Ok. Hi, everyone and welcome to this session on leading innovation. I'm go going to go on and get started as it's that time. So welcome. Thank you for joining me.Of course, today, I'll be discussing how leaders can be better supported in their efforts to drive a culture of innovation across the organization. But before I get started, I will introduce myself, I'm gonna encourage those of you who haven't done it yet. I think only Niha in the chat have done so so far, just introduce yourself. See, where are you joining from and what you do as well. So just drop that in the chat so we can get better acquainted. I'm going to be looking from my side over to this end just to see the chat is over on my left. OK. So about myself, I'm Khadija Moore and I am from the beautiful island of Barbados in the Barbie in the Caribbean. And that's where I am joining you from. I'm AC PTD, which is a certified professional in talent development and I've worked with global companies in the capacity of organizational development and this includes things like talent, strategy, performance improvement, pro process improvement as well as change management, just to name a few. Ok.

So that's why I'm happy to be here today. Speaking on culture and leadership in the carnage track and I'm just looking over to the chat and see we have persons from Barcelona. Welcome. We have an agile coach, Danica from Germany and an accessibility specialist. We have another person from Barcelona from Berlin. Welcome to all of you and thank you for joining my session today. Now I always tell persons, yes, I'm in organizational development, but I'm a trainer first and that's actually how I got into organizational development. So my goal as we progress through this session today is that it provokes you just pause, take a minute, think and note down any areas that you believe that you can cooper incorporate into your professional journey. And I have someone here from the Caribbean, but from Mexico.

Welcome, welcome to you as well. Perfect. Ok. So now that we are about equated without further ado, let's get to the topic at hand and leading innovation. We all know the importance of innovation to businesses as is a key success factor to sustainable success. You've heard it lots and lots and lots and lots of times, I'm sure. So I'm not going to delve into that. But as it becomes increasingly um a as it as innovation, sorry becomes increasingly a corporate wide initiative, leaders today are expected to drive it through the culture of the company and within their teams. So whether you are an aspiring leader, you're currently a leader or you are a leader of leaders. This discussion today is for you. OK. So when driving a culture of innovation, leaders are expected to champion efforts by doing at least these three things that I have highlighted here, they're expected to inspire, to empower and to direct what's important to note here is that to do any of these things, you must first receive them.

So you must receive some inspiration. You too must be empowered and you must also have direction for yourself as a leader. So if you are aspiring leader, the question is how can you begin to work on these areas? If you're already a leader? The question then becomes, how can you kind of create this environment for yourself? And if you are a leader of leaders, it is how can you foster these things for the persons that report into you? And that's what we are going to be discussing moving forward today. So first we're gonna start with inspiration and I think this one is really just spot on as today's women text the day is all about getting inspired or get inspired. So let's just jump into it. You want to be inspired and to continuously source these new ideas and these new perspectives that you can use to open your team to the same, you yourself must incorporate that inspiration in your day. To day routine, your day to day, your month to month environment as well.

And I have two ways by which you can do that and that's community and exposure. So for community, I have some points and exposure, I have some points and these are by no means exhausted. But they're to get you thinking about things that you can begin to do to find inspiration and curate even inspiration around you from day to day. And if you are already part of some communities, perhaps you can drop them in the chat as well to share with your colleagues that are joining us today. And if you already take part in any form of exposure, maybe you listen to some podcasts, you're at a conference today, so you're, you're on the right track or maybe you take part in accelerators hackathons, these kind of things, share them in the chat about what you're doing to find that inspiration.

And I will even share pretty much what I do because right here, I have reference linkedin groups and I think linkedin is a really great place to find inspiration and I'm absolutely d almost about it. And the way I go about doing it, I'm I create a linkedin 100 List and I have about 12 to 15 persons Sunday through Saturday that I check in on a check on. I look to see what they're posting what they're talking about because that allows me to spark an ID and spark some form of or have some form of inspiration that I can use throughout my week and throughout my responsibilities and within my role from day to day. So to inspire, you must be inspired and you can see the bit of the Caribbean popping in here as well in the background. Uh The goal really is, as I said, to spark that idea to find that parallel that you can apply to view existing situations with new eyes or in new ways so that you can use this inspiration that you've gathered to inspire your team and drive them towards innovation and building that culture of innovation.

So first we left our inspiration and now we're gonna move on to empowerment and this one is also pretty much important as well. How can we as leaders empower ourselves? And how can we as maybe CEO S or COO S or leaders of leaders? How can we empower the persons that report in us? So to encourage and facilitate ideas and processes that lead to new innovations. Leaders need to be equipped before the resources. These may be tools, times programs or the skills and skills can be both technical skills and soft skills or even mindset. They need to be equipped with both or we as leaders, I should say needs to be equipped with both to do so. Skills will enable us to mo all those innovative behaviors to our team. Whereas resources will enable us to set up our teams for success. So I want you to think about some of the resources you may require to generate better outcomes for your teams and some of the technical skills and soft skills that you may need to brush upon in the upcoming weeks and the upcoming months to empower yourself so that you can empower your team.

