IM2 Level 1 - Innovation Deficient:

Culture:   Culture is risk-averse, overly stressful, lacking trust and closed to new ideas

• This is typically the culture you find in most organizations today, especially organizations that have recently experienced layoffs or a period of aggressive cost cutting activities.  Management doesn't care about new ideas, unless they are ideas that reduce cost.  This is also the culture found in organizations that take Six Sigma programs to the extreme.

Leadership:  Leaders focused on past performance and current initiatives only

• Leadership vision is limited to reviewing how they did the past quarter and new directives have aggressive, short term goals.  Leaders in this stage are not willing or confident enough to attempt new initiatives.  Leaders are mostly interested in doing whatever it takes to maintain the status quo.

People:  People are viewed as productivity units, rather than idea sources

• The focus of employee count strategy is to do more with less.  Organizations at this level do not replace positions that come free when people advance or leave the company.  Organizations also do not backfill for people who accept temporary project-related assignments.  Instead, employees who remain where they are can expect increasing workloads and work hour demands.

Processes:  Innovation-related processes not present

• Innovation-related processes are typically not even considered at this level.  Employee creativity is not encouraged and only cost-cutting ideas are entertained by management.

 Tools & Techniques:   Innovation-related tools & techniques not present

• Typically, the only tools used by organizations at this level are dictated by accounting and cost/value engineers.

Training:  Innovation-related training not provided

• Employees are lucky to get any training dollars, much less creativity or innovation-related training, at this level of innovation maturity.  Training is viewed as an unnecessary cost by management.

Facilities:  Innovation-related facilities not present

• Meeting rooms are reserved for accountants and cost/value engineers to run their cost containment numbers rather than for idea generation sessions.

Idea Capture:  Ideas from employees, customers and other sources are not captured

• Ideas that are percolated up from the employee level are typically blocked by middle management as too risky. 
  

Idea Management:  Idea Management Systems not present

• Ideas that do somehow "make it up the ladder" are not documented, organized, filtered or selected using any available rigor.
  

Strategic Planning:  Corporate strategic planning focuses on past performance, maintaining status quo and protecting existing market share

• The description really says it all at this level.  Management has no strategic plan...other than survival

Metrics:  No established innovation-related metrics

• The only metrics tracked by management at this level are employee counts, cost ratios, and the bottom line.