Innovation that ships.
MW builds the operating machinery that turns innovation ambition into shipped commercial outcomes. Senior-led, embedded with your team, sized to ninety-day cycles.
Why most corporate innovation fails to deliver.
Most large organisations have an innovation function that under-delivers against the ambition that funded it. The cause is the absence of an operating model that takes ideas through the lifecycle to scaled production, with the discipline to kill weak ones early and the structure to commercialise strong ones properly.
Most organisations respond by spending more on innovation theatre: more hackathons, more idea workshops, more strategy decks. None of it closes the gap, because the gap sits in the operating machinery that turns ideas into shipped product. The visible symptoms compound over eighteen months: talented staff burn out, initiatives drag on past the point they should have been killed, and the function comes under cost pressure that risks dismantling it. The cycle then restarts with new leadership and the same gap unaddressed.
The MW Innovation Framework is the operational answer. Three foundational artefacts, three maturity levels, one entry point.
The MW Innovation Framework.
Three foundational artefacts address three dimensions of innovation capability: where you stand today, how you operate, and what is actually in your portfolio. A three-level maturity model tells you which artefact to commission first. Six capability pillars provide the diagnostic instrument.
the capability map
Capability Diagnostic
An honest assessment of your innovation capability across the six pillars: Strategy, Ecosystem, Ideation, Organisation, Scale, and Culture. Identifies which pillars are foundational gaps and which are downstream symptoms.
the structural design
Operating Model
A defined operating model: decentralised, hybrid, or centralised. Pipeline ownership, governance machinery, funding flow, and the engagement model across executive, management, operational, and graduate levels.
the active portfolio
Portfolio Review
A review of the current innovation portfolio against the five-stage lifecycle. Which initiatives are progressing on evidence, which are zombies that need killing, which commercialisation model fits each MVP-approaching initiative.
Different from existing innovation frameworks.
Most published innovation frameworks score organisations across capability pillars, produce a capability index, and recommend a transformation programme. They work as measurement instruments. As action instruments they are limited, because the work of producing the actual artefacts begins after the roadmap is delivered, somewhere else.
The MW framework operates differently. It identifies which of three foundational artefacts your organisation has not yet produced, and produces them. The Capability Diagnostic maps the capability and prioritises three pillars; the Operating Model designs the structure your function will run from; the Portfolio Review signs off kill decisions and commercialisation models for MVP-approaching initiatives. All in three to eight working days. The diagnosis converts to action without an intermediate strategy phase.
Where is your innovation function on the curve?
Three patterns recur across the innovation engagements MW takes on. Identify yours, and the right entry artefact follows.
Level 1
Sporadic
Occasional projects, no operating model.
Innovation happens when an individual champion pushes through; otherwise standard delivery work fills available capacity. There may be aspirational language at executive level but no operational instrument behind it. Procurement and project governance treat innovation work as if it were standard delivery, which kills it.
Innovation Diagnostic → Capability Diagnostic (5 days) → Capability Sprint (8–10 weeks) → Retained Innovation Ops
Level 2
Structured
Function exists, output below ambition.
An innovation function exists, with a pipeline of sorts, some governance, and some delivery capability. Too much time is spent on early-stage ideas that should have been killed; too few make it through to production; the commercial conversation about which model to take to market happens too late and too informally.
Innovation Diagnostic → Operating Model (8 days) → Pipeline Build (10–12 weeks) → Retained Innovation Ops
Level 3
Industrialised
Scaled delivery, scaling pressure.
Innovation as a core capability, with a continuous pipeline and commercialisation models already in place. The pressure is no longer about whether the organisation can innovate but whether it can sustain the operating cost, manage the portfolio across BUs, and continue to attract the talent the function requires.
Innovation Diagnostic → Portfolio Review (8 days) → Scale Programme (12–16 weeks) → Retained Innovation Ops
How MW works on innovation.
Senior-led.
Every engagement is led directly by Mark Goodchild. Twenty-five years across the sectors that fund innovation: financial services, media, government, energy, and retail. Eleven of those years at EY, building innovation programmes for Fortune 500 clients. The person on the call is the person doing the work.
Embedded.
Innovation artefacts are produced alongside your team, not delivered to them. When MW leaves, the operating model sits in your people.
Hands-on.
The output is the working artefact and the operating capability. Success is measured by what gets built, scaled, and shipped.
Honest.
Where engaging MW would not yet pay back, the Diagnostic recommendation is a clear not yet with specific advice on what to do next.
Building your own venture rather than running corporate innovation? That work sits in MW Ventures.
Start with a Diagnostic.
Every MW innovation engagement begins with the same thirty-minute call. Seven questions across the six capability pillars. One named recommendation delivered in the room: which artefact, how it runs, what it produces. Or an honest not yet with specific advice on what to do instead.
No charge. Run personally by Mark Goodchild.
Not ready for a call? Notify me when MW publishes the next briefing.
About Mark Goodchild
Mark is the founder of MultipleWorks. Twenty-five years across financial services, media, government, energy, and retail, including eleven years at EY where he led the APAC Digital and Emerging Tech Consulting practice. He has designed and operated corporate innovation programmes for Fortune 500 clients across multiple industries.
Mark runs every Diagnostic personally. Every Capability assessment. Every Operating Model engagement. The person on the call is the person delivering the work.