I unfortunately had to spend most of the month in Washington, DC suffering through the hottest June on record. Washington has had 18 days over 90 degrees this month with lots of humidity to boot, resulting in heat indices well over 100 degrees. And the few days of the month I was in New York, it wasn’t much better.

While the global warming theory appears to have lost some of its steam of late, if June 2010 in DC is any indication, then the planet is in for a heap of trouble. Where’s Al Gore when you need him? (Answer: He’s preoccupied with his divorce and other tabloid rumors.)

Maybe there’s a silver lining with all this heat.

As long as it’s this hot, many of us will choose to stay indoors – in the cool of our office buildings — and not on the golf course, the tennis court, or at the baseball game. And as long as we’re in our offices, we might as well spend part of that time thinking about how our respective businesses can be more productive and innovative during the second half of the year.

So use this time wisely. Pull together your management team, challenge them to take a fresh look at the next six months, and come up with a game plan that could move the dial in each business and function across your organization.

Better yet, treat your team to an inspiring offsite meeting or innovation workshop, in a nice air-conditioned space, where thought-provoking speakers and thought-enhancing surroundings might spur more creative thinking.

That sounds like a pretty cool idea to me.

DuPont announced yesterday the winners of its 22nd DuPont Awards for Packaging and Innovation. Granted, the DuPont Awards do not yet have quite the cachet of the Academy Awards or the Pulitzer Prize, but they do represent the pinnacle of extraordinary achievement in “packaging materials, technology and service innovations.”

This year, Alcoa Inc. and Exal Corporation took home one of the top “Diamond Winner” awards for their new aluminum bottle, which offers a lighter, stronger, cheaper, 100 percent recyclable container, referred to as the “”Coil-to-Can” or “C2C” bottle. The new, high-tech bottle uses Alcoa’s bottlestock sheet and Exal’s C2C manufacturing technology.

Exal launched the C2C aluminum bottle in 2008, which is now used by companies like Coca-Cola, ESKA Still and Sparking Water of Canada, and Anheuser-Busch.

Ok, so what’s the big deal you might be asking? A lot in my book. The DuPont Awards illustrate a point that I have made on a number of occasions in earlier blogs on this website. Innovation is not only about the iPad, or the latest flat-screen technology, or a Mars rover. It’s potentially about everything your company is doing.

Innovation can and should occur across every nook and cranny of your business — from better and more advanced products, to enhancements in services for customers and clients, to improvements in internal processes, and to the very packages that contain your company’s products.

In short, if your company’s executives and managers are not actively pursuing innovations in all these areas – and strongly incenting your employees to do so – you may not only be missing out on possible revenue and market share, you may end up missing the boat altogether.

So this coming weekend, when you find yourself sipping your favorite beverage from one of those newfangled, super-cold aluminum cans, think about how your company can be more creative across the board.

I can assure you that a new can-do approach to innovation will put your company on a path to bringing home your own awards.

The Ladew Topiary Gardens of Monkton, Maryland boast the title of “the most outstanding topiary garden in America” as named by the Garden Club of America. I now see why. This past Saturday, I toured the Ladew Gardens as part of its second annual garden festival, and came away a very big fan.

Any fine collection of art starts with a passionate collector and a talented artist. Harvey S. Ladew (1887-1976) was both. He loved flowers and topiaries, and he put his love to work in the 22 acres of gardens he created from a 250-acre farm he bought in Maryland in 1929. Ladew discovered the art of topiaries (trimming and training shrubs or trees into unnatural ornamental shapes) during his many travels to Europe with his parents, and later as a young adult and Army officer during World War I.

A self-taught gardener, Ladew created two long cross axes on his Maryland property, which provide for spectacular vistas in each direction. Off of the axes are 15 garden “rooms,” each devoted to a single color, plant, or theme. Ladew is considered “one of the first Americans to create garden rooms on this side of the Atlantic,” according to the garden’s brochure. Many of the garden rooms feature elaborate topiaries of animals in sculpted settings.

One of the most impressive areas of Ladew Gardens is the “Great Bowl.” Several dozen swan topiaries swim atop a sea of large, billowy yew shrubs that border a two-acre circular lawn, which gently slopes toward a round pool in the center.

Harvey Ladew was influenced by the work of landscape and topiary artists from England and Italy. How many botantical artists and gardeners have been influenced by Harvey Ladew over the last 70-80 years? Hundreds I am sure, who in turn have most likely influenced thousands more.

The ingredients for creativity and innovation are fairly simple, yet get surprisingly little attention from corporate executives and managers. Provide your employees with the opportunity to nurture their passion and talents, expose them to other successful creators and innovators, and serve up a culture that welcomes and incents creativity and risk-taking.

Spend time and energy on these fundamental elements for innovation, and you’ll soon find your company will be on its way to some supernatural performance.

Last week, Washington Post’s Steven Pearlstein profiled career analyst and author Daniel Pink and his new book: “Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us.”

