Peter F. Drucker said, "Innovation opportunities do not come with the tempest, but with the rustling of the breeze." The greatest impacts that we can have on our companies are not necessarily from the large-scale changes, but by the small things we do to try and implement to perform just a little better each day. 

My team and I have regular meetings to analyze what we are currently doing and how we can make it better. We have completely revamped several processes, at minimal cost, simply by asking ourselves how can we make it better? Those brainstorming sessions throw out some terrible ideas, and we end up laughing a lot. That's okay, it also helps us to look at what we're doing in a different way. When we start those brainstorming sessions, we usually start with the chirping of crickets. No one can think of any ideas. So, we start by asking, what things about your job bother you the most right now? Everyone has a gripe, right? An answer like "Salespeople'" or "IT" just gives us the opportunity to dig deeper. Why does that problem bother you? If someone wants to throw out a generic response like that, we'll keep asking questions until we identify a real problem that we can do something about. We didn't like that we were wasting so much time hunting down paper to get information, so we started scanning paper in to a central database so anyone on our team can find what they need at any time. We didn't like that we didn't know how to communicate with our salespeople, so we had our sales team provide us with a presentation on what the sales team sees, who they are, and where their territories are, and then presented the accounting side of things to the sales team. Even a short overview of what each team sees and needs from the other helped to improve the relationship immensely. None of these were big earth-shattering changes, but they have had an important impact on how we do business, on our efficiency, and on our employee morale. Our employees are motivated because they finally have a say in the things they used to just grumble about at the water cooler. 

Another way we can drive innovation is simply by attending our credit meetings and talking to other people that do the same thing you do every day. I found that whenever I bring up a question at an industry group or ICEL meeting, the other Credit Managers are always willing to help out with great ideas, stories, and resources I wouldn't have easily found on my own. Ask your cohorts in credit how they deal with a problem you have, and you may get some ideas that will work better for you than what you are doing now. 

Sometimes the challenge is just keeping up with the changes. In order to keep up with changes, I can't stress the value of NACM education enough. LEARN! Learn everything you can about the industry, about changes in the economy, about new laws and legal decisions that affect your industry. ICEL is a small commitment - one lunch a month. It's a great way to learn about some of those changes that affect you, as well as a great opportunity to network with others in your field. Signing up for a class can be intimidating, but there is so much support from NACM and other students, that you are given every opportunity and encouragement to succeed. Online classes, Western Region or Credit Congress are just a few other opportunities that NACM presents you on a regular basis to make it easier for any credit professional to keep up with and adapt to changes in our industry. 

Small changes make a big difference. The Credit Department can have a significant impact on driving change for your business. Driving change and being able to adapt to a changing environment, are an important part of what we do. Luckily, we have NACM to help us keep up with it all.