An innovation strategy aims to provide guidance in terms of direction and prioritisation regarding innovation efforts. This study explores formulation and implementation of innovation strategy in the context of a case study of an organisation that explicitly deploys the guidance standard for innovation management systems ISO56002. Interviews were conducted and were analysed together with an abundance of company documentation, spanning seven years. The empirical results convey how intertwined the work on innovation strategy was with the formulation and implementation of the company’s innovation management system (based on ISO56002). The study addressed the call for more research on strategy implementation and showed the innovation strategy (part of the ISO 56002 Leadership element) influencing the other system elements within the innovation management system. Further, it is important to use a system of systems approach to integrate an Innovation Management System with other management systems. This may be achieved through ambidextrous leadership competences given that the management systems have with different purposes, properties and actions. Finally, as an innovation management system develops, it is important to adapt rather than over-optimise in order to for retain flexibility required to innovate.