Influencing innovation : how do strategic leaders in financial services influence innovation implementation

Abstract

These are unprecedented times for the financial services sector in South Africa. This is a time when financial technology companies or fintech’s have aggressively penetrated the financial services sector in South Africa with attractive innovative propositions for customers from a product and service perspective. Traditional financial services organisations are not responding commensurately to the innovative value propositions taken to market by their new entrant competitors. This is the business problem. The business community is turning to strategic leaders in traditional financial services organisations to understand the sluggish response to fintech innovations entering the market. This research study brought strategic leaders in traditional financial services organisations to the fore with the objective of understanding how innovation implementation is influenced within their organisations. The purpose of this research study was to explore industry knowledge on challenges confronting strategic leaders in influencing innovation implementation collate insights, methods, techniques and strategies on how leaders can influence innovation implementation and be used a guide for leaders battling to break barriers underpinned by non-progressive cultures and norms within their organizations. The research was a qualitative study that deployed semi-structured interviews to a sample of 13 strategic leaders across a spread of executive positions that were purposefully sampled according to qualitative research methods. An additional two industry experts formed part of the research participants, bringing the total to 15 interviews. An extensive desktop literature review formed part of the research process including a thematic analysis to arrive to research findings and outcomes.It was found that strategic leaders influence innovation implementation mainly through persuasion, negotiation and through building resilience in their approaches to influence, coupled with two key mechanisms which include effective engagements and positive enabling behaviours. Based on the analysis of the findings and the outcomes from the research, five key recommendations were provided in the study for management. The recommendations focused on strengthening current approaches to influencing innovation implementation and suggestions on strategic considerations and tactics they can utilize. One of the aims of this study was to position a research report that documents a comprehensive strategic guideline based on theoretical principles of how strategic leaders in financial services can practically influence and drive the innovation implementation agenda successfully.