A Culture of Builders and Innovators - A Message from Smartsheet Chief Product Officer

Arsineh

Chief Product Officer at Smartsheet, Praerit Garg recently shared "When people feel empowered to take risks and be creative, they help us stay ahead of the curve in product design and features."

He went on to say, "When people see how they contribute to the company’s success, they are more engaged, leading to higher productivity and better outcomes. A culture of innovation can help attract and retain top talent looking for challenging and dynamic work environments."

You can read the full Forbes article here which provides six ways to build a culture of builders and innovators.

Do you do your best work and accomplish more when you're given the freedom to come up with and try new things?

Tell us about the work environments, organizational culture and management style that empower you or your teams.

Drop your thoughts in the comments below. ⬇️

Paul Newcome

I personally try to do my best work regardless, but I definitely thrive more when I have creative freedoms. More relaxed environments as well as those that are more open to new ideas seem to be much better off (and have happier staff). If new ideas can come from anyone regardless of position, role, etc., it fosters a more collaborative environment and even helps people find their best role within the company.

Darla Brown

When we were first sent home to work in March 2020, I was nervous about how I would maintain my workload and stay off the Leave Without Pay list. As an Executive Assistant, there is just so much I could "assist" in a remote environment with my boss. Thankfully, we are both forward thinkers, and she allowed me the freedom to begin moving processes into Smartsheet. Knowing I would strive for excellence and build better efficiencies, she gave me the freedom I needed. Because of that decision, we have exponentially expanded our user footprint across the company. And now I have even more freedom to continue with WorkApps. She will retire in 2 years. Because I've been able to create and build innovative ways for our teams to do their jobs, those in leadership look at my role in a different light.

Leaders who allow their teams the freedom to create within the framework of their systems generate a healthier environment. Teams take ownership of their work instead of just checking off a To Do List. They have purpose and motivation instead of dread.

Deanna Vandermeer

I couldn't agree more with @Paul Newcome -- I have always had the same work ethic and done my best each and every day, regardless of the platforms, programs, office spaces, etc., that I have had to do my work within over the past 36 years. But thanks to discovering Smartsheet more than 6 years ago, and successfully implementing it in our District, it has helped open up so many doors (including the creation of a new role/title/promotion for myself). The creativity, the freedom to explore, to feel empowered, to try new ideas and ways of doing things, and building our own solutions has been a game-changer for moving our processes to higher levels. More importantly we giving back the most precious commodity of 'time' to our staff so they may focus more on their time on the work itself rather than focusing on the tedious tasks.

StevenBlackburnMBA

When 2020 began and the virtual world began to open up by force -- our teams needed better ways to track information in an efficient manner. We began looking at systems we used internally and noted some improvements that could be made.

We noticed we could improve the way we support operational teams in the healthcare field and in our business operations by improving the intake of requests from departments. This ended up scaling to ultimately become what our organization calls the "One Stop Request Center". Essentially, this is our version of a custom help desk that we built from scratch. In doing so, we were pioneers in assisting Smartsheet to develop the conditional logic that is now used in "Forms". This did not exist at the time, and we had to build out multiple forms. We later rebuilt and revamped our version when the forms were updated and were able to get more creative in our reconstruct. This system is used by our entire organization and has been helpful in approximately 3,000 organizational requests where we can now gather data and efficiently track items we never had the capability to do before -- in the ways each department likes to track their requests.

Since then, we have learned creative ways to build large scale systems that infrastructurally are needed, and have created a roadmap that allows us to track employees from application to onboarding, have been able to build in tracking systems that our teams needed, and have leveraged various different partnering products that have significantly positively impacted our organization. With Smartsheet's constant updates, and flexible customizable options -- our teams have been able to adjust and use systems confidently -- and track items, send out notifications to our partners, and build our own reporting using PowerBI. This shift has been beneficial for the organization, despite the horrible reasons (COVID-19 pandemic) that caused the virtual shift.

It is important for organization's to shift and remain flexible, as technological trends are constantly changing. AI can be a positive thing if programmed correctly, and quality safeguards are a must. When we build our products, we build roadmaps, technical diagrams, and detailed trainings to ensure that when these new products are launched -- teams are impacted immediately. The teams that use these products are thankful for the efficiency and improvements that accompany them.

Iseward

Smartsheet has provided me the ability to create forward facing Dashboards and an easier way to automate processes within my area and with others in their processes. This program has expanded the level of work I do on a day to day basis but it provide me so much satisfaction knowing that I get to assist others with improving what they are doing. I don't currently have the ability to do SSRS reports or specialized Dashboards but with Smartsheet I get to do it all.

Cassi

People are what give Smartsheets a beautiful advantage. Having support in place and learning from one another creates a learning environment for all. I was introduced to a blimp of smartsheets a few years ago and I loved how user-friendly it was. Once I was introduced to the admin side I fell head over heels with not only the community but with the program 100%. If I cannot build it in smartsheets is it even worth building?