As a way to develop actionable plans within projects and initiatives, « Human centricity and systemic innovation » explores multiple dimensions of diversity to explain how they jointly contribute to build intelligent and systemic innovation. This four parts analysis enables to apprehend diversity as a multiple lenses tool to define those values that bind teams and projects together, as well as external challenges and synergies that can be addressed through ecosystems and knowledge networks. The first part, « Diversity and the dynamic of change », takes the reader through the mechanics of diversity as a horizontal, vertical, systemic and technical reading grid of external and internal ecosystems to ensure identified missions are assigned to relevant projects and teams. The second part, « Diversity to connect knowledge and experience », dives into business benefits generated by diversity: systemic growth, smart leadership and dimensional diversity. They respectively form the business, leadership and operational engines of systemic innovation generated by diversity. The combined understanding of human and business benefits of diversity as identified in these two first parts enables to understand how project management and creativity can benefit from diversity into operational action plans, « the diversity scope » and « creativity in action », detailed in the third part: « Diversity to reach systemic impact ». Finally, the fourth part, « Diversity as a core element of intelligent change », applies the previously defined systemic innovation plan to demonstrate how social intelligence, skills for change, open innovation and individual values can be combined to generate systemic innovation from human-centricity.

1. Beautiful Diversity
Chapter 2
January 2017
!
!
A management report by Johanna Camp
weareinnovation.org

2. !
!
« It is not because it is difficult that we do not dare to do it. It is because we do not
dare to do it that it is difficult. »
Seneca
!
!
!
!
To Lisa and Adrien,
my very best inspirations for a better world.
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org2

3. About Beautiful Diversity
Beautiful Diversity is a series of management reports issued from
weareinnovation.org think lab. Based on analyses shared by experts and
analysts in innovation, it intends to highlight the benefits of diversity in
business world, and beyond. By addressing business issues through diversity,
these reports aim at reconsidering the notion of difference, taking it beyond
social, cultural and gender scopes to outline human components that build
our common skills to address global issues. As a result, Beautiful Diversity
draws a plan to enable readers to use this diversity of skills, which is also
reflected in a diversity of cultures and personalities, to develop innovation
baked in human priorities and realities.
The series is articulated around four different reports:
-« Diversity as a success story » explains how we can reverse engineer
current management and project development thinking patterns to better
include diversity of thoughts and attitudes, leading to higher efficiency and
increased business benefits. This report was published in 2015.
-« Human centricity and systemic innovation » outlines human costs and
benefits of developing diversity in businesses and society, detailing actions and
plans that can be taken into account. This business and human case results in a
systemic innovation plan for intelligent change. This report is now published in (2017).
-Diversity as a philosophy concentrates on the global impact of having more
diversity in society, for the environment, to address increasingly complex issues
brought by our economic and political ecosystem.
-Diversity in action is an action plan to encourage individuals in society and
businesses to become diversity champions and start connecting skills and knowledge
to generate value based on diversity.
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org3
-
Beautiful
Diversity!
!
Diversity as a
success story!
!
Human centricity
and systemic
innovation!
!
Diversity as a
philosophy!
!
Diversity in action

4. As a whole, these reports combine the views of an experienced strategy and marketing
manager, her operational insight, as well as innovation experts’ specialized views, jointly outlining
how diversity drives human change, triggers team cooperation and smart solutions for systemic
improvements. By synthesizing these views, the reports intend to inspire professionals,
students, leaders interested to build their own discussions towards a diversity driven
organization delivering human value on a systemic level.
!
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org4

5. About weareinnovation.org
weareinnnovation.org is a global think l@b curating and analyzing
information related to future developments, management and strategies, to make
sense of innovation and inspire intelligent change. Organized as a live strategic
plan, it aims at analyzing trends shared on social networks among innovation
peers to outline key messages and catalyze change. The blog builds a living
story of the initiatives developed around change management, ecosystems and
business models implied by innovation, as well as specific technology trends
such as Big Data and Internet of Things. As a result, weareinnovation.org
provides a 360° overview of innovation as seen from experts and
analysts to inspire readers with fresh views and questions for their
daily business life.
Created in 2013, the blog gathers four years of analyses sorted by:
-Vision and thought leadership: analyzing the values and leadership
skills experts seek to develop through innovation
-Ecosystem analysis: covering politics, economics, society, technology,
legal and environment, as well as market trends
-Strategy and management: assessing readiness to market and trends
impact on projects and strategies
-Customer requirement analysis: segmenting and analyzing innovation needs
by segment (business experts and professional communities, education, politics
and public policies, investors, companies, innovation experts, customers and
influencers)
-Strategic recommendations: an on-going review of information and plans as
shared so far, shaping the story of innovation as shared on weareinnovation.org
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org5
!
We Are
Innovation!
!
Our global story,
as we write it.

