SME Leaders: How to Identify Key Players Within Your Company to Drive Innovation
SME leaders are known for being brimming with ideas, but they often lack the solutions to bring them to fruition. Hidden within SMEs’ physical and digital communication networks are unexpected stakeholders who can either facilitate or hinder the adoption of innovations. This article proposes a method for identifying and engaging these key stakeholders to maximize the chances of innovation success.
Rémi Le Goff, Montpellier Business School; Marc Robert, Montpellier Business School and Sophie Mignon, University of Montpellier
In the face of recent disruptions, such as the COVID-19 crisis and, more recently, inflation, the imperative for SME leaders is clear: innovate to overcome crises. Whether it involves managerial innovations (such as the “liberated company”) or technological innovations (such as the adoption of data analytics), leadership teams are usually not short on ideas.
However, they often face significant obstacles, such as the legendary resistance to change. Management regularly struggles to implement these innovations because negative attitudes persist. Our study reveals that there are unexpected, often overlooked players within SMEs who can play a decisive role in the adoption of these innovations. Who are they? How can they be effectively engaged?
Choosing the Right Communication Channels
It is often believed that the acceptance of an innovation depends on a rational pitch from senior management highlighting the expected benefits. The goal is to build a coalition of attitudes favorable to innovation within the SME to minimize resistance to change. Although necessary, this strategy may be insufficient if the message is not conveyed by the right people, particularly when management strictly follows the organizational chart to disseminate its message. To be effective, this message must be conveyed through influential individuals within the SME’s communication network—a network that rarely mirrors the organizational chart.
This trend has intensified with the digital transformation of most small and medium-sized enterprises (see Baromètre Num 24). Tools such as WhatsApp, Slack, or Teams facilitate communication—often informal and discreet—allowing individuals or groups outside the management team to play a central role in internal communication. This increase in communication significantly influences attitudes toward innovation and creates social dynamics that can disrupt innovation initiatives led by the management team.
The Unexpected Drivers of Innovation
In our study, we analyzed an industrial SME with approximately 50 employees that had implemented lean management practices. The introduction of these practices at this SME met with significant resistance to change. In this context, we identified influential employees within the company’s communication network and examined their role in disseminating discourses related to innovation. Using social network analysis (a method for modeling relational systems well described by Emmanuel Lazega) and interviews with the SME’s employees, our study confirmed the key role of managers in disseminating a discourse that legitimizes innovation and fosters positive attitudes. However, we also found that the SME’s communication network is not centered around the management team; it is fragmented into several subgroups dominated by actors with varied profiles, ranging from the factory worker to the financial director. These actors share three characteristics: (i) their legitimacy, often linked to seniority or individual performance; (ii) their representativeness, as they advocate for the interests of a group of employees; (iii) their central position within the communication network.
Employee coalitions or pockets of resistance? These actors influence the dissemination of information about innovation and help shape the attitudes of other employees. They filter certain information, promote certain narratives, or create their own stories—whether or not they support innovation. This control over information gives them significant power over the formation of attitudes and, by extension, over the emergence of resistance to change. Their influence enables the formation of employee coalitions, either supportive of or opposed to innovation. In our case, these actors were initially underestimated by management due to their non-managerial status and their subtle influence within the communication network. The leadership team ultimately had to adjust its messaging and negotiate with them regarding the adoption of new practices, the maintenance of existing practices, and in some cases even the promotion of certain individuals.
Promote the adoption of innovations by leveraging internal champions
We are convinced that anyone working in an SME—whether they are part of the management team or not—intuitively recognizes these key, legitimate, and influential figures who have the power to either foster or hinder innovation. Nevertheless, it is crucial to look beyond this simple intuition.
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Our research shows that management is often unaware of these individuals, largely because much of the communication among employees takes place digitally and therefore goes unnoticed. Yet they play a crucial role, as they are often better positioned than executives to convince their colleagues to adopt an innovation.
Understanding resistance to change.
SME leaders should therefore start by identifying key players, using simple network analysis methods to visualize their company’s communication structure. Many social network analysis software tools are relatively accessible. For example, there are numerous tutorials available to help users learn how to use Gephi and NodeXL.
In addition, generative AI tools like ChatGPT can “serve as experts in network analysis” and guide leaders in collecting, analyzing, and interpreting data. This analysis will identify key stakeholders. Next, the leader’s intimate knowledge of the company will help them determine which actors are also legitimate and representative, making it easier to identify those who play a key role in internal communication and who can rally their colleagues. The leader’s role is then to engage these key actors, encouraging them to actively participate in innovation activities to select and adapt innovations.
The goal is for them to become advocates within the company, capable of defending employees’ interests while ensuring the effective dissemination of information, thereby enabling teams to form their own opinions. Finally, our study shows that these stakeholders, although they may represent a source of resistance, offer a valuable opportunity to foster innovation. Resistance to change is often a signal to be leveraged to better adapt innovations to the specific context of those who use them on a daily basis. These stakeholders then become key partners in overcoming these obstacles.
Rémi Le Goff, Professor of Strategy and Entrepreneurship, Montpellier Business School; Marc Robert, Professor of Management Sciences, Montpellier Business School and Sophie Mignon, University Professor, University of Montpellier
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Readthe original article.