Most large organizations claim innovation as a core value, yet struggle to move beyond R&D labs and executive-led initiatives. Success depends on building systems where every person can contribute, no matter where they work or what they do.
But what is employee-driven innovation? At its core, it's the practice of empowering every team member to identify problems, propose solutions, and contribute to continuous improvement—regardless of their role or department.
This article examines how one global manufacturer transformed fragmented innovation efforts into a company-wide capability.
RHI Magnesita doesn't fit the typical tech company profile. As the global leader in refractory products, they operate in an industry most people have never heard of. Yet with nearly 2,000 active patents and recognition as one of Austria's top 25 most innovative companies in 2024, innovation is undeniably at the core of what they are doing.
The company's 20,000+ employees span multiple continents, creating a uniquely multicultural environment. Born from a merger between Austrian and Brazilian competitors, the Vienna headquarters echoes three languages: English, Austrian dialect, and Portuguese. R&D centers dot the globe from Leoben, Austria to facilities across different regions, each bringing local insights to the innovation process.
For Innovation Manager Chiara Fabrizzi, this diversity is both an asset and a complexity. "Our company is really lucky to have people who are super curious and enthusiastic about what they are doing," she observes. But translating that curiosity into sustained, inclusive innovation across such a distributed workforce? That required something more systematic.
The relationship between organizational culture and innovation was clear: RHI Magnesita had the curiosity and talent, but lacked the structures to channel it effectively. Creating an employee driven innovation culture in the workplace demands systematic infrastructure
Despite innovation being deeply valued in the company's DNA, the practice was uneven. While R&D teams generated patents and technical breakthroughs, innovation wasn't evenly distributed across the organization.
The central question facing RHI Magnesita was deceptively simple: How do you make every employee, from R&D scientists to factory floor operators, feel they can contribute meaningfully to innovation?
RHI Magnesita's answer was to build what would become a model for employee driven innovation culture examples: an innovation infrastructure with the innosabi platform rooted in three core principles: accessibility, transparency, and recognition
Rather than treating innovation as a separate initiative, the company explicitly connected it to core strategy and company values.
The company rolled out the innosabi idea management platform designed with radical inclusivity in mind. The platform became available across all departments and regions, breaking down the traditional barriers between "innovators" and "everyone else."
"I think that people that don't use it, especially at the beginning, the main obstacle is that they don't know the tool itself," Chiara explains. To counter this, RHI Magnesita created ready-to-use videos for each idea challenge launch, featuring real employees and giving participants visibility while motivating others to join.
Every step of the idea journey became visible.
Perhaps most critically, Chiara and her team made feedback non-negotiable. "What I always try to be careful about is when there is no feedback," she emphasizes. She actively pushes challenge owners to respond, even when overwhelmed. "I think that this is really crucial (...) to recognize, to take the moment to understand and recognize the contribution of other people."
Beyond process and platform, RHI Magnesita worked to cultivate what Chiara calls a "culture of curiosity, the foundation of any innovation driven culture. The goal was making innovation feel less like an obligation and more like a natural extension of how employees approach their daily work.
The transformation in how RHI Magnesita innovates is evident both in metrics and in daily behaviors.
Hundreds of ideas now flow through the innosabi platform from employees at every level. The geographic and departmental silos that once fragmented innovation efforts have given way to cross-pollination of ideas.
Employees describe themselves as "curious and enthusiastic," with innovation becoming part of routine work rather than an occasional special project.
Several ideas submitted through the platform have developed into fully implemented projects, delivering real business value. The visibility into what happens to ideas (which ones get adopted, how they evolve, where they create impact) reinforces the loop of contribution and recognition.
In 2025, RHI Magnesita's innovation culture earned the company's internal Global Award for Culture, validating years of deliberate cultural transformation work.
"You cannot motivate people that are not motivated themselves in the first place," Chiara admits. "But it's rather how to make them see the value of using this tool that is helping them."
The results suggest they've succeeded: employees now see the platform not as corporate bureaucracy but as infrastructure that amplifies their natural curiosity.
RHI Magnesita's journey offers several critical insights for companies building innovation cultures:
Innovation thrives when people are already motivated — our job is to make participation effortless.
For RHI Magnesita, building an innovation culture that engages every employee was about creating infrastructure, establishing feedback norms, and recognizing that thousands of curious minds, properly connected and supported, can transform how a global company solves problems and creates value.
The corridors buzzing with innovation conversations tell the real story: when employees at every level feel they can contribute meaningfully, innovation stops being something you do and becomes how you work.
