Innovation Readiness Checklist
9 questions. 10 minutes. One honest score.
You don't have an ideas problem. You have a blocker problem. Something in the organization kills the ideas before they get anywhere, and this free checklist shows you where, in about 10 minutes.
Nine questions, built on the same three levers I use in my diagnostic work: leadership support, organizational design, and innovation practice. Score yourself honestly and you know exactly where your organization stands, and what to fix first.
7 out of 10 innovation projects fail. Not for the reason you think.
Not because the ideas were bad. Not because the team lacked effort. Not because the budget ran out too soon. I see this pattern regularly, across industries and company sizes: the organization was not ready before the project started.
Three things usually stand in the way:
- Leadership talks about innovation but never gives it real backing. No strategic direction, and the resources are unprotected.
- The organization is built to execute, not to explore: pilots have no legitimacy, no bridge to the core business, and no incentive to succeed.
- Nobody runs an actual innovation practice. Proven methods sit unused, and testing new ideas has no process of its own.
Find the blocker before you pick the method. That is what these nine questions are for.
Nine questions, three levers.
The checklist scores your organization on nine dimensions across three levers, the same framework behind the Innovation Readiness Workshop. Score each one from 1 (beginner) to 5 (world class): your lowest scores show you where the blocker sits. The checklist then asks you to pick the areas to improve over the next 12 and 36 months, so the score turns into a direction, not just a number.
Leadership support
- Strategic guidance: does leadership give clear, explicit direction for where innovation should focus? Or does every project have to guess what the company actually wants?
- Resource allocation: are people and budget for innovation protected? Or are they the first line cut when the quarter gets tight?
- Portfolio management: does someone own the full portfolio of innovation bets? Without that owner, every project fights alone for survival.
Organizational design
- Legitimacy and power: does innovation have real standing in the organization, with power and a seat at the table? Or is it skunk work tolerated in the margins?
- Bridge to the core: can innovation teams draw on the customers, brand, and skills of the core business? Teams without that bridge start from zero every time.
- Rewards and incentives: does anyone get rewarded for testing a risky idea? Most incentive systems pay for flawless execution, and experiments get nothing.
Innovation practice
- Innovation tools: does the organization actually work with proven innovation methods? Tools only count in daily practice, not in one slide deck from one workshop.
- Process management: is there a dedicated process for testing new business ideas? Or does everything run through the same stage-gate built for existing products?
- Innovation skills: do you hire and develop people for innovation work? Unless you do, it falls to whoever has time this month.
Three steps, 10 minutes.
- 1Fill in the form.
- 2The checklist lands in your inbox.
- 3Score your organization on nine dimensions. Ten minutes, and the blocker has a name.
Where the nine questions come from.
The framework comes from The Invincible Company (Osterwalder c.s.) and Strategyzer's Innovation Culture Readiness assessment. I sharpened it in my own practice, and I facilitate this diagnosis as an official Strategyzer coach, one of 19 worldwide. No hype. Just the nine questions that separate the organizations where innovation sticks from the ones where it stalls.
Get your score.
Nine questions. Ten minutes. One honest score, and the first thing to fix.
The score shows you where. The Innovation Readiness Workshop shows you why.
The checklist gives you your own score. It won't show you your team's blind spots, the gaps hiding under everyone's individual number, or which blocker to fix first.
That is what the Innovation Readiness Workshop is for: one day with your management team, everyone's scores on the wall, and an action plan with owners and dates. You leave with a shared diagnosis instead of nine private opinions.
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