What CIOs need to lead innovation

What: "Playbook for CIO-Enabled Innovation in the Federal Government," from the IBM Center for the Business of Government.

Why: Federal CIOs are expected to wear many hats, and "chief innovator" is an increasingly important one. Innovation efforts are often stymied, however, by bureaucratic obstacles, unclear lines of responsibility and uneven executive buy-in.

In this new report, Arizona State University's Gregory Dawson and the Royal Military College of Canada's James Denford deconstruct the innovation life cycle, then detail the most common challenges and offer five specific recommendations for CIOs seeking to drive innovation in their agencies.

Through interviews with nearly a dozen current and former agency IT leaders, Dawson and Denford identify practical examples from recent government projects and argue that committed leadership and a well-established ecosystem are required to foster an innovation-oriented culture. Agency leaders must bring other key participants into the process, and CIOs should document the baseline levels of innovation and create a formal process for their colleagues.

Verbatim: "Not surprisingly, process discipline is often lacking.... While everyone we spoke with is very supportive of the need for innovation, few agencies have a defined and repeatable process for enacting innovation. Rather, often the person who generates the idea is unaware of a process to enact the innovation, and either tries to create a process or simply gives up trying to implement it."

For the full report, go to www.businessofgovernment.org