Charities are trapped in an innovation ‘doom loop’ as they struggle to develop, pilot and launch new services and products, research based on the views of more than 70 innovation leaders in the sector has found.

Half describe their charity’s ability to deliver new products or services as ‘weak’, and three in five warn their organisation ‘does not meaningfully enable innovation’.

Just under two thirds of charities deliver fewer than two pilots of new services or products a year.

Almost nine in ten of those surveyed believe the charity sector “needs at least significant or fundamental change in how innovation is delivered”, found consultancy Good Innovation, which carried out the research.

Innovation ‘doom loop’

Good Innovation describes many charities as being caught in a "doom loop" in terms of innovation “where individual successes don’t build into a rising tide and belief in innovation” and “hard-won learning evaporates”.

Too often functions within charities focused on innovation “get cut and rebuilt” and “every reset costs the sector time it cannot afford”, found the consultancy.

It warns that charities “delivery environment is not set up to move things through quickly, proof points are slow to materialise, and expectations were never quite calibrated to the timeline the work actually needs”.

This is resulting in a loss of confidence and investment in innovation and expert roles within charities being cut or restructured.

“The doom loop is not a story of failure. It is a story of innovation being set up in a way that makes this outcome almost structurally inevitable,” said Good Innovation, which found that innovation sits in fundraising or income functions among more than half of charities “rather than centrally or within services or programmes”.

Good Innovation is urging charities to tackle six barriers to ending the innovation ‘doom loop’ many are facing. These are:

• Unclear purpose and connection to strategy
• Weak belief in the value of innovation
• Insufficient leadership and power
• Risk aversion and resistance to change
• Poor delivery and execution
• Low speed and volume

Charity chief executives and trustees are being urged to assess their role in innovation and bringing about the transformation needed to ensure their organisation can innovate.

“Your job right now is to create the conditions: a fair runway, visible backing, and protection when the pressure comes,” said Good Innovation.

“When the function is ready for transformational change, you will know. And you will need to be willing to act on it."

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