One of the biggest questions faced by innovation managers is how to measure success. Finding the right combination of KPIs which deliver relevant and actionable information can be difficult for the unseasoned Innovation Manager. Most organizations require a different set of data since their strategies will differ; however there are a few ‘core’ KPI that no innovation strategy must be without.

Our philosophy at INCENT is not to focus on the end result as much as the execution phase of the innovation process. Ensuring execution of your strategy will likely guarantee the end results. A good starting point in defining the KPI for your innovation strategy, (and more so if using idea management software across a vast group of users) is to measure the following items:

1) Participation
     a. The more people are engaged the likelier the chance of finding the 'diamond in the rough'.
     b. Recurring participation will indicate the team continues to be motivated to participate.
2) Idea Quality:
     a. Is your team proposing very random ideas or are they focusing on specific challenges?
     b. Are most ideas discarded? Or are they turning into actionable items?
3) Aging:
     a. If it takes too long to process an idea participants may lose interest.

If you can stay on top of these then they will ensure the other KPIs (financial gains, patents achieved, or any other end result KPI that you want to measure) show consistent progress.