Published on January 11, 2024
Innovation has always been an integral part of the TBEM criteria. In keeping with the importance of innovation in organisational competitiveness and success, Tata Business Excellence Group (TBExG), with support from Group Innovation, Tata Sons, has revised and enhanced the TBEM criteria pertaining to innovation. Further, to meet the needs of Tata companies to develop their innovation management capabilities and performance, TBExG and Group Innovation have collaboratively developed and launched the Tata Innovation Excellence Framework (TIEF).
The TIEF is designed to evaluate innovation management in Tata companies with the objective of growing value from opportunities and ideas that are successfully turned into innovation. It aims to develop a shared understanding of innovation for adopting best practices, nurturing a culture of innovation to enhance the competitiveness of Tata companies, and aligning with the group’s vision to be ‘future-ready’. It is designed to be sector, market and geography agnostic. Aspects such as innovation strategy, organisation, culture, processes, resources, and knowledge are interrelated and jointly managed to maximise value. The framework also provides a self-assessment tool that can be used by the assessed companies and assessment teams to:
- Identify gaps in innovation management
- Prioritise critical aspects for deep dives during site visits
- Prepare sharper feedback
TIEF’s core values and concepts are embodied in the five dimensions: leadership, strategy, capability, process and infrastructure, and open innovation. The results across these five dimensions focus on financial, non-financial, people, process, infrastructure, and open innovation performances.
The TIEF was formally rolled out to group companies by TBExG and Group Innovation at an event organised at the Beldih Club in Jamshedpur in September 2023. The session was attended by 25 colleagues from 13 Tata companies. The session was graced by Dr Nikhil Tambe, CEO of the Energy Consortium at IIT Madras. Since then, four more sessions on the subject have been facilitated in Pune, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Delhi to sensitise over 120 colleagues from 40 Tata companies on the TIEF.
During these sessions, the leadership team from TBExG shared salient features of the framework and emphasised the significance of incorporating this framework within the broader business excellence model. Sanjeev Singh, Vice President & Head; Vinod Kumar, Assistant Vice President; Devraj Chattaraj, General Manager; and Naman Gupta, Consultant, from TBExG led these sessions. On the Group Innovation side, Ravi Arora, Vice President - Innovation, Tata Sons, touched upon the evolution of the approach towards innovation management, while Dr Piyush Mishra, General Manager, and Chandrasekar Iyer, Senior Manager, Tata Sons, provided a detailed overview of TIEF and demonstrated the self-assessment tool. As a next step, TBExG and Group Innovation will encourage group companies to undergo self-evaluation to identify strengths and opportunities for improvement and to organise deep dives using the TIEF framework to introduce/adapt global best practices in innovation management to achieve the desired impact on business.
During the 2023 TBEM Assessment Cycle, four companies completed their self-assessment, the findings of which were used by TBEM assessors to refine and validate their observations and deliver sharper feedback. Two other companies since then have also completed the self-assessment and more are preparing to take it in the coming weeks. Based on the feedback received from these assessments, TBExG and Group Innovation will collaborate with companies to develop action plans for improvement interventions. They will also facilitate the sharing of best practices and enable benchmarking across different sectors and industries.