2009 Issue 1 - Raytheon

Feature
Enterprisewide Innovation Initiatives
Raytheon Certified Architects Program
Innovation Challenge
IDEA Program
Technology Networks
External Collaboration
Independent Research and Development
Collaborating
to Ensure
Customer
Success
An inclusive approach to
Innovation at Raytheon
Innovation, as embodied in a novel product,
method, or service providing a result
with a valued quantifiable gain, is receiving
significant attention in industry and
government. The mantra, “innovate or
die,” is now being applied to corporations
and industries. At Raytheon, we have
always prided ourselves on our culture of
innovation — it’s not a passing trend, it’s
how we do business. This culture of innovation
enables us to provide leading-edge
solutions to our customers, as we have
continuously done for more than 85 years.
But we are not resting on our laurels.
Our innovative culture is rooted in our
diversity of people, products and thoughts,
and we continue to look for new ways to
drive innovation to address our customers’
needs. We nurture numerous specific internal
initiatives and strengthen our external
partnerships to ensure we constantly challenge
ourselves to invigorate the company
with new ideas to maintain our edge in
the marketplace.
4 2009 ISSUE 1 RAYTHEON TECHNOLOGY TODAY
Experience has convinced us that there is not
just a single approach that leads to successful
innovation in all aspects of the company.
We benefit from multiple complementary
approaches to encourage innovation across
Raytheon. Today, we are opening the aperture
by developing and applying internal
and external technologies to core and
growth markets. Our innovative culture
is at the center of these initiatives.
This set of approaches to innovation is
rooted in a set of principles outlined below:
Raytheon Principles for Innovation
Ideas can come from anyone, anywhere
in the organization
Robust ideas come from nurturing collaborative
environments
Innovation occurs at the intersection of
needs and ideas
Ideas may exist for sometime before value
or need is determined
Trust is crucial for people to collaborate
and share ideas
Radical/disruptive ideas are more likely to
come from diversity of thought created by
intersections of people with differences
Organizational Innovation Initiatives
Programs and Systems
Office of Innovation
The Bike Shop
Innovation Day
Rapid Initiatives Group
The Mission Innovation Group
Truly radical/disruptive ideas will often be
viewed as not feasible, impractical, or of
no value
Ideas are initially fragile; they need to be
nurtured
Different people have different styles of
creating ideas
Innovation cannot be scheduled, it occurs
when it does (but it can be facilitated and
encouraged)
Like innovation itself, Raytheon’s approaches
to innovation are dynamic and varied.
Together, they form a tapestry from which
internal and external inventions are
spawned, nurtured and matured into truly
innovative solutions. Some of the
approaches are summarized below and
described in further detail throughout this
edition of Technology Today.
Certified Architects – Through the
Raytheon Certified Architect Program
(RCAP), Raytheon’s top architects receive
advanced training to hone their skills and
enable them to define world-class architectures
that will integrate internal technologies