Full interview with John Dignam – Leading Successful Innovation at Ingal Civil

Full transcript of interview with John Dignam, MD of Ingal Civil Australia, with Tim Collings, Founder 4iGroup, focusing on Leading Successful Innovation.

John, can you firstly describe briefly the recent Ingal story…

The business was a supplier of traditional safety barrier products, more recently we’ve done a lot more product development and R&D to achieve two things – boost the safety performance of our products and more efficiently use materials.  We’ve then leveraged a global network to take these new products outside of our conventional domestic market and are now selling these new products into Mexico, Malaysia, Thailand, Hong Kong, India and the Middle East.

How focused have you been specifically on leading innovation? Or has innovation been a by-product of other focal areas?

To grow the business, we focused on product development in our core markets. New product ideas have mainly come from our sales channel as we have engaged more closely with our customers.  Because of our growing export business we’ve been able to leverage that spend to over a broader span of markets. As a part of our new product development process we have lodged several patents as we’ve gone along this journey. 

How has the innovation progress been balanced between customer led vs internal originated?

I’d say we’ve been more weighted to customer needs, it’s much easier to justify a business case for product development when there’s a need for it in the market.

What benefits would you say innovation has brought to the Ingal organisation?

From a customer stand-point, I believe we are seen more relevant and responsive to their needs.  From an employee perspective, I believe that they are more engaged, that they are more comfortable in contributing their energies and ideas to an organisation that is growing and innovating.  From an operational perspective, we’ve tested our ideas in the market, made the investment in R&D, then re-tooled and re-focused the operational side – the delivery of these new products generates new revenue which has increased the value of the business for our shareholders.

What have the main successes of this innovation been?

We’ve seen a material change the use of new product in the Australian market, our competitors are now following that lead.  Secondly we had success in deploying that technology into other countries.

What changes were necessary to make in order for innovation to succeed?

Mainly mindset in our people, that this is good, it’s not going to result in job losses, it’s going to make the company more sustainable, even though we could be seen as an “old economy” manufacturer, change is possible and positive for both the individual and the company.  This message cascaded down from the leadership team into the broader business.  As we have delivered results that has reinforced the message.  The current level of infrastructure in Australia has been a positive for our industry, but it’s been our ongoing focus on new product development that has allowed us to capitalise on this lift in spending in ways that were not possible a few years ago. One of our values, continuous improvement, means we are also smarter about the way we do things as we have delivered new products to the market.

How important were the following to that success:

• Culture and people, I’d say this as critical, people have to feel ownership, embrace and drive change. People either respond to this or they don’t. We’ve had some churn but on the whole this has been beneficial as we now have a more cohesive group who are on the same page and want to work together.
• Strategy, we have had a consistent, market grounded and clear strategy. We have the constant support and guidance from our shareholders and customers. I believe this is essential for successful business.
• Systems & processes, these are necessary but we’ve been conscious to not let the systems and processes stifle the innovation – we’re going to provide what the market wants, and change the systems accordingly. The reality is when you have an alignment of people around a strategy and you create the right culture, you can drive the customer led innovation with open and honest communication, and ensure the systems catch up along the way to support this.

Are there any attributes you’d say a leader must have to enable successful innovation?

You’ve got to be open to change, you’ve got to build a good team and then trust and empower them, and give honest feedback good or bad (if the later, admit and deal with it, if good – celebrate the heck out of it).  Our business won an employer of the year from a local TAFE, for our training program. For me that is about empowering our employees, giving them the tools to come up with the ideas, and then investing in those ideas. This reinforces the culture of trust and accountability that I believe we’ve created.

What would you say you are most proud of in terms of the innovation you have led?

I’m most proud of the way the organisation has embraced, owned and driven the innovation.  I am responsible for strategy but I definitely don’t have all the answers, and a lot of the ideas have got to come from the organisation or the customers.  We have together gone on a cultural change journey and I’m proud of the results it’s delivering from these.