-> Prioritize: To keep things on track, prioritize concepts that you’re committed to doing based on the goal, resources, and schedule for your project. -> Support incremental development: Start with miniature testable versions; you can validate ideas and control feasibility and risk. -> Create an open communication culture: Enable team members to openly debate the trade-offs between new objectives and pragmatic limitations and align. -> Tap into feedback loops: Collect stakeholder feedback frequently to validate whether innovation aligns with end-user needs and business goals. -> Measure impact: Assess each innovation’s feasibility and scale to focus on high-impact solutions.

To balance innovation with practicality, the focus should be on understanding the business problems, so that you’re able to choose the appropriate technologies to solve these efficiently. By understanding your current context, both from a technical and business perspective, time should be dedicated on researching newer technologies and more modern ways of working, with the goal to become more and more efficient, but without losing the focus on the main goal, which is delivering business value. Investing time in trainings and research, even when the research doesn’t necessarily result in a technology or tool being adopted, is not wasted time, it’s knowledge that would be used to make the software projects more successful.

The simple and most important thing to do is to stick to basics and prioritise the business deliverables . Use innovation when the basics needs are up to mark.

It’s critical to ensure that any new innovative technologies being introduced will actually contribute to system performance at a reasonable cost. In my experience, it is critical to involve user subject matter experts, who can make judgments about the potential utility of the innovative concepts prior to committing to their incorporation into systems.

Innovation often evolves iteratively rather than instantaneously. Begin by addressing the problem with a practical solution. Afterwards, engage in a reflective process by: 1. Imagining you haven’t solved the problem yet and explore a completely different method as if starting afresh. 2. Critically assessing the existing solution to identify its flaws and explore entirely new approaches, rather than merely making improvements. This method promotes continuous innovation without disrupting existing workflows. Time-box these reflective activities, focusing on one at time. This allows for the gradual emergence of innovative ideas, even during the initial phase. Record any new ideas that arise, but maintain focus on completing current task.