MortgageBroker mbabc.ca fall 2014 | 41
As mortgAge professionAls,
imagine the growth our business would
experience if we could create an exponential
increase in exposure of our business and brand.
Building your brand is fundamental to the
success of your business. One of the ways to
support this growth is to consider the concept
of diffusion of innovations (
DOI), the model
that explains how, why and at what rate new
ideas are spread through your company.
Although
DOI is oen associated with the
adoption of technology, it can also drive
change within a company.
In the late 19th century, French sociologist
Gabriel Tarde first studied the concept of
diffusion of innovations. However, this
theory was not popularized until 1962 when
Everett Rogers, a professor in the field of
communications studies, began discussing
diffusion in companies.
Let's look at company culture as an
example. As a mortgage company, it is
important to develop an employee culture
that really reflects the values and beliefs your
company stands for.
A company that positions itself in the
marketplace as family-friendly, for example,
needs to have a family-friendly corporate
culture. To create this culture, a company
must support family-friendly principles and
these attitudes must be widely adopted in
order to be self-sustainable. One can expect a
family-friendly office environment to include
programs like on-site daycare, flexible working
hours, family activity days, work-from-home
opportunities and generous maternity or
paternity policies.
When the preferred culture has more
people practicing it than employees who do
not accept it, it reaches a tipping point: the
idea becomes self-sustaining and the culture
is created.
Why is it so critical to invest time in office
culture? Your office culture will be a direct
reflection of your success in the marketplace as
a mortgage company.
Five steps
e diffusion of innovation model records five
necessary steps before an innovation is adopted:
1) Knowledge: Expose employees to your
concept. During this stage, employees are
introduced to the ideas, through different
mediums, but will not have enough relevant
information to really connect to your concept.
2) Persuasion: Individuals actively seek
additional information and details about
the concept. e company needs to create
enough curiosity for individuals to seek
further information.
innovation
Investing
in Innovation Adoption
Successful transitions depend on early adopters embracing new concepts
By fred sarkari
