The first step to supercharging your ideas into a revenue-driving game plan is to get your team on board.

In my two decades of helping businesses grow through innovation, the only companies I’ve seen succeed are the ones whose teams are all aligned on the common goal.

Most often, that goal is to generate more revenue for the company although it can also focus on other types of business growth:

• Improving brand loyalty
• Developing acquisition plans
• Increasing average contract value
• Gaining more customers.

The trouble arises when an organization grows so quickly and becomes so complex that its teams steer…

During a time of mass disruption, companies need to step out of survival mode and innovate for their customers, no matter how challenging that is.

I recently returned from a motorcycle vacation throughout the southeast U.S. It was a magical trip with multiple destinations from the Tail of the Dragon in North Carolina, and Cherahola skyway to Ocoee River Gorge in Tennessee and Little River Canyon in Alabama.

While planning each stop, I was surprised to find 2-star hotels from companies like Hilton and Marriott were charging up to $180 a night in most small towns on our route.

That’s 30–40 percent above average rates for this time of year.

Nine months into the pandemic, that’s not surprising. The hospitality industry is still struggling with…

By Michelle Royal

Everyone is an innovator whether they realize it or not. As humans, we simply cannot help but innovate.

Over centuries, innovations sprouted from the Renaissance, the agricultural revolution, and the industrial revolution. We didn’t call these developments innovations back then. Instead, we referred to them as a creative process, a political process, or a war strategy because the innovation process had yet to be defined. But when you truly think about Michaelangelo’s works or the invention of modern farming, they are at their core, examples of innovation.

Today, we define innovation as the realized value of an…