What Nobody Tells You About Leading an Innovation Team

On the way to the office in an external innovation hub in Barcelona

From the outside, working in an innovation team looks exciting. You are the ones doing the cool things, running the labs, exploring bold ideas. Everyone’s eyes are on you. But what almost nobody talks about is the inside story – the weight, the energy it takes, and how draining it can be to make the unknown known so that others can understand and believe in it.

In a big corporate setting, that reality hits hard. Comments like, “Your team doesn’t really do anything… we don’t see it live, we don’t see it scaled,” can cut deep. For years I thought: maybe it’s me. Maybe I need to be better at storytelling, at stakeholder management, at anticipating every obstacle before it comes. Maybe I need to work harder to protect the team, to keep them motivated while they keep hitting walls.

Because here’s the thing: when you challenge the status quo, people will not always like it. And as soon as your ideas threaten existing structures, the “no” comes quickly. I’ve lived through the heartbreak of a concept that could transform the company being blocked because an exploitation team felt it disrupted their rhythm.

Leading in innovation is not just about bold ideas, it is about constant convincing. You spend more time storytelling, navigating politics, and defending your team’s work than actually building breakthroughs. That has been one of my hardest lessons.

I am, by nature, someone who values harmony. I am not drawn to conflict. I often work quietly in the background, connecting people, smoothing paths, creating context so others can see the bigger picture. But innovation leadership stretched that part of me to its limit.

Over the past years – through my MBA, through building my own business, through investor rounds and negotiation tables – I’ve started to see the whole system more clearly. I studied how to build inclusive teams and how to create cultures where ideas can thrive. I learned how to read financials and strategy, not just from the lens of “what’s possible,” but “what’s sustainable.” And now, through my thesis work, I am interviewing experts from across industries. Again and again, I hear the same reflection I had:

Maybe I am not a good storyteller.

Maybe it’s just me.

But it’s not.

It is the system. It is the culture, the structures, the leadership alignment, or lack of it. And yet, even knowing that, it still takes courage every day to keep going.

So this post is for you, if you are in an innovation team or leading one. It may look glamorous from the outside, but inside, it can be exhausting, lonely, and at times heartbreaking. And still, you are not alone.

Through my thesis I am exploring what environments can actually enable intrapreneurs to succeed. In the coming weeks and months I will share what I am learning – the different angles, the patterns, and practical ways to see things differently, both from a coaching perspective and from my own lived experience.

For now, I just want to say: if innovation is your passion, hold onto that. You can find ways to make it happen. And please remember, bringing innovation forward is not just about the idea or the process. It is also, always, about the human side.

You've got this!

Sarah 🌊