Overview

Certified Government Innovative Organization is a unique accreditation reserved exclusively for government organizations. Through a process of independent third-party review and assessment, the CGInO establishes that your organization has demonstrated a certain level of maturity and capability with respect to being able to consistently deliver on short, medium, and long term innovation and growth endeavors. This distinguishes your organization among its peers as being capable of delivering leading-edge value and customer experiences to its constituents.

CGInO accreditation is awarded at three distinct levels, corresponding to increasing levels of innovation maturity and capability. These three levels, from the least to the most capable, are:

1. Initial Level.
2. Advanced Level.
3. Excellence Level.

What Organizations Should Apply?

Any government organization that relies on the use of innovation to pursue strategic aims such as social impact, economic impact, and environmental impact will benefit and should apply:

1. City / County Government Organizations – those whose governance spans a city, county, or other similar limited geography.
2. State / Regional Government Organizations – those whose governance span an entire state or region.
3. National Governmental Organizations – those whose governance spans an entire country.
4. Para-government organizations – those that are otherwise affiliated with a government and thus structured and operate as a governmental entity or agency.
   

Benefits

Become a More Progressive, Forward–Thinking Organization

Your organization will become increasingly progressive and proactive as it pursues market leadership through innovation. By focusing on delivering next generation solutions and experiences that connect deeply with its markets, it will develop a sense of purpose in the organization and a strong engagement with the marketplace.

Ensure Your Organization’s Ongoing Relevance and Long-Term Resilience

Your organization will learn how to develop and drive the best mix of short, medium, and long-term innovations to ensure its ongoing relevance in the marketplace and its long-term resilience to the inevitable changes that will occur all around it. It will come to understand the importance of pursuing long-term growth in order to retain its position as a market leader.

Develop the Capability to Drive Innovation Strategically Throughout Your Organization

Your organization will learn how to pursue innovation strategically, and as such how to develop and implement an innovation strategy that supports its broader business strategy. It will also learn how to leverage both internal and external insights and capabilities to ensure it consistently delivers relevant and impactful value to its markets.

Show the World Your Commitment to Innovation and Progress

Your organization can wear its certification proudly as an emblem of its commitment to innovation and progress. It can likewise use its certification as an effective marketing tool to reinforce a message of relevance and leadership in its markets.

Obtaining

Working Through a GInI Authorized Training & Assessment Provider (ATAP)

To obtain a CGInO accreditation, your organization must contract and work through a GInI Authorized Training & Assessment Provider (ATAP)®. This ATAP will in turn secure two or more GInI Authorized Innovation Assessors (AInAs)® who will execute the CGInO review and on-site assessment process with your organization, and thereafter submit their final Government Innovation Maturity Assessment Report (GInMAR) to GInI. Following this, GInI will make a final determination of your organization's passing of this process, and if passing, the level of CGInO accreditation reported will be awarded. After this, GInI will notify your organization and its ATAP of this determination, and will provide your organization with a copy of the Assessors final report (the GInMAR).

The CGInO Innovation Maturity Assessment

The CGInO Innovation Maturity Assessment is conducted using GInI’s Government Innovation Maturity Assessment Tool (GInMAT) which was developed by GInI exclusively for this purpose. This tool assesses an organization’s level of innovation capability, maturity, and outcomes. The innovation maturity assessment consists of eight Group Sections. Each Group Section is further divided into Categories, with there being 29 Categories in all. The assessment seeks to answer four fundamental questions for each category, namely:

The first question is typically answered through a direct review of select collateral, including Strategy Reviews, Organizational Reviews, Program Reviews, and Targeted Operations Reviews. The latter three questions generally require Targeted Interviews of knowledgeable individuals in order to arrive at useful answers.

One of the key outputs of the CGInO Innovation Maturity Assessment is a series of Innovation Maturity Radar Plots. These portray graphically the relative strengths and weaknesses of each area of your program for each of the eight Groups, with the Outcomes being presented at a higher level of detail given their relative weight.

GInI’s Innovation Maturity Assessment Tool (InMAT) evaluates the following eight areas:

1. The starting element of Innovation Strategy –  which can be established using the GInI Innovation Strategy Cycle (InSC), the GInI Strategic Innovation Compass (SinC), and the GInI Strategic Innovation Roadmap (SInR). 
2. The six elements of the enterprise innovation architecture –  which can be established using the GInI Enterprise Innovation Architecture model. 
3. The Outcomes of the enterprise innovation program.   Together these make up everything evaluated by GInI's CGInO¬Æ Government Innovation Maturity Assessment Tool (GInMAT).

Scoring

The CGInO Assessment scores and ranks each of the 30 Categories in the GInI Innovation Maturity Assessment Tool (InMAT) on a scale of 0 – 10, and weights these according to specific GInI guidelines. The final overall score is therefore a weighted average of these 30 Categories and will thus also range between 0 and 10. This allows organizations to be recognized as a Certified Government Innovative Organization® at one of the three possible levels, as reflected in the following chart.

Maintaining

To maintain its CGInO accreditation, your organization must pass a full third-party reassessment every two years.

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