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Operational Innovation means coming up with entirely new ways of filling orders, developing products, providing customer service, or doing any other activity that an enterprise performs.¹

When it comes to operational innovations, the most important and rather difficult part is the phase of execution. Many companies, though leaders in their own fields, have often failed to implement. Though the ideas and innovations might be disruptive, but if not accompanied by effective and careful groundwork, it might lead to painful failures. Even in day-to-day managerial activities, we come across a lot of creative ideas, but how many of those innovative thoughts really reach the practical application stage is a questionable issue.

In this regard, Aravind Eye Care² stands out as a clear leader in adopting operational innovation as a part of its organizational culture. It particularly satisfies the following major principles of Operational Innovation¹: -

1. Look for Role Models Outside Your Industry - Aravind successfully adopted the practices of assembly line in its surgical operation theaters. (If Coca-Cola can sell billions of sodas and McDonalds can sell billions of burgers, WHY can't Aravind sell millions of sight-restoring operations and, eventually, the belief in human perfection?" - Dr. V of Aravind).²

2. Identify and Defy a Constraining Assumption - With a target of manufacturing an intra-ocular lens at less than $10, it converted seemingly impossible work into reality.

3. Make the Special Case into the Norm - Aravind has progressively moved up the ladder in implementing various innovative measures and has made it a routine.

4. Operational Innovation is a Step Change - Over the years, Aravind has implemented many innovations in various processes in a phased manner and reached a world-class status. Aravind Eye Hospitals examine over 1.7 million patients and operates on over 250,000 annually. It is world's largest provider of eye care services.

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1. Michael Hammer, "Deep Change - How Operational Innovation can Transform Your Company", in Harvard Business Review, April 2004, Pp 4-12
2. www.aravind.org

* Contributed by: -
Dr. Shreyas Goswami is a II Year Business Management student at XLRI, Jamshedpur. He is an MBBS doctor from B. J. Medical College, Ahmedabad, and had extensive work experience in the Healthcare Sector prior to joining XLRI.
This Paper was adjudged one of the Best 8 Papers in "Ashwamedh Paper Writing Contest" organized by XIMB.