wrong, it becomes an exploration where you will be able to perceive choices that you could not see before. Who knows? You might even enjoy the process!

Being out of your comfort zone can be lots of fun if you embrace it and let it be a possibility and not a problem.

Ask yourself: If this wasn’t a problem, what would the possibilities be?

You might be surprised at what shows.

4. Never give up, never give in and never quit

Never giving up doesn’t mean doing the same thing you have always been doing and driving a business into the ground until it dies.

• Never giving up is about always looking for what else is possible.
• Never giving in is about always looking for the way around things.
• Never quitting is about always demanding that no matter what, you will do whatever it takes to make something happen.

Put these three elements into practice and you will be unstoppable.

Creating a fun and innovative business that is sustainable is possible. Never stop asking questions. Always be willing to look from another perspective. Choose to change anything that requires changing, even if it demands that you step outside of your comfort zone. Commit to yourself that no matter what, you will never give up, never give in and never quit.

Now, enjoy the ride!

This article was first published on Flying Solo, read the original here.

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