Category Archives: Innovation

Focus on the principles not the examples

“All men can see these tactics whereby I conquer, but what none can see is the strategy out of which victory is evolved.” – Sun Tzu

We all use examples to explain our ideas. Some people use examples from the same category, and a small percentage of us use examples that fall outside those categories. To explain these ideas, we conceptualize them into principles.

In the world of strategy, we have stratagems. For example, the golden rule of strategy principle: Do what others are unwilling to do.

And example of how this looks in practice: Map every walkable street on Earth (including those shared with animals).

Most companies wouldn’t think about doing it. But one company didn’t shy away from the challenge: Google.

What are the most important things you can do to speed and improve the creative process?

question to innovate

This the fourteenth of a series of weekly posts where I will answer a few common questions about innovation. Please feel free to add your own response. Also, if you have any questions you think we should discuss, let me know.

This is an interesting question. Here are a few thoughts on how you can speed and improve the creative process:

Maximun productivity at coworking space IOS Offices

coworking space in mexico IOS Offices

Fast Company recently published an article about the benefits of a coworking space. From experience, I have my office in mexican coworking space IOS Offices, I can tell you it is true. Especially the part of feeling more productive. Why that is? I have no data  to back it up, only how I feel while I’m there. When I was working at home, I do not feel the sense of accomplishing something, as our home isn’t really meant to be a place for work, but to relax playing . I ended performing less than I did when I tried a co-working space. Maybe it is because of the excitement of going to work and I have developed a plan to give myself a proper sleep. It was difficult adjustment, and I had to resort to Modafinil from to help me focus in the day for the first two weeks in the office.

And to share that feeling of productivity, I regularly invite other entrepreneurs to work at my office at anytime. Here, I interviewed Ivan Rodriguez of startup Instapart, to get his thoughts on his experience while working there (spanish):

You can’t copy real leadership

steve jobs innovative leadership

There is a reason innovative companies keep evolving: innovative leadership.

It has been proven time and time again, innovative leaders drive innovative companies.

Last week I gave a social media workshop to two Mexican companies. While this workshop was focused on the MarCom function, still at the beginning of the workshop I had them answer a few questions about their companies. One of them was: how do you want to be remembered?

Their responses were varied, and along with other words, they all had the word “innovative” in there. To which I asked: what specifically is your company doing to be innovative?

How not to iterate yourself to innovation

new delicious

I’m a big fan of Delicious. Have been using it since 2006. And was glad when former YouTube Co-Founders bought it from Yahoo a few years ago to keep it alive. Thinking how these guys have built the #2 most visited website in the world, you would think they wouldn’t have any problems with their next project. How to buy YouTube subscribers and views the right way? YouTube channel owners are often on the search for ways to gain more views and subscribers for their videos and one tactic is to pay for them. Increasing engagement and making YouTube videos visible is not an easy task. Some Youtubers may ask themselves how to make this easier. Luckily, paying for subscribers is a good decision today. Many tools offer different options.

It hasn’t been an easy ride. They’ve changed quite a bit since then, and just as they did with YouTube, they’ve followed the same startup logic: Try something, see what happens, if it works do some more and if it doesn’t, fix it.

Yesterday, Delicious updated their website. Once again. And here’s what happened, once again:

blu maya and the simpsons

VIDEO: The Process of Animation by Walt Disney Studios and The Simpsons

blu maya and the simpsons

Here is the video from the conference we held at our office two months ago.

Edwin Aguilar, Assistant Director at The Simpsons, and Jose Zelaya, Character Designer at Walt Disney Studios, talk about the Process of Animation to a large audience at IOS Offices Tijuana.