Why Rendanheyi is Great for Modern Corporate Innovation

What is Rendanheyi?

The Rendanheyi method, is an organizational method pioneered by the Haier Corporation, a Chinese multinational. It represents a shift from a traditional, top-down approach, to a more employee-centric approach. The word itself can be broken down into three parts:

• Ren: referring to individual employees
• Dan: referring to the needs of each user
• HeYi: referring to the connection between employees and the needs of the user

The term has gained a lot of attention, due to its revolutionary capabilities in initiating innovation at scale. Ultimately, it focuses on two key components. Firstly, it promotes the fact that everyone can be an intrapreneur. Secondly, it creates “zero distance to the user”, meaning that the end user remains at the forefront of the innovator's thinking.

Haier recorded a year-on-year growth of over 9% by turning its organization into a series of self-governing micro-enterprises. When used effectively, Rendanheyi could be the key to long-term innovation and business model success for companies across all industries.

10 benefits of the Rendanheyi model

1. Encouraging company-wide innovation

Statistical evidence shows that a company-wide approach to innovation yields more ideas. Rendanheyi's belief that everyone can be an entrepreneur involves and values all employees in the company. When employees want to be creative, their environment allows them to be. With Rendanheyi, innovation is no longer limited to a select group of individuals, instead everyone is involved through intrapreneurship.

2. Putting the user first

Effective innovation often revolves around establishing customer-centric ideas and the Rendanheyi method celebrates this. Employees are continually encouraged to focus on providing value to the end-user. In turn, ideas are designed and developed keeping desirability in mind.

3. Intrapreneurs are in charge of their ideas

When employees see their ideas taken over by a senior staff member, their motivation levels can fall. Likewise, it means that the initial idea’s perspective and contextuality might be lost. Rendanheyi encourages ambition and allows employees to actively work on their ideas without being creatively stifled. This open and accessible approach will yield better results.

4. Promoting easy communication

While this method to corporate innovation does let intrapreneurs take responsibility, it also paves the way for easy communication. This includes links to other team members within their micro-enterprise as well as other parts of the business. It can also open the door to client suggestions and collaborations, like those seen by platforms like the NASCAR Fan Council.

5. Self-governance encourages intense planning and testing

Mistakes can pave the way to future successes. Likewise, innovation often requires an iterative approach. When employees are in charge of their ideas, they can follow various testing scenarios to determine which ideas are worth pursuing and which ones are not. As such, the roadmap to incremental innovation becomes far smoother.

6. Removing the fear of failure 

Psychological safety is an essential ingredient in the recipe for successful corporate innovation. Having micro-enterprises removes many of the barriers previously linked to seeking approvals from superiors. This allows intrapreneurs to work on ideas and ensure that they are allowed to evolve organically. As such, good ideas won’t be destroyed by bureaucracy. 

7. Rendanheyi allows for innovation at suitable times 

Rendanheyi puts intrapreneurs in control and enables them to work on ideas when they strike. This is something many big organizations do, even if they don’t use the Rendanheyi Method. Creative productivity will subsequently soar while innovations can evolve before losing their momentum.

8. Analysis of innovations are focused on the context of the business 

We live in a data-driven world where agile frameworks can accelerate creative processes. The user-centric approach to innovation ensures that contextuality and viability are continually evaluated. This can highlight failed ideas far sooner while also ensuring that ideas that have a future can be continually improved on.

9. Time is not wasted when ideas aren’t flowing 

Time is the most valuable resource at your company’s disposal. By removing the denied schedules, you won’t only allow employees to work on ideas while they’re fresh, you will also enable them to work on other matters when they are having a creative block. Thereby, optimizing the overall time spent on different tasks.

10. It yields results

Finally, the results of implementing Rendanheyi as a business strategy, speak for themselves. Haier’s Rendanheyi-spearheaded growth came during the unprecedented difficulties posed by the pandemic. This efficient approach to innovation can transform a company and boost its bottom line. Moreover, it is shown to actively yield more ideas, which can only strengthen the organization's hopes of finding successful solutions too.

Transform corporate innovation with Rendanheyi and KICKBOX

Embracing the Rendanheyi approach to innovation can deliver remarkable results for your business, especially if it is supported by the right tools. The KICKBOX intrapreneurship program for example, improves accessibility to innovation for all, while also ensuring that customer-centric ideas are allowed to thrive. By making innovation tangible, gamified and fun, the program sets free the innovator and creative in your employees. Used in conjunction with the Rendanheyi approach, you can revolutionize your company's innovation efforts.