In the book, Pink makes the case that money can only motivate employees up to a point. In fact, he cites studies and real-life examples that support the notion that incentive bonuses actually result in less creative and innovative thinking.

Granted, Pink notes that good performance starts with employees who feel like they are fairly compensated. Beyond that, he contends that employees will in fact use higher levels of initiative, problem-solving, and creativity in response to traditional, non-monetary competitive forces.

In a speech at a TED conference at Oxford, England last summer, Pink previewed some of his thinking that went into “Drive.” He cited a 2005 study by MIT conducted for the Federal Reserve that found that “as long as the task involved mechanical skill, bonuses worked as would be expected: the higher the pay, the better the performance.” However, “once the task called for an even rudimentary cognitive skill, a larger reward led to poorer performance.”

Pink also wrote “A Whole New Mind” in 2006, which makes the case for more right-brain thinking (e.g., inventiveness and creativity), noting “the workplace terrain is changing yet again, and power will inevitably shift to people who possess strong right-brain qualities.” This is an interesting proposition (and a correct one in my opinion) considering it is coming from a trained left-brain-thinking lawyer.

Given today’s level of global competition and the fragile economy, companies would be well-advised to look differently at how they try to motivate employees. Based on my own experience in managing executive compensation programs at large multinational companies, companies are far too quick to assume that traditional carrots like higher bonuses and larger stock grants will result in higher levels of performance.

These compensation tools are important for retaining your most promising employees. Yet, when used alone, they may in fact be stunting – not inducing – higher levels of innovation, risk-taking, and problem-solving.

Companies that seek to promote a motivating corporate culture, a competitive work environment, and ample levels of recognition for excellence will ultimately be in the best position to elicit the innovation “drive” needed from employees to beat the competition.

I don’t know why, but I have found myself more interested in this year’s Winter Olympic Games than in previous years.

Maybe it’s the proximity of Canada to the U.S. and the friendly sports rivalry between the two countries. Maybe it’s the beauty of Vancouver and the surrounding area, which I visited in 2007. Or, maybe it’s the fact that I still have nearly two feet of snow in my yard from the recent blizzard in DC that has put me in the Olympic spirit.

Whatever the reason, I’ve enjoyed the diversion from the bad economy, the political discord in Washington, Tiger Woods, and the late night talk show melodrama.

I admit, I feel a bit nostalgic when I watch the Olympic Games. It harkens back to a time in my youth when I dreamed of being a famous downhill skier. There’s something about watching the world’s best athletes compete their hearts out, not for a paycheck or a corporate sponsorship, but for the sole purpose of winning — and standing on a podium to proudly represent his or her country.

It boggles the mind to think about the thousands of hours and years of practice that many athletes invest to become the best at what they do. And more boggling is that all that work may come down to a mere 60 to 120-second performance.

What drives a person to work that hard for a reward only of recognition?

The Olympics are unique in this regard. A company or organization could never, ever replicate this level of drive and dedication from its employees. Employment is work. It is a compulsory activity whose purpose is to make a living, provide for one’s family, and ideally save towards retirement.

With that said, there’s a lot that a company could learn from the Olympic ideal. Creating a healthy, competitive environment is a good thing. Rewarding those employees who excel and distinguish themselves is a worthy exercise and will drive increased performance across the ranks.

A corporate culture that celebrates achievement, both of individuals and of teams, is one that will lead to long-term success. It also creates an environment where employees are more likely to enjoy their work, and not dread coming to it.

Seek to ignite a fire within your employees. Light a cauldron that can serve to fuel creativity and innovation. I bet you’ll like the results and the golden opportunity it will provide your company to best your competitors.

It’s not everyone who can say they accomplished what relatively so few others have done, beat the long odds and the obstacles, faced adversity head-on, and finally reached the pinnacle of achievement where you can plant a flag and mark it as your own.

As the photo shows above, this past weekend I did reach a once seemingly unobtainable peak …or so it would seem.

What may appear as a desolate and snowy peak just before sunset, is in fact a photo of my neighbor’s roof taken yesterday in late afternoon after a near-record 24-inch snowfall in the Washington, DC area.

Images and words can sometimes create a powerful illusion. They can lead one to take action – or result in inaction – in light of a perceived set of facts. Such a phenomenon is not limited to an individual, but can also beset an entire company or organization.

Companies, which possibly once enjoyed a leadership position or a genuine high level of performance, many times find themselves operating in a culture of perceived accomplishment. The management may convince itself that yesterday’s achievements are still in play, or it may insist that it is further down the field than reality would allow.

Worse yet, management may believe that the company’s employees are fully motivated, productive, and eager to take the next hill.

Things aren’t always as they appear. A false sense of achievement can erode the foundation of an organization, and can eventually bring it down. An honest and candid assessment is a good start, but should be followed by high-value leadership development, employee training, and a creative incentive program that can help put your company at the top if its game.

Let New Lantern help your company truly reach its peak performance.