Chief Innovation Officer: Skills and Talents of a successful CINO

In the age of AI and rapid technological change, the role of the Chief Innovation Officer is becoming even more important for the success of a company. In a previous article, I outlined the mission of the Chief Innovation Officer and the essential responsibilities. In this article, I am presenting the talents and skills that I consider to be essential for a great Chief Innovation Officer.

The skills and talents that make a great Chief Innovation Officer - CINO

1. Strategic thinking. The Chief Innovation Officer must be able to connect the purpose and strategy of the company with the innovation initiatives and programs happening across the organization. More specifically, the CINO must translate the corporate strategy purpose and objectives to ‘focus areas’ or a broader ‘Innovation Agenda’ that acts as the North Star for the innovation efforts. A talented Chief Innovation Officer can shape and prioritize initiatives, programs, roadmaps, plans, and projects that best support the strategy and focus of the organization.

2. Deep understanding of technology. The role of the Chief Innovation Officer is demanding and multifaceted. Successful CINOs understand both the capabilities of current technologies and their limitations: they understand not only what is feasible now but also what will become feasible in the innovation horizon of the company.

3. Deep understanding of the product development process. Whether a digital or physical product, the Chief Innovation Officer must know how a product can be conceived, designed, validated, built, launched, and operated. Experience in actual product development with a strong innovation focus is a major success factor for the Chief Innovation Officer.

4. A master of the innovation process. The Innovation process, especially in a corporate environment, can become rather complex, expensive, and occasionally slow. The Chief Innovation Officer must be able to make the right interventions at the right time; they must know what innovation processes make sense for the organization, the required Innovation Technology Stack, the Innovation toolkits, templates, and other resources required for real innovation to happen.

5. Able to speak ‘corporate’, ‘product’, and ‘technical’ languages. This is an essential skill – a successful Chief Innovation Officer is able to communicate effectively with product managers, patent attorneys, engineers, and designers along with the C-Suite. A challenging requirement.

6. A role model for innovation. The CINO must be able to lead by example – must be hands-on and be an innovator themselves. Seeing the Chief Innovation Officer actively participating in the Innovation process is one of the most inspiring experiences that can further motivate teams and the community of innovators.

7. Able to effectively manage Risk and Failure. To do so, the Chief Innovation Officer must be able to quantify risk and its impact and have the willingness to take calculated risks. Moreover, when failure happens, the CINO knows how to handle it and how to convert it into a learning event – allowing the team to gain experience while feeling ‘safe’ to fail (under certain conditions of course – I am covering this and the ‘fail-safe, fail-fast’ approach in a different article)

8. Able to prioritize wisely. Ideas, projects, and initiatives all compete for the same corporate resources. The Chief Innovation Officer must be able to prioritize wisely towards a defined mix of risk and disrupt opportunity – a balanced Innovation Portfolio that serves the organizational purpose and strategy.

Furthermore, a successful Chief Innovation Officer must be adaptive and ready to innovate the Innovation Process itself: given that the cultural, financial, and operational states of a company change drastically over time, the CINO must be able to adapt by identifying what is most important about the innovation process itself. For example, the Chief Innovation Officer must be decisive in terms of the Innovation Programs to be introduced or suspended to help the company deal with a particular challenge or a crisis; or the tools and methods that are expected to bring more value to the Innovation Process; or the specific innovation events (hackathons, design sprints, brainstorming, etc.) that could increase the morale and inspire the community of innovators.

I like to think of the Chief Innovation Officer as the conductor of a big orchestra that composes its own music.

Read here, why the role of the Chief Innovation Officer is becoming even more important as Artificial Intelligence is taking taking the lead. Check also our unique advisory offering: Chief Innovation Officer On Demand program