"That whole training ground that was middle management has disappeared," Charette says. "Executives say they like to promote people because they are leaders, so one of their real major promotion criteria is how [people] will make future decisions. But we've filtered out the innovators, we've filtered out the parts of the organization where people could learn how to make decisions, and of course we don't spend any time training people in making decisions. Then we expect those promoted to be leaders, and loudly complain when they don't lead. We haven't given them any opportunity to learn that skill set.

"Worse, we don't select for leadership skills anyway; we select for management skills. So what we end up with is this very vicious cycle where the people who are running the corporations are normally not real leadership material. They are brought in because of financial prowess more than strategic prowess; they don't necessarily even know the business very well. Just look at problems created by companies that were run by the celebrity CEO. There is this pervasive thought that if I have an MBA I can manage a business whether it involves IT or kangaroo farming. So skill and experience are not necessary and not even appreciated. What we end up with is this vicious cycle that is going to be very, very hard to break."

Technical specialists are not immune either. The corporate habit of hiring people with specific skills rather than general experience is another innovation killer and cause of poor decision making. Companies will advertise for someone with training and intensive experience in XML or Java, but would not dream of helping employees to gain those skills. Charette calls it "hiring for a job, rather than a position".

This is an incredibly self-defeating stance, he says. Buying-in experience and skill sets creates high turnover - and timid employees.

"Innovation takes people that are willing to challenge the status quo. People who challenge the status quo are normally your non-conformers, and your non-conformers are pretty strongly focused," he says. "They are normally single-minded, they have a big disregard for other people's feelings, and they're very open about telling you what you are doing wrong. They will try and do things that are not necessarily what you want them to do, because they're trying to figure out how to do something better.

"But organizations today don't tolerate non-conformers well. People are supposed to do what they're hired to do, and they don't have remits per se to go out and improve the corporation. What's worse is that a lot of the people who are non-conformists are the ones who are sticking their noses into other people's business."

Organizations spot the non-conformers quickly, he says. It also does not help that many organizations today offer no scope for people to fail. If innovation is to thrive, failure goes with the territory.

Rearranging the Deckchairs

If this were all, it would be bad enough. However, Charette believes we must also factor in the failings of the re-engineering revolution. Too many organizations took to re-engineering piecemeal, he says, in a way celebrated guru Michael Hammer has chastised as "Paving the cow path" or "Rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic".

Hammer proposed targeting basic changes in the way the organization developed and delivered its products and services - a high-risk, high-reward strategy. Too many organizations turned business process re-engineering projects instead into mindless cost and headcount reduction exercises.

Re-engineering has also flattened most companies out and rid them of middle management. Commentators widely hail this approach, but Charette sees serious problems. When you flatten the organization you not only lose opportunities to learn, he says, but rid the organization of the people most tolerant of and happy to shield non-conformists. "And what's more, because of this bottom-line orientation, every individual has to provide value, not only at a project level, but at individual level. If you can't show that you're contributing to the bottom line, you're quickly out the door," he says.