Innovation Heartbeat Planner

How to Use the Tool

The short video above gives an overview of the Innovation Heartbeat Planner, and some useful built-in features.

Get Started

"(* Required)" indicates required fields

1GETTING STARTED

2CUSTOMERS – EXTERNAL

3CUSTOMERS – INTERNAL

4SYSTEMS + TOOLS

01 : GETTING STARTED

In this section, we ask a few questions in order to classify your business and help us build a profile to improve the relevance of the Innovation Heartbeat plan for your unique characteristics.

You’ll find it much easier to complete this questionnaire on a device with a full keyboard. If you’re on a smartphone, scroll down to the bottom and tap Email me a continue link to send yourself a link to pick up the work later.

Filling out this questionnaire typically takes 10-15 minutes.

Recipient Email Address

Your plan will be generated on this landing page, but we do not store your plan or the information you enter on our servers. Please enter your email address if you’d like a copy sent to you—once you close this page, the data is automatically deleted and your plan disappears.

Enter Email Confirm Email

Organization Name(* Required)

What’s the name of your company or organization?

Employee Headcount(* Required)

Roughly how many people are employed by your company? Include subcontractors or external parties who you can resource to do work.

Industry(* Required)

Which industry do you operate in?

Growth State(* Required)

How would you characterize your organization’s current state of growth?

Strategic Priority(* Required)

What’s your top strategic priority, currently?

OTHER : Strategic Priority(* Required)

Please jot down your top strategic priority.

Transformation Point(* Required)

What do you most want to improve upon within the next twelve months?

02 : CUSTOMERS – EXTERNAL

In this section, we ask questions which seek to clarify the makeup of your existing external customers—those whom you transact with and sell to. The answers will be used to customize the framework for connecting feedback touchpoints.

If needed, scroll down to the bottom and tap Email me a continue link to send yourself a link to pick up the work later.

Ownership of Insights Generation(* Required)

Is there currently a single person in your organization who owns the voice of the customer, or who’s responsibility it is to collect and champion feedback from customer groups?

Yes

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Content : Ownership of Insights Generation = Yes

Customer Segments(* Required)

Who do you sell your products or services to?

Consumers

Businesses

3rd Sector (Governments or NGOs)

Products / Services Provided(* Required)

What do you provide to your external customers? A brief summary is fine—no need to go into specific, granular detail here.

Frequency of Interactions(* Required)

How often do individual customers generally interact with your business?

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Content : Feedback Modes = Not Actively Collecting Feedback

Interaction Touchpoints(* Required)

Which communications channels or touchpoints do you currently use to interact with your existing customers?

In-Person

Email / Support Ticketing

LiveChat / SMS / Real-Time Messaging (ex : WhatsApp)

Phone / Web Calls (ex : Zoom)

Website / eCommerce

Social Media

Other (Specify)

OTHER : Interaction Touchpoints(* Required)

Please list any other touchpoints where you interact with existing customers.

Current Feedback Modes(* Required)

When you actively solicit customer feedback, how do customers currently provide it to you?

Structured Surveys

Online Reviews

Support Tickets (Email/SMS)

Social Media

One-to-One Conversations (In-Person or Phone)

Many-to-One Conversations (ex : Focus Groups)

We don’t actively collect customer feedback

03 : CUSTOMERS – INTERNAL

In this section, we ask questions which seek to clarify the makeup of your existing internal customers—the functional teams and key stakeholders within your organization. The answers will be used to customize the framework for synthesizing feedback and distributing insights.

If needed, scroll down to the bottom and tap Email me a continue link to send yourself a link to pick up the work later.

Functional Teams(* Required)

Which functional teams are a core part of your organization? Please indicate whether they’re in-house, outsourced, or not applicable.

	In-House	Outsourced	N/A
Product / Service Development (R&D)
Marketing
Sales / Business Development
Customer Service / Success
Supply Chain / Logistics
Operations
Finance / Accounting
ICT / Information Technology

Connection to Feedback(* Required)

For each functional team, how connected do you feel that they are to customer feedback (either internal customers or external customers)?

