Innovate or evaporate.(includes related articles)(innovation in associations)

MAKE INNOVATION A REALITY IN YOUR ASSOCIATION. HERE'S HOW YOU CAN AND WHY YOU SHOULD.

When a new product at Owens Corning fails, no one gets fired. The company celebrates the failure by throwing a party and giving each team member a savings bond. Why?

To demonstrate the company's commitment to innovation. By embedding innovation in its culture, Owens Corning allows employees to take risks without fear of reprisals. Associations can, too.

WHAT IS INNOVATION?

Think of innovation as a mind-set, a pervasive attitude, or a way of thinking focused beyond the present into the future. Think of innovation as more than rolling out new products. It can be initiating new processes, dreaming up creative ways to deliver services less expensively, or paving uncharted paths for member involvement.

Consider the experience of the Minnesota Orchestral Association (MOA), Minneapolis, which in 1996 initiated a new business process. A team of board members and community leaders met and brainstormed more than 100 ideas, leading to the launch of animated videotapes of the orchestra's music. Called "story concerts," these videotapes have received national acclaim and won multiple awards. MOA leaders anticipate that annual profits from this venture will cover up to 10 percent of the association's operating costs.

Other nonprofit organizations are tapping new sources of income through innovative endeavors. Share Our Strength, an organization in Washington, D.C., devoted to fighting hunger and poverty, joined with New England-based manufacturer Cains Foods to develop and brand Taste of the Nation food products. Cains is producing, marketing, and distributing the product line; Share Our Strength is receiving a percentage of the sales.

Chicago Television Workshop licenses Sesame Street products to help generate gift shop sales. Harlem Textile Works, New York City, sells artwork and licenses its own designs to outside vendors. And Save the Children, Westport, Connecticut, sells a line of men's neckwear. The common denominator in each of these examples is that the leaders in these organizations were able …