Rite Solutions Case
CASE: HR-27 DATE: 09/11/06
RITE-SOLUTIONS: MAVERICKS UNLEASHING THE QUIET GENIUS OF EMPLOYEES
We freely acknowledge that we are not the two smartest people in the company... . Weíve got a lot of real world experience. Weíve got a vision of where we want this thing to be at some point in time. But exactly how to get there, and what technologies to use, and how we should employ them, thatís much bigger than any two people should be responsible for. ó Jim Lavoie, CEO of Rite-Solutions, speaking of himself and company President Joe 1 Marino
In July 2006, Susan Duncan attended a workshop at Rite-Solutions to learn more about an innovative tool that the company had developed to foster innovation, and to encourage collaboration among employees. She had read about the tool, a stock market game called ìMutual Fun,î in an in-depth article in the New York Times. If an employee had an idea that might help the company, either by saving money, developing a product or service, or developing new technology, the employee could create a stock that would be listed on Mutual Fun. Other employees could invest virtual money in the idea, provide comments, or volunteer for short projects that would move the idea forward. The stock market tool provided an interesting vehicle for harnessing the creativity of employees. Rite-Solutions had created Mutual Fun for its own use, but found it to be so powerful that the company wanted to license it as a product to others. The New York Times article generated a tremendous amount of interest in Mutual Fun, and the Rite-Solutions put on a series of day-long workshops for companies interested in learning more about it. Duncan was an executive with a consumer products company, with a large portfolio of products such as soaps and detergents. Her company was struggling to come up with new products. Duncan attended one of the RiteSolutions seminars, and learned about the stock market game. However, she quickly realized that the game was just part of
RITE-SOLUTIONS: MAVERICKS UNLEASHING THE QUIET GENIUS OF EMPLOYEES
We freely acknowledge that we are not the two smartest people in the company... . Weíve got a lot of real world experience. Weíve got a vision of where we want this thing to be at some point in time. But exactly how to get there, and what technologies to use, and how we should employ them, thatís much bigger than any two people should be responsible for. ó Jim Lavoie, CEO of Rite-Solutions, speaking of himself and company President Joe 1 Marino
In July 2006, Susan Duncan attended a workshop at Rite-Solutions to learn more about an innovative tool that the company had developed to foster innovation, and to encourage collaboration among employees. She had read about the tool, a stock market game called ìMutual Fun,î in an in-depth article in the New York Times. If an employee had an idea that might help the company, either by saving money, developing a product or service, or developing new technology, the employee could create a stock that would be listed on Mutual Fun. Other employees could invest virtual money in the idea, provide comments, or volunteer for short projects that would move the idea forward. The stock market tool provided an interesting vehicle for harnessing the creativity of employees. Rite-Solutions had created Mutual Fun for its own use, but found it to be so powerful that the company wanted to license it as a product to others. The New York Times article generated a tremendous amount of interest in Mutual Fun, and the Rite-Solutions put on a series of day-long workshops for companies interested in learning more about it. Duncan was an executive with a consumer products company, with a large portfolio of products such as soaps and detergents. Her company was struggling to come up with new products. Duncan attended one of the RiteSolutions seminars, and learned about the stock market game. However, she quickly realized that the game was just part of