Aerospace and Electronic Systems Magazine May 2017 - 54

Industry Insights:

DOI. No. 10.1109/MAES.2017.160101

Why It Is Important to Build an Innovation Strategy
Through the Project Management Maturity Model
Emanuela De Fazio, Leonardo-Finmeccanica, Rome, Italy

INTRODUCTION
Today, innovation is the main global economic growth booster, as
well as representing a real need in all human matters. Private and
public organizations must innovate to survive in a hypercompetitive marketplace that is changing profoundly and at an increasingly
fast pace, conveying an ever-higher level of expectation, and linking social and technological fields that were previously separated.
All organizations, public and privates; nonprofits; academia;
professional associations; small and medium enterprises; and multinational industries have to develop their own missions in a highly
complex scenario based on a large number of variables that are
often unpredictable, dynamic, and managed by different owners.
The market is affected by global crisis, not only economic and
financial crisis but also crisis due to the reduced availability of
natural resources; United States-European Union-North Atlantic
Treaty Organization-Russia political tensions; social, ethnic, and
religious issues; and different perceptions of values, quality, time,
and cost. Consequently, it is more difficult to be innovative or to be
recognized as an innovator, because the standards, the reference,
and the metrics to measure this attitude have changed. In addition,
it is more complicated to figure out how to create a sustainable
development process. Studies on organizations show that innovation is achievable only through a strategic thought process and a
specific risk-taking approach; it's feasible by implementing initiatives that aim at a global, integrated, and continuous modernization
process, but it will and must infiltrate the whole value chain's phases and parameters [1] (e.g., people, processes, business models,
offerings, and technology). Organizations, governing all these assets, can reach a real and concrete competitive position and create
tangible benefits and values for all stakeholders and shareholders
(Figure 1). Strategic initiatives should be carried out as projects, so
they must refer to well-defined processes. They must benefit from
support tools for their planning and execution and from teams with
appropriate management and technical competencies and skills.
Unlike projects based on sales contracts, innovation projects require a more distributed and deeper organizational culture, a better
Author's current address: Leonardo-Finmeccanica, Competitive Analysis & Strategy, Tiburtina, km 12,400 Rome 00131,
Italy, E-mail: (emanuela.defazio@leonardocompany.com).
Manuscript received April 20, 2016, revised October 20, 2016,
and ready for publication November 30, 2016.
Review handled by M. Greco.
0885/8985/17/$26.00 © 2017 IEEE
54

connection to the decision-making process, diverse flexibility, controlled agility, and an adequate rigorous approach. This article presents the rationale and the process used for the definition of innovation
strategy without referring to a specific company but instead being
valid and useful for any modern defense and security company.

SCENARIOS
For centuries, human progress has developed through paradoxes
and dichotomies that have inspired literature and revealed through
discussion how the natural contrasts between methodological and
destructured approaches and scientific and lateral thinking are overtaken and finally seen, as part of the same matrix, as essential for
growth. Art and science icons like Einstein, Leonardo, Michelangelo, Edison, and Mozart have proved how genius, recklessness,
individualism, and disregard for rules have allowed people to exploit chaos and disorder, break existing links between things, and
create new orders. Other cases have pointed out how abilities to read
strong and weak signals from context in a structured manner, to design a vision, to plan in a widespread and pervasive way, to innovate processes and behaviors, and to different leadership styles have
provided opportunities to overcome stereotypes that were no longer
sustainable and patterns that were no longer adequate for success. In
a like manner, the history of organizations proves how the traditional
concept of innovation has been changing, not so much in terms of
content but rather in the balance between tangible components and
intangible ones. This attitude of innovation continues to be linked to
the ability to design and develop new and useful ideas through technology, as well as products, exploiting market and technical gaps
and omissions, uncertainties, needs, and opportunities. But compared to the past, today's scenario is correlated to a wider and more
profound understanding in terms of demand and supply.
The impacts of globalization, the fall of the walls and the breaking apart of the old status, are wide and deep, overwhelming in
some aspects, incredibly fascinating in other respects, and overall,
bringing into focus a holistic innovation approach that is no longer
a generic strategic choice but has become an imperative. Functional
and performance requirements, standards, and interoperability constraints are increasingly challenging and complex. A different technological paradigm no longer sees technology as a mere tool but as
an objective. Technology is everywhere, pervasive and immersive,
and it has greatly changed the social and behavioral model, as well as
strongly changing the business model, the organizational assets, and
the development processes. People, users of the technology, want

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