6. Through a diversity of standpoints, the blog intends to shape a smarter
approach to innovation, encompassing the best practices identified across
sectors and applying them in new ways to generate cross benefits to the
innovation ecosystem. It encourages innovation professionals to consider fresh
thinking patterns in order to better develop innovation. Through a professional yet
personal view, posts provide innovation practitioners with tools and open
mindedness to thrive in a growingly endangered and rapidly changing world.
!
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org6
Making sense
of innovation:!
Management view!
Operational view!
Combining skills for
change!
!
Inspiring
intelligent
change:!
Curating information!
Sharing knowledge!
Catalyzing change

7. About the author
With over ten years of experience as Marketing, Business Development and
Strategy Manager for major IT and Consumer Electronics companies, Johanna
Camp has developed and driven global strategic plans for a variety of IT
products and services. Her keen interest for innovation has led her to take on
decisive roles in rolling out technologies that are today being used by millions
of customers around the globe, interconnecting networks and applications to
develop enhanced communication services. From product management to
financial analysis, she has an in-depth understanding of processes, business
models and market ecosystems.
After an intensive career path in Paris, she moved in La Châtre,
Georges Sand’s hometown, where she now concentrates on her writing
ambitions and enjoys a happy family life. As weareinnovation.org author,
she has spent the last four years reading and analyzing the meaning of
innovation for scientists, investors, entrepreneurs and end-users. In the
midst of an economically deserted French rural area, she has managed to
help local SMEs build their innovation processes to attract strategic
customers and investors, implementing innovation and diversity in an
ecosystem looking for a new breathe. Giving a voice to innovation is not her
only passion, as she also exercises part of her creativity writing songs as lead
vocals for her own music band, actively participating to local social life and
cultural diversity.
With a Master’s Degree in Management from Grenoble Ecole de
Management, Johanna is dedicating her time and energy sharing a meaningful
life, using innovation as a tool to open her ideas and thoughts to the world.
Johanna is 33 years old, mother of a young daughter, a keen English and French
literature reader, playing piano when she is not typing on her keyboard.
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org7
Johanna Camp!
!
!
Innovation!
Marketing!
Business
Development!
Writing!
Creativity!
Grenoble
Ecole de
Management

8. Content
Introduction p9
Diversity and the dynamic of change p12
Diversity of thoughts as a core engine for innovation p14
Diversity of viewpoints leading to meaningful conversations p19
Diversity brings life to our human ecosystems p25
Technical diversity to optimize change p31
Diversity to connect knowledge and experience p36
Diversity as a driver for systemic growth p38
Leaders and smart diversity p43
Connecting knowledge through dimensional diversity p49
Diversity to reach systemic impact p53
The right skills for the right issue: the diversity scope p55
Enrich creativity through diversity: creativity in action p67
Diversity as a core element of intelligent change p78
Social intelligence and diversity p81
Diversity to combine the best skills for change p85
Open innovation fueled by diversity p89
Diversity to define individual values in a global world p95
Conclusion p100
!
!
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org8

9. Introduction!
!
! The systemic trends affecting any innovation related project have created an
interconnected and complex environment where decisions of some affect lives of others in much
more dramatic manners than any technological evolution may have brought in the past. Because
the spread of new services and technologies are accelerating together with the economic and
social impact they drive, it becomes critical for any change maker to develop appropriate tools and
thinking frameworks to understand and align with an ever changing project environment. Beyond
the ethnic, cultural and gender dimensions it necessarily impacts, diversity as a management and
innovation practice is an essential element to decipher systemic changes, analyze internal and
networked impact, develop creativity and meaningful value through unique standpoints and
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org9

10. solutions. This management report, « Human-centricity and systemic
innovation », intends to provide innovation leaders and practitioners with a
pragmatic approach to diversity, analyzing how multiplicity of ideas and tools
contributes to intelligently read external threats and opportunities in order to
combine them strategically with internal strengths and weaknesses.!
!
! As a way to develop actionable plans within projects and initiatives,
« Human centricity and systemic innovation » explores multiple dimensions of
diversity to explain how they jointly contribute to build intelligent and systemic
innovation. This four parts analysis enables to apprehend diversity as a
multiple lenses tool to define those values that bind teams and projects
together, as well as external challenges and synergies that can be
addressed through ecosystems and knowledge networks. The first part,
« Diversity and the dynamic of change », takes the reader through the
mechanics of diversity as a horizontal, vertical, systemic and technical
reading grid of external and internal ecosystems to ensure identified
missions are assigned to relevant projects and teams. The second part,
« Diversity to connect knowledge and experience », dives into business
benefits generated by diversity: systemic growth, smart leadership and
dimensional diversity. They respectively form the business, leadership and
operational engines of systemic innovation generated by diversity. The
combined understanding of human and business benefits of diversity as
identified in these two first parts enables to understand how project management
and creativity can benefit from diversity into operational action plans, « the
diversity scope » and « creativity in action », detailed in the third part: « Diversity
to reach systemic impact ». Finally, the fourth part, « Diversity as a core
element of intelligent change », applies the previously defined systemic innovation
plan to demonstrate how social intelligence, skills for change, open innovation and
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org10
Diversity and the
dynamic of
change!
!
!
Diversity to
connect
knowledge and
experience!
!
!
Diversity to
reach systemic
impact!
!
!
Diversity as a
core element of
intelligent
change

