At Engine we’re very proud of our Great Portland Street offices. We think they’re modern, vibrant, and help make for a genuinely nice place for people to work.

But while the foosball table, sizeable bar and array of funky chairs all play their part in creating an attractive working environment (and indeed, the former Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe/Y&R executive creative director Damon Collins has written an excellent piece on how an office transformation can also transform an agency’s creative output on his blog here), we also know that this all counts for nothing if we don’t back this up with an internal creative culture.

The Digital Maturity Index, a study carried out by our channel shift experts Transform to determine how well prepared companies are for the ‘digital revolution’, has come up with a similar view.

Officially launched this week (you may have been aware of an event held in conjunction with the report in April - picture above), the report spoke to a number of major organisations, including Argos, BSkyB, BT, O2, Royal Mail, Waitrose, Investec and various government departments, and found a significant uplift in the number of companies that are working hard to adopt an organisation-wide approach to innovation.

Last year, 39% of Public and 53% of Private companies surveyed stated that having an organisation-wide approach to generating new ideas would have a high or medium impact on their organisational success, whereas those figures for this year were a much more promising 92% for Public and 82% for the Private sector.  

As Simon Shorey from Barclays said in the report: “Transformation means a change in culture and process in order to deliver change and make sure that we are seen by our customers to be innovating and moving forward.”

The benefits are clear. During a prolonged period of recession or stagnation, many organisations scale back the level of investment allocated to innovative projects as they seek to manage costs. However the inevitable consequence is the long-term impact on sales and customer experience will be detrimental if all innovation activity ceases.

The smart companies are therefore the ones embracing new technologies, introducing greater flexibility, being prepared to fail if it ultimately means progression further down the line, and creating and facilitating teams that work in new ways.

With digital talent scarce, potential employees are looking for a strong brand to work for, as well as the more obvious salary increase and other benefits. It is only those companies that embrace innovation and have a transformative culture running through their entire core that will be able to offer that.