Suppose that you had to pick three teams for three very different problems in a world-class tire plant: one about machines, one about people, and one that needs a leap of imagination. Would you pick by seniority, by department, or by who happens to be free? Continental Tyres (Thailand) chose a different way. Alongside a three-year X-IDEA engagement to build a culture of Creative Continuous Improvement at its plant in Rayong, TIPS made sure the people driving the change were cognitively aligned with the task, the team, and the transformation.

We began where lasting change begins: at the top. In November 2021, we TIPS-profiled the senior leadership team, the top two levels of plant management. The profiles revealed what you would expect from a world-class manufacturing plant: a cognitive landscape concentrated in the lower part of the TIPS Map, dominated by operational energies such as Systematizers, Organizers, and Experimenters. But it wasn’t a flatline. Sprinkled throughout were Conceptualizers, Ideators, and a few other catalysts with strong creative energy: a diverse talent base, not yet aligned, waiting to be activated.

When the managers took on three real innovation projects with significant bottom-line impact in 2022 and 2023, we didn’t assign them at random to a project. We used TIPS to compose each team, matching its core energy to the challenge while keeping enough diversity to avoid blind spots:

• Machine maintenance: a team stacked with T- and S-energy (Theorists, Technocrats, Systematizers, and Organizers), plus one of the most creative minds in the plant to spark fresh thinking, and a Conceptualizer to integrate the insights.
• Employee engagement in a 24/7 operation: a team built around Partners, Promoters, and Organizers, with a few Ideators to stretch beyond the usual HR playbook, plus the plant manager himself, a Systematizer.
• Removing a critical production bottleneck: first framed as a systems-engineering issue, it really needed a leap of imagination. So we centered the team on Ideators, Experimenters, and one sharp Conceptualizer, anchored by a couple of pragmatic Organizers.

In other words, each team got the energy its challenge demanded, plus a counterweight to keep it honest. The proof came from an unexpected corner. One project lead, a Theorist by profile, told us: “I don’t know how you picked this group, but I’ve never had such a positive experience working on a project team. The chemistry, the clarity, the way we built on each other—it was a joy to work this way.” We weren’t guessing. We were using TIPS.

When the plant leadership later decided to build its own in-house innovation team, TIPS came into play once more. After two cohorts of 30 managers and engineers each had gone through X-IDEA training, we TIPS-profiled and interviewed a shortlist of candidates in September 2024. We looked for strong Ideas energy to drive change, and for the People energy needed to lead sessions, inspire teams, and create psychological safety. Ultimately, twelve of them became certified in-house X-IDEA innovation facilitators in November 2024. Today, they keep Creative Continuous Improvement alive at the plant.

Are you about to staff an important project team, or to choose the people who will carry your innovation agenda forward? Contact us to find out how TIPS may help you see the cognitive terrain of your organization, compose teams that match each challenge, and select the champions who will keep your transformation alive.

Read the main story: how X-IDEA helped Continental Tyres Thailand build a self-sustaining in-house innovation team.