Accenture creates a platform to curate ideas from employees

Realising the importance of ideas that can come from employees, Accenture India has built a proprietary platform called ‘IdeaHarvester’.

The human mind is a warehouse of ideas – ideas that can change lives, help build a better future and lead businesses to great success, provided these ideas are seen or heard and are implemented well.

More often ideas do get killed at germination due to lack of direction or encouragement by employers. Organisations which expect employees to follow protocols and continue working the way they do, miss out on those great ideas.

However, there are some companies which know how to nurture ideas in a structured environment. Accenture India is one such company, which has built a proprietary platform called ‘IdeaHarvester’, for the submission and curation of employee ideas.

This platform sorts ideas and sends them to the right people for curation. So far it has gathered over 9,000 ideas from employees, nearly a third of which are being implemented for clients.

This January, Accenture started a competitive program the ‘Innovation Summit’ which received 4,000 ideas, of which 500 were implemented. About twenty of those ideas were selected by a jury consisting of 10 of Accenture’s top customers and were provided an initial funding of $2000 each to build prototypes.

In addition, the company has also organised over 40 Innovation Workshops with its customers where these ideas are presented and thought over.

As the corporate world heads towards disruptive technologies and digital platforms that are replacing conventional ways of work, organisations have become more focused on boosting innovation.

This is also why organisations are consciously investing efforts in learning and development programmes. An official statement shared that In FY15, Accenture invested more than $840 million in employee learning and professional development.