Very Connected teams actively solicit feedback at regular intervals, consider the input and create insights, and then act on those insights to improve or innovate.

Very Disconnected teams… don’t.

	Very Connected	Somewhat Connected	Somewhat Disconnected	Very Disconnected	N/A
Product / Service Development (R&D)
Marketing
Sales / Business Development
Customer Service / Success
Supply Chain / Logistics
Operations
Finance / Accounting
ICT / Information Technology

Barriers to Action(* Required)

What are the top few things which are impeding your organization’s ability to act on customer feedback? Saying “I don’t know” is okay—it can be challenging to surface these barriers. Tap the plus/minus buttons to add or remove lines in this list.

04 : SYSTEMS + TOOLS

In this section, we ask some questions about your processes, systems, and technology tools. This information is used in creating a personalized communications structure for your Innovation Heartbeat.

If needed, scroll down to the bottom and tap Email me a continue link to send yourself a link to pick up the work later.

Internal Communications Tools(* Required)

What kinds of tools does your organization currently have at its disposal?

Project Management Tools (Ex : Asana/Jira/Trello)

Instant Messaging (Ex : Slack/Teams)

Business Intelligence / Analytics Dashboards

Other (Please Specify)

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Content : Internal Communications Tools = Instant Messaging

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Content : Internal Communications Tools = BI Dashboards

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Content : Internal Communications Tools = PM Tools

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Content : Internal Communications Tools = Email

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Content : Internal Communications Tools = Other

OTHER : Internal Communications Tools(* Required)

Please indicate the types of other internal communications tools that your organization has at its disposal. Tap the plus/minus buttons to add or remove lines in this list.

Frequency of Structured Leadership Meetings(* Required)

How often does your organization’s leadership come together, with a stakeholder from each of your functional teams present?

Daily

Weekly / Biweekly (Fortnightly)

Monthly

Quarterly

Semi-Annually

Annually

Irregularly / As-Needed

Leadership Meeting <> Feedback Link(* Required)

Is customer feedback routinely reviewed or discussed at these meetings? Or, are the aggregate results of feedback collection discussed?

Yes

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Content : Leadership Meeting = Yes

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Content : Leadership Meeting = No

Functional Teams <> Feedback Links(* Required)

Do your functional teams have regular standups or meetings to review customer feedback together?

	Yes	No	Unsure	N/A
Product / Service Development (R&D)
Marketing
Sales / Business Development
Customer Service / Success
Supply Chain / Logistics
Operations
Finance / Accounting
ICT / Information Technology

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Content : Employee = Under 10

The most effective internal champion will likely be a founder/co-founder or long-standing senior employee. This person should assume responsibility for reviewing feedback and distilling it into insights, and then distributing those insights to the rest of the team.

After building any touchpoints that you need for soliciting feedback, start out by holding a one-hour meeting monthly, for the entire team, to talk about the insights the champion distills and bounce ideas around.

The small team size is actually an advantage here—it shortens the communication pathways, and it's very difficult for anyone to be out of the loop or misaligned to purpose.

Another advantage is that founders/co-founders/long-standing senior employees will likely know the business EXTREMELY well, which will make the distillation of insights and their transformation into tangible innovation much more likely (though, the burden of knowledge is a blindspot to watch out for).

Try this 30/60/90 implementation plan :

Day 0-30 (Pilot)

* Set the cadence of your feedback collection, grading, insights distillation to top five, and how often you'll review with the team (see how monthly/60 minute goes and adjust as needed)
* Stand up your internal communications tools as needed (creating channels, BI dashboards, email templates, et cetera)
* Run your first monthly distillation, and generate your top five

Days 31-60 (Grow Some Roots)

* Add specific summaries for business functions if relevant, and categorize your insights as feedback collection grows
* Convert 2-3 insights into committed items that you'll implement, and plan that out with the team
* Start measuring Time-to-Insight and Time-to-Action (see ’Metrics’ below)

Days 61-90 (Show Your Wins)

* Showcase a win with your colleagues, and talk about the positive impact you expect for customers for taking the insight to action
* If the Innovation Heartbeat's flow is smooth and stable, add intake touchpoints to collect more feedback
* Lock in your internal communications efforts and review session schedule, and make it a habit with the team

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Content : Employee = 10-100

The most effective internal champion will likely be a long-standing senior employee who folds this role into their existing responsibilities (and perhaps shifts off others). This person should assume responsibility for reviewing feedback and distilling it into insights, and then distributing those insights to the rest of the team while working to build buy-in and accountability links in partnership with key stakeholders and leadership.

After building any touchpoints that you need for soliciting feedback, start out by holding a one-hour meeting monthly, with the key stakeholders, to talk about the insights the champion distills and bounce ideas around. If this time commitment is unwieldy, shorten it—or add the agenda to an existing relevant meeting (like a regularly occurring leadership team meeting).

The long-standing senior employee serving as the internal champion will ideally know the business EXTREMELY well, which will make the distillation of insights and their transformation into tangible innovation much more likely (though, the burden of knowledge is a blindspot to watch out for).

Given the size of your organization, the most effective internal champion will likely be a dedicated, experienced employee resource. This person should assume responsibility for reviewing feedback and distilling it into insights, and then distributing those insights to the immediate leadership team while working to build buy-in and accountability links in partnership with key stakeholders. If you can allocate an existing employee resource to this role through an internal hiring process, that will shorten the learning curve for them about the business (understanding the business well is extremely important for the internal champion).

After building any touchpoints that you need for soliciting feedback, start out by holding a one-hour meeting monthly, with the key stakeholders, to talk about the insights the champion distills and bounce around ideas. If this time commitment is unwieldy, shorten it—or add the agenda to an existing relevant meeting (like a regularly occurring leadership team meeting).

Try this 30/60/90 implementation plan :

Day 0-30 (Pilot)

Days 31-60 (Grow Some Roots)

Days 61-90 (Show Your Wins)

* Showcase a win with your colleagues, and talk about the positive impact you expect for customers from taking the insight to action
* If the Innovation Heartbeat's flow is smooth and stable, add intake touchpoints to collect more feedback
* Lock in your internal communications efforts and review session schedule, and make it a habit with the team

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Content : Employee = 101-250

The most effective internal champion will likely be a dedicated, experienced employee resource. This person should assume responsibility for reviewing feedback and distilling it into insights, and then distributing those insights to the immediate leadership team while working to build buy-in and accountability links in partnership with key stakeholders. If you can allocate an existing employee resource to this role through an internal hiring process, that will shorten the learning curve for them about the business (understanding the business well is extremely important).

Try this 30/60/90 implementation plan :

Day 0-30 (Pilot)

* Allocate your dedicated resource to serve as the internal champion
* Set the cadence of your feedback collection, grading, insights distillation to top five, and how often you'll review with the team (see how monthly/60 minute goes and adjust as needed)
* Stand up your internal communications tools as needed (creating channels, BI dashboards, email templates, et cetera)
* Run your first monthly distillation, and generate your top five

Days 31-60 (Grow Some Roots)

Days 61-90 (Show Your Wins)

* Showcase a "live-from-insight" win with your colleagues, and talk about the positive impact you expect for customers
* If the Innovation Heartbeat's flow is smooth and stable, add intake touchpoints to collect more feedback
* Lock in your internal communications efforts and review session schedule, and make it a habit with the team

This field is hidden when viewing the form

Content : Employee = More than 250

Try this 30/60/90 implementation plan :

Day 0-30 (Pilot)

Days 31-60 (Grow Some Roots)

Days 61-90 (Show Your Wins)

Six Catalysts

Innovation Heartbeat Planner

How to Use the Tool

Get Started

01 : GETTING STARTED

02 : CUSTOMERS – EXTERNAL

03 : CUSTOMERS – INTERNAL

04 : SYSTEMS + TOOLS