Uh What I usually tell leaders is, is think of it in terms of like a three month segue a three month timeline to build the skills that you need. And there are numerous resources that you can use to do so as well. You have things like linkedin learning, udacity coursera, you even have webinars within the community, um like women tech and other tech communities that you can join as well to make sure that you're keeping up to date on your skills with them soft skills or technical skills.

And of course, to empower you must be empowered. Someone said you to me and yes, that's a really, really great resource, really good resource. Someone said, certifications as well, that's great. So you want to ensure that by having the requisite skills and resources, you can in turn utilize and share these to empower your team, to innovate. And we're gonna move on to the third area direction. So we've looked at inspiration, we've looked at empowerment and now we're gonna look at direction and essentially what you want to do here, what you want to be able to do as a leader, a leader fostering innovation and innovative culture within your organization. You want to be able to take creative ideas, those new perspectives and translate them into performance and even business value to the wider organization. So how can you go about doing this? You need to have both objectives that had defined. And I always tell leaders, you need to be clear on what goals they are, what goals you want to achieve and what are the business priorities around which your innovative efforts should be focused. It's also imperative that leaders have someone, it could be a mentor, it could be perhaps a professional consultant and adviser that they can seek guidance from when they need it as they need it as they carry out their duties.

And I always at the beginning of every financial year because usually that's how um I usually, when I should say objectives are set, you want to really find out, I always encourage leaders to find out what are the overarching strategic objectives of the company because you want to use those to make sure that that is where you focus your efforts so that you can create that value for the organization.

So are you and your business leaders clear on their priorities and on their objectives or do they need some strategic support both in terms of better, defining those goals and better defining those priority areas? And perhaps even to have a mentor that they can go to some one who is in the organization that maybe more experienced at facilitating innovation or someone, maybe even outside of the organization that they can leverage as a consultant to bounce off ideas off of and to kind of seek that guidance that they need as they go through their duties from day to day.

And you know, it's gonna be the quote again. So to direct, you must be directed. It's that simple and it's important that our leaders know what they're trying to achieve, what you're trying to achieve, what we are trying to achieve. And that you're able to seek guidance on that journey to achieve in it when you do this and when you have this, you are definitely better able to go on ahead and direct your teams as well. So we've looked at three areas and I'm not seeing too many notes in the chat, but I encourage you to just write down even if you're taking your own personal notes. What are some things that you can do to find inspiration? Right? How can you open up your team to new ideas and new perspectives? What new ideas can you bring to them? And we talked about the ways in which we can do that primarily are through community, which is extremely important. And even to ensure that we have that source of expulsion, someone put in a chat reading, that's absolutely important just reading articles is great podcasts, great books, great articles. And I mean, if there's anything that you're reading right now, I would say even share it in the chat because you don't know that this is all part of community. You don't know who sharing that with can either benefit.

But yes, di on the topic itself, it doesn't always have to be a course. That's a really great point reading. Researching Google is your friend and finding those articles that can help you to deep dive and get a better understanding um of what it is. You're looking into a better understanding of the things that inspire you, right? So one said radical focus as well. So these are all great ways which we can find inspiration, the empowerment aspect of it. Now you want to be able to encourage and facilitate ideas and processes that lead to new innovations and the way in which we say that we are going to do this and the way in which we can do this is primarily through resources and skills. So boosting our skills. So someone mentioned some way to boost skills. Being at the conference is a good way. So yes, just by being here, you're empowering yourself to better lead your team when you go back to the organization next week or at the end of the day or halfway through the day, if you're just joining us for part of the day as well. And the other thing that we can do. And I always encourage persons to do is to make sure that you, you are finding that direction that you need, that you're working towards specific goals.

Very and everyone knows, I'm sure you know about smart goals and making sure they're specific and measurable, attainable and all of that other really great stuff that we need to put in place to develop goals when we are leading. And if you don't have one as yet, I encourage you to find a mentor and linkedin is a great place to find a mentor. Find someone that can assist you on your journey and help you to develop into a better leader. Doesn't have to be a, a mentor. It could be a consultant that you bring on for a specific project that you're working on and that you can use as perhaps like a subject matter expert or some uh in some other way that allows you to use them as a resource that helps you to better lead your team. So as we come so close to the end of the session, we're pretty much just about wrapping up. I want you to pause and reflect on what has been covered. I've kept it short and I've made sure I've kept it actionable so that you can at least note some areas that you can work. So I hope that you've noted at least one dose of inspiration, one step towards empowerment and one goal that grants better direction with, of course, the intention to take them away and imply it when you go back to your organization so that you and your leaders can drive a culture of innovation.

So that pretty much brings us to the end of today's session. And if you have any questions or if you have any feedback, feel free to reach out to me via linkedin or email, I believe you should be able to click on my profile to see um that information, but I'll be sure to just drop it in the chat in a second as well. And if you have again, any questions, any feedback, if you want to know perhaps some specifics for your individual situation or your specific team and how you can better inspire direct power, feel free to reach out to me and I'll be happy to suggest some of those for you as well.

So thank you so much for joining this session and I hope that you enjoyed it and that you continue to enjoy this session and that you're using it to find that inspiration and for that empowerment as well. Thank you so much for joining me. Have a lovely day. Goodbye.