One need that further emphasized the 2020 Corona crisis was the need to innovate. Organizations were already working on this, but this crisis forced them to innovate twice as fast and adapt to changing circumstances, as working from home drastically changed daily work practices.
The challenge for most companies then was to find a way to continue innovating, while physically meeting was impossible and major innovation sessions with different teams couldn't take place...
One organization found a way to innovate effectively with their virtual teams. The Dutch Ministry of Justice had already used Synthetron for the first time at the beginning of the Corona crisis to get in touch with their people who suddenly worked from home in isolation. After being highly satisfied with the results and the dynamism it had created within their teams, they used it again and transformed it into a powerful tool for virtual innovation.
Their different departments had developed new practices with their teams, tried and tested different work practices, and it was now time to bring the different departments together so that they could learn from each other and implement efficient new practices as an organization.
Everything came together nicely for the organization. They were already working on a leadership program and a change program when the Corona era arrived. At that time, they found it important to share innovation experiences with their top managers in order to learn from each other quickly in an open setting.
Innovation was the main goal. There was a clear need to innovate and share ideas that could be adopted and implemented directly by managers. To achieve that, it was decided to organize a virtual meeting with all managers from all departments and combine Synthetron (the discussion and co-creation part) with Webex (to introduce, present and close the meeting).
The meeting was divided into 3 cycles, one per innovation initiative presented. All cycles were structured as follows:
Firstly The team of 150 managers used Webex (a video conferencing tool) so that the entire group could listen to the manager presenting the initiative. He presented and explained his new ways of working and what he had learned. (5 min)
Secondly the various departments met with the help of Synthetron to discuss whether they could adopt certain working methods in their own processes. Each department could discuss: “Can we do the same in our processes? Would it work for us too?” (10 min)
Thirdly Webex was used again so that the organizers could respond immediately and conclude what had come out of the virtual discussions and what, based on these findings, would be the next steps. (5 min)
This cycle was repeated 3 times and followed by an overall conclusion of the meeting.
A lot of ideas have come out of it. It was a big step forward in identifying ways to improve processes across departments, in just over an hour!
The biggest added value for the organization was that Synthetron makes it possible for them to use a video conferencing tool such as Webex alongside our e-dialogue platform. This allows them to start with a “one-to-many” format, and then quickly move to separate conversations in the “many-to-many” format to delve deeper into topics, share innovations, and learn from all participants.
The best-known video conferencing tools such as Zoom and Webex simply don't have good functionality when it comes to giving people who sit at their computers and usually take a passive role to play a proactive role by sharing and ranking their insights and opinions with those of others. By adding Synthetron, the organizers were able to let everyone speak, comment, debate, and find relevant insights that they could bring out after just one hour and respond to with Webex before concluding with concrete next steps.
The Synthetron consultant who worked on this case concluded: “Without our tool, you can only have someone give a long presentation and maybe get a few people to respond, but that usually doesn't exceed 10 people. It's really more of a 'one man show' or a 'show by a few people'. It remains limited when it comes to sharing and discussing topics. And that is essential for any innovation process.”
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