Innovation is about taking managed action that creates new value, or renews distressing situations in positive ways.  Innovation is not a fad.  Innovation is power.

Radical (or disruptive), evolutionary (or incremental), continuous, and sustainable innovation represent some of the innovation research and practice terminology.  Americans need to understand change and how to be involved in the many innovations around us, both in markets and politics.

I applaud President Obama’s efforts in accelerating America’s innovation capabilities.  Some may be unaware that the President discussed innovation in his 2011 State of the Union Address.  Part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 specifically focused on innovation programs.  I look forward to learning more about the effects of the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) Social Innovation Fund, part of the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act of 2009.  Next, we need a national innovation program (NIP) that competes with the EU NIP.

Positive ethical innovation

Innovation is different from invention, especially in the context of new product development.  Positive ethical innovation is needed in many areas of both business and community life.

Unfortunately, innovation can and has been used to drive misdirected business strategies and all kinds if political disasters.  Examples include the derivatives markets, especially credit default swaps, and disethical enabling tools like the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act which turned off critical depression era safeguards.

The national debt is a problem that can be managed with care and foresight.  Major national threats are bad ideas, rotten data—and generally impoverished critical thought and communication capabilities.  Inadequate leaders and misdirection communications do more than waste our time: the outcomes can be disastrous and the fixes can take decades.

We need innovations, and positive innovators, but we also need to make sure we aren’t betraying our least powerful citizens while renewing the economy.  Poverty is accelerating. 

Usually innovation requires resources of some kind.  And human capital is almost always a key priority in any innovation strategy.

The good news is that innovation is part of our higher selves.  Human creativity, our more positive ethics, and our desire to preserve and protect life can cause us to develop a definition of personal and national innovation based in mutually assured success.  

Let’s incorporate the innovation factor

Having a group ethic and dealing with unethical people are different things.  However, it should be obvious that unethical people and organizations work to prevent a positive national innovation ethic from being realized.  [Insert your own list here.]  And Americans don’t do a good job of preventing bad ideas from becoming the status quo.

A critical aspect of a positive innovation ethic is stakeholders having quality data, evaluation tools and criteria available to match leadership words with potential outcomes to be truly informed.  We are the ones who make the call as to whether a political or economic leader and their agendas are great innovations.  Making a decision based on the information flow during a city council hearing, or during a congressional race, doesn’t work so well.  It’s also usually too late to make a difference as that point if you’re a citizen who wants to participate beyond voting; and you probably only captured a fraction of the more important, relevant perspectives.

While profits (and cost control) are important in any innovation strategy, we should not visualize innovation as simply acquiring infinite minority wealth.  A positive national innovation ethic means saving lives and mutual aid prosperity.  Let’s make sure innovations are measurably positive. 

Grant Millin is CEO of Sun Project Systems and Innovograph.