11. individual values can be combined to generate systemic innovation from human-
centricity.!
!
! Writing management reports on innovation and diversity has been incredibly
inspiring. So many different approaches and ideas resonate with this similar
call for a human and intelligent change that diversity as a business philosophy
has definitely turned out to be a real life philosophy to me, as a writer. Within
the professional experiences I’ve had to chance to live in my current career,
the ability to identify and build from constructive differences has proved
meaningful and profitable to my teams, projects and individual values. The
first report from the « Beautiful Diversity » initiative, « Diversity as a success
story », has given birth to practical tools that can unlock status quo and
tensed discussions on strategic projects. Because diversity has remained a
priority topic in the development of weareinnovation.org stories, and
because it has inspired and solved business cases and personal questions
in real life, this human and business case for diversity will hopefully provide
readers with the right mindset and thinking framework to address complex
and global issues with a richer environment to read, enlightened creativity to
define solutions and clearer understanding of systemic innovation.!
!
!
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org11
« How can we
combine
individual
values to
generate
systemic
innovation
from human-
centricity ? »

12. Diversity and the dynamic of
change
!
After working for almost ten years within a global company, I have made the conscious
choice to go and scout other enterprise types from distinct sectors to understand how marketing
and strategy are defined and developed under differing positioning and management styles.
Although one could understand how resource limitation and market reach necessarily limits the
place of such activities in the two SMEs I have been working for, I have been personally intrigued
to find each and every employee was in fact forced to develop their own strategy and marketing
ideas to guide their daily activities. In both companies, everyone happened to highly specialize
in business insights for their own tasks and customers. Speaking brand and priorities
therefore demanded an on-going open conversation with each and every member of the team,
when management and consolidated information rule bigger and more structured organizations.
!
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org12

13. Spending time on the phone to gather strategic details and multiplying coffee breaks
was not the worst strategy job I’ve ever had. It did ask more time and energy to
gather information, but the human links and feelings developed on both sides of
conversations have been of tremendous value both when defining a long term
strategy and when implicating resources to deliver it. The written and spoken
advise I have gathered have not only contributed to develop my skills, they
also participated in shaping a common story we have successfully sold
both to customers and investors. This shared sense of purpose and value
was able to bring prestigious influencers and stakeholders on board. It made
little doubt to me that my personal ability to read and manage differences by
applying diversity skills as developed in « Diversity as a Success Story »
helped making sense of differing priorities and constraints to build a common
story for success.
!
Many of the strategic and business discussions that have occurred in
these two SMEs I’ve worked can only confirm the need to practice diversity
as a management style. For instance, the commercial energy required to
investigate market potential for business entities that have very limited time
and money to spend has led me to drive insights from sectors and technical
products I had never heard of before. Because I am exposed and influenced
by daily reading and curating of innovation and management information on
weareinnovation.org, I have been able to open and drive business
conversations that not only led to develop commercial results in the short term,
but also brought investors on management board to ensure a long term
sustainability for these companies. The following chapter details how those
tools can also help readers build the knowledge and capacity they need to thrive
in an ever-changing business world.
!
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org13
Diversity of
thoughts as a
core engine for
innovation!
!
!
Diversity of
viewpoints
leading to
meaningful
conversation!
!
!
Diversity brings
life to our human
ecosystems!
!
!
Technical
diversity to
optimize change

14. Diversity of thoughts as a core engine for innovation
Based on « We Are Innovation because we read », WAI, November 2015
Management view
!
Diversity of thoughts and ideas enables innovation experts to explore
topics and strategies under varying angles. Knowledge sharing is one of the
management tools that can be considered to facilitate this diversity.
Although complex systems and technologies now enable automated
communications between experts, companies and customers, developing a
proper innovation culture is highly encouraged by reading and learning from
competitors and subject matter experts. As one of the activities that can
nurture an innovation culture, reading is considered by experts as an
elementary source of development.
!
Knowledge sharing as part of developing innovation could be
considered a horizontal diversity tool: it enables to share insights
among peers on a given topic, including thoughts and ideas from
outside our daily business box to take concepts and projects further. In
other words, horizontal diversity enables to build a common view of a given
topic with a shared expertise or passion. By referring to a specific publication
or author, innovation practitioners can easily explain and illustrate their view
points and strengthen their reasoning. This passive information sharing allows
knowledge incubation into projects requirements.
!
Spending time analyzing and understanding different approaches to
market and methodologies plays a role in challenging currently known innovation
strategies. Diversity of thoughts is indeed required to optimize processes and
decision making. Experts and analysts’ call for more in-depth reading of
management and strategy books. This call highlights essential behaviors
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org14
Horizontal
diversity:!
Sharing insights
among peers on
a defined topic

15. sought to develop diversity and innovation: curiosity, openness, adventurous spirit yielded
by multiple dimensions of an identified issue.
!
!
Operational view
!
As a learning and inspiring activity, reading is encouraged by entrepreneurs, leaders and
business experts to enable individuals to develop new approaches and ideas. Not only does it offer
the space and stand back to integrate knowledge, it also offers the space to think and feel the
emotions we sometimes miss in daily routine to apprehend situations with a fresher view. Because
reading connects readers and writers’ experiences into a constant dialog defining leadership,
innovation and change, developing thoughts through different angles and varying voices, words, is
a key requirement to continuously nurture creativity and willingness to solve growingly
intricate issues.
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org15

16. !
!
Experts view
!
Books help us find additional inspiration. We can choose “silent” mentors
whom we read to develop new ideas by understanding their own views and
experience. Experts encourage to learn from others’ successes and
failures, gaining precious advice and time to adapt strategies to new
markets. While approaching business leaders and economists may prove
difficult, reading thoughts from inspirational authors can help understand their
core motivation and indirectly learn from them. By disconnecting our
thoughts from daily projects, reading allows space for new ideas. Innovation
projects potentially last a long period of time and the operational details
professionals often have to review tend to consume a lot of energy.
Accessing parallel windows opened on similar issues provides stand
back and relief to breathe in new ideas and improve leadership skills.
Management books may also assist experts in recovering existing ideas
and principles that could have drawn in the daily flow of information any
business is submitted to. Expert writers in fact offer us some stand back. In
the obviousness of specific situations, we sometimes need additional
thinking to consider facts under a different angle. Reading is about
confronting our choices and our story to others, it is about discovering how
similar problems may have been solved in distinct situations, and defining a
value for such a difference. It can also be about disagreeing with specific
standpoints, and understand in more depth the reasons of this disagreement,
as further detailed in « Diversity as a success story ».
!
Of course, experts also share their own expertise through books, connecting
experiences with reader’s operational choices. The pragmatism of business
books helps shape new ideas and organizations. While promotional content
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org16
« In the
obviousness of
specific
situations, we
sometimes need
additional
thinking to
consider facts
under a different
angle »

17. and intellectual content growingly converge to defend specific opinions supported by brands and
organizations, reading through different approaches encourages diversity by offering the ability to
better understand market strategies from competitors or developing a new leadership style. Other
operational reading can benefit to readers and practitioners in specific areas such as Business
Intelligence. For technical topics, in depth reading enriches knowledge and competences, directly
delivering value to readers. Sometimes, books come with an inspiration for change, ringing alerts
to bring readers into writers’ own reality, leading them to take action. Embracing or rejecting a
reasoning and a standpoint helps develop readers’ own standpoint and actions to drive
towards identified solutions. In the end, reading gives us time to think. It may just be a virtual
escape from a time and efforts consuming daily life. Or a disconnection from on-going thoughts
that tend to close our minds and spirits on already known environments and activities. Reading is
the rendezvous we give to an unknown expert or writer to discuss out of time and connections
about topics and travels that only us can know about. It is a key to find ourselves again.
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org17

18. Books also provide us with more emotions. Because words enable to trigger
thinking patterns closely linked to our feelings and mindsets, experts are in a position
to mentor and support readers rather than simply communicating knowledge. Those
emotional travels in someone else’s minds and experiences enrich our own
empathy. Consequently, reading enables us to change. On a pragmatic level,
books nurtures our writing skills to develop accurate messages for an audience.
Being emotionally engaged in the content they share, experts are able to listen
and explain more efficiently the meaning of the solutions they have built for a
specific problem. Eventually, reading enables us to improve. On a leadership
level, learning from reading is identified as a key requirement to success. The
accumulation of learning from a wide range of expertise, knowledge,
experiences and emotions enables leaders to build the appropriate
competencies panel they need for specific projects and teams.
!
!
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org18
« Those
emotional travels
into someone
else’s minds and
experiences
enrich our own
empathy »

19.
Human-centricity and systemic innovationweareinnovation.org19
Download the full report:
!
https://gumroad.com/l/rppH
!
Read more on:
!
https://weareinnovation.org
Our global innovation story, as we write it