Ideas Are Free : How the Idea Revolution Is Liberating People and Transforming Organizations

A worker in one of Europe's largest wireless communication companies showed his manager how to repair an error that was costing the company $30 million per year. A secretary at Grapevine Canyon Ranch proposed a simple change to pull the company's website to the top of search engines. These are just two of many examples in Ideas are Free that highlight the single best resource in a company - those frontline employees who can see those telling little details that escape managers. Based on extensive research with hundreds of companies around the world and in every major field, this practical book shows how to draw the most useful ideas from frontline employees and, in the process, significantly improve the atmosphere - and success quotient - of any organization. Ideas are Free is the definitive book on getting - and applying - business-transforming ideas from frontline employees, and will be required reading for Alan Robinson's televised course on PBS - The Business Channel. The fact is, because they're the ones actually doing the day-to-day work front-line employees see a great many problems and opportunities that their managers don't. But most organizations do very poorly at tapping into this extraordinary potential source of revenue-enhancing, savings-generating ideas. Ideas Are Free sets out a roadmap for totally integrating ideas and idea management into the way companies are structured and operate. Alan Robinson and Dean Schroeder draw on their ten years experience with more than three hundred organizations in fifteen countries to show precisely how to design a system to take advantage of this virtually free, perpetually renewing font of innovation. Robinson and Schroeder deal with two fundamental principles of managing ideas that are highly counterintuitive - the importance of going after small ideas rather than big ones, and the problems with the most common reward schemes and how to avoid them. They describe how to make ideas part of everyone's job, and how to set up and run an effective process for handling ideas-how to take a good idea system and make it great. And they show how good idea systems have a profound impact on an organization's culture. At the end of each chapter they provide'Guerrilla Tactics for the Idea Revolutionary', actions to promote ideas that any manager can take on his or her own authority, and that require little or no resources. Ideas Are Free Shows Managers How To Tap All The Ideas Their Employees Have And Gain Significant Advantage Over Their Competitors. In Today's Increasingly Competitive Business World, Only Companies That Are Successful At Managing Ideas Will Thrive. Robinson And Schroeder Have Discovered, Through Extensive Research And Work With More Than 300 Companies - In Dozens Of Industries, From Agriculture To High-technology - The Key Factors That Influence The Quantity And Quality Of Employee Ideas. They Provide A Roadmap For Totally Integrating Ideas And Idea Management Into The Way Companies Are Structured And Operate And Show How Any Manager Can Develop This Increasingly Critical Competency.--jacket. Chapter 1 The Idea Revolution 1 -- Chapter 2 The Power Of Small Ideas 29 -- Chapter 3 The Pitfalls Of Rewards 59 -- Chapter 4 Making Ideas Everyone's Job 93 -- Chapter 5 Putting The Process In Place 119 -- Chapter 6 Focusing On What Matters Most 149 -- Chapter 7 Getting More And Better Ideas 169 -- Chapter 8 Liberation And Transformation 197. Alan G. Robinson, Dean M. Schroeder. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 219-221) And Index. The definitive guide to maximizing ideas from employees presents true stories of management encouraging workers to share their ideas with profitable results for everyone. What will future generations say about the way we practice management today?