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If you had an idea in your organization, would you know where to go?
That question is the simplest audit of whether you have an innovating engine or just innovation theater.
Ben Bensaou asks it every time he walks into a company. He interviews 15 to 20 people randomly. Frontline employees. Middle managers. Specialists.
Most say no.
Or they say: Go talk to R&D. Go talk to the innovation unit. It is not my job.
But the companies Ben studied for 15 years? The ones that became innovation powerhouses without disruption?
They all say yes.
They know exactly where to go. Who the innovation coordinator is at their level. Where the training unit is if they want to develop a new skill. How to find an internal coach to support their team.
Ben is a professor at INSEAD and author of Built to Innovate. He spent years studying 400-year-old companies like Fiskars entering new markets. Traditional manufacturers like Kordsa reframing themselves as the reinforcer and entering aerospace. Pharmaceutical giants like Bayer building platforms where 40,000 employees participate.
None of them relied on genius leaders. None of them chased disruptive breakthroughs.
They built innovating engines. Concrete structures where anyone can innovate as part of their job.
In this episode of the Activate Innovation Lounge, Ben unpacks the three pillars: permission, capability, and motivation. He explains why frontline employees are best positioned to sense customer pain points. Why middle managers are the critical link between permission and execution. And how companies like Bayer trained 1,000 internal coaches who bootstrap capability across the organization.
This is not theory. This is governance. Processes. Tools. Systems that treat innovating as a repeatable verb, not a lucky noun.
The Activate Innovation Lounge brings you conversations with leaders who build engines, not theater.
Listen now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube. Link in comments.
