094. Breaking the Barriers to Innovation: Carlos Simon on Organizational Culture & Change in NGOs

Summary

Innovation is often treated as a buzzword—but few nonprofit leaders take a hard look at the cultural, structural, and leadership obstacles that keep it from taking root. In this episode, Tosca talks with Carlos Simon, an innovation strategist and longtime leader at World Vision, about what it really takes to build innovation-ready organizations. From internal mindsets to outdated processes, they explore what’s getting in the way—and what to do about it.

Guest Bio:

• CEO of World Vision Costa Rica and iSmart360
• Director of Data Science and former Regional Director of BD & Marketing at World Vision
• Innovation strategist with 25+ years at World Vision International (WVI)
• Author of a forthcoming framework on the 7 stages of organizational innovation maturity

We Discuss:

• Why innovation is not the same as continuous improvement—and why that matters
• The cultural and structural obstacles that slow down innovation in large NGOs
• How Carlos developed a framework that identifies 7 distinct organizational "zones" of innovation capacity
• The importance of removing outdated processes to truly make space for new ideas
• Why leaders must address internal “friction” as much as they focus on promoting new ideas
• How senior leadership mindsets—like overconfidence or premature solution bias—can block innovation
• The role of flat structures, strategic alignment, and client focus in driving real innovation

Quotes

“You cannot have a disruptive vision and then treat it as a continuous improvement plan.”

“Innovation doesn’t fail because of a lack of ideas—it fails because of internal resistance.”

Resources

Organizational innovation index with exponential factor