RESEARCH REPORT

In Brief

In Brief

  • Investments in innovation are expected to increase 1.8X in the next five years.
  • However, companies are neither allocating innovation investments strategically nor managing these investments with discipline.
  • Companies that govern innovation extensively over time expect stronger revenue growth.

Governing Innovation: The recipe for portfolio growth

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The secret sauce for successful innovation?

Governance.


Many companies assume that innovation and growth come hand in hand — that creative, new ideas will spark more business and provide a better way to run a company. But how do you turn those ideas into commercial reality?

The answer isn't adding more to the innovation budget, according to our survey of 1,090 executives across 11 industries. The answer is to allow innovation to thrive in the right businesses. Companies should allocate innovation investments based on their businesses' future potential — not on today's needs — and apply governance to extract value from those investments.

Our research reveals that increased governance can create the right conditions for innovation to thrive in the right businesses. We call this Portfolio Innovation: the application of incremental and non-incremental (breakthrough or disruptive) innovation across businesses with different maturity levels.


Portfolio Innovation



Paul Daugherty

Chief Technology & Innovation Officer Accenture

Dr. Vedrana Savic

Managing Director of Thought Leadership at Accenture Research

Paul Nunes

Global Managing Director of Thought Leadership at Accenture Research

Kevin Millan

Senior Principal of Thought Leadership at Accenture Research

Rethink your innovation investment strategy

Leaders need a structured way to direct their innovation investments. Chief strategy and chief innovation officers need to first determine their desired business portfolio composition for the future, discern what type of innovation each business needs, and set their investment strategy accordingly.

Legacy businesses

Growth businesses

Emerging businesses




From these two portfolio models, two innovation investment strategies emerge.

INVESTMENT STRATEGY: LONGEVITY

Majority of innovation investments flow to legacy businesses

INVESTMENT STRATEGY: BALANCE

Majority of innovation investments flow to growth and emerging businesses

Get ready to govern innovation more

So what distinguishes companies that achieve growth from innovation and those that don’t? One factor is implementing more disciplined governance.

We identified 12 key governance rituals companies are practicing to effectively govern innovation.



Governance rituals enable innovation


  1. Put innovation at the center of corporate strategy
  2. Actively communicate the innovation agenda to employees and the investor community
  3. Actively build a culture of innovation

  1. Everyone generates ideas to improve existing offerings
  2. A diverse team of experts generates ideas for brand new offerings
  3. Identify disruptive ideas with the help of tech partners

  1. Experimentation investments are made as part of the budgeting lifecycle
  2. Experimentation investments are funded gradually
  3. Experiments are conducted by an innovation lab/digital factory

  1. Scale with technology partners
  2. Scale with talent partners
  3. Scale through an innovation lab/digital factory

More is more

Companies that govern innovation extensively delivered 2x revenue growth compared to those following a haphazard approach

We found that the 12% of companies that already adopt six or more rituals are achieving double the revenue growth of companies using fewer rituals.

In fact, when companies that aren’t governing innovation as extensively increase to six or more rituals, they expect to see their revenue growth catch up to those currently in the lead.

REVENUE GROWTH AND COMMITMENT TO INNOVATION GOVERNANCE
Revenue Trajectory (Past: 2013-2018 and Future: 2019 to 2023 Estimated)

Blend well for best results

It takes the right mix of innovation and governance

Some people fear that governance will stifle innovation. But in reality a systematic approach to managing innovation is key to greater financial impact.

When leaders align their future innovation investment strategy to the desired portfolio mix, they gain the power to turn innovation into a real advantage.


Are you ready to govern more to grow?

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Accessible PDF Accenture-Innovation-Portfolio-Management-Governance-Report-V3

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Full Report

New research reveals that increased governance can create the right conditions for innovation to thrive.

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Accessible PDF Accenture-Innovation-Portfolio-Management-Governance-Infographic

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Infographic

Learn why innovation needs more governance.

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Videos

Insights from Emmanuel Lagariggue

Insights from Paresh Modi

Insights from Julian Birkinshaw

Insights from Albert Mundet

About the authors

Paul Daugherty

Chief Technology & Innovation Officer

Dr. Vedrana Savic

Managing Director of Thought Leadership at Accenture Research

Paul Nunes

Global Managing Director of Thought Leadership at Accenture Research

Kevin Millan

Senior Principal of Thought Leadership at Accenture Research

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