How to manage innovation and how the new NP 4457:2021 standard can help

For some people, the terminology of "innovation management" seems contradictory. Thinking of management as something formal, rigorous, procedural, how does this align with something that should be free, open, and out of the box?

The fact is that when these two realities are combined and synergized, organizations only stand to benefit from it.

This is the great objective of NP 4457:

- To enable organizations, in general terms, to have greater ease in defining their innovation objectives (aligned with strategic objectives);

– Allow the creation and collection of ideas (whether they are the result of internal creativity or monitoring inputs from external sources) in the organization and improvement of the tools;

– Define and prioritize the innovation initiatives that the organization intends to establish (whether they are the creation of new products, goods, or services, processes, new marketing, or organizational methods);

– Control the results and return that each initiative brought to the organization;

NP 4457 is a certifiable Portuguese standard that allows this entire system to work internally and guides organizations towards practices that lead to an improvement in their performance at this level, creating knowledge and innovation and transforming it into economic and social wealth.

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The latest version of the standard was revised and published in December 2021 and now includes the aspects introduced with the publication of ISO 56002:2019 – Innovation Management System – Guidelines. The creation of this new version was due to the need for the standard to evolve and to improve and update some points, namely in relation to the previous standard:

  • is now aligned with the SL Annex and allows for easier integration with other ISO standards;
  • introduces the themes of change management and analysis of risks and opportunities;
  • defines in a more concrete way the innovation principles and adds new terminologies, such as strategic intelligence management, innovation culture and innovation vision;
  • enhances the management and control of the operation, initiatives and innovation processes, emphasizing internal validation tools and methods;
  • introduces the theme of financing, which requires determining the necessary financial resources and accounting for the resources allocated to innovative activity in an organization;

Organizations that hold their Research and Development Management Systems certified according to NP 4457:2007 will have a transition period of 24 months, which means until 15/12/2023, they will have to adapt their systems to the new standard, being that Strongstep is available to support in the implementation or transition to this standard.

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