Category Archives: Leadership

Why settle for average? Steal from the greats to be great

in Innovation, Leadership, Strategy
strategy as uniqueness

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nevenka/3061982219/

The challenge with copying uniqueness is that is takes a relentless commitment to excellence.

Whenever I’m asked about innovation, a list of names always comes up: Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook.

Why, I always ask, are these the ones that always come up?

Nothing wrong with bringing up those companies, but surely, there are others. This is an issue when discussing innovation, because there is a very narrow view about what innovation looks like. And, when this gap in definition exists, people naturally look around for examples of what it looks like. They can’t imagine anything else.…

To innovate start with inspiration, not need

in Innovation, Leadership

In the world of innovation, we routinely talk about addressing needs as a starting point to frame our thinking. That is what the vast majority of innovation approaches, and practitioners, consultants; preach. There is a huge industry that is booming at the moment because of this, and a dominant model is slowly taking over both the startup and corporate world: Lean Startup.

We can sum up The Lean Startup like this: identify a need that isn’t being addressed, think of a solution, validate that solution with potential customers, iterate to get close to a solution as fast as possible.

While I don’t disagree with addressing people’s needs, I do believe that is a limited view over the long run. It is simple logic, how long does it take for a framework to become a best practice? And, how long until we have undifferentiated products and services?

For this reason, in my workshops, I like to get people to redesign/rethink things for themselves. As I take them through a process of thinking critically about what’s around them, I tell them to “look beyond the problem and see possibilities”, and then create something for themselves.

Why?…

Innovation is not a short game. It’s the art of playing the long game

in Innovation, Leadership, Strategy

Will this move the needle? What is the ROI? When will we see a return on our investment? How fast can you prove this will work?

No, I wasn’t at a BIG company meeting when I heard these questions. I was at a Startup Weekend this past weekend, and the people asking these questions were participants. Not the judges. What?!

As one of the original founders of SW in Tijuana, I get a lot of feedback from participants about their experience at SW. From what they think sucks, to what they like, to what they think would add more value, I hear it all. Besides the questions above, one particular group of participants (composed of a lawyer and a couple of MBA types) noticed that most of the people who come to pitch are of the “let’s create this because it would be cool” variety, not the “let’s do this because we’re going to make a lot of money”.

You would not be surprised if big company executives were making these types of remarks, or asking these types of questions. In big companies, being able to prove that your idea will make a significant impact on the bottom line is a criteria your idea must have if you want to move your project through the gauntlet.…

Culture tells us what to do when the leader isn’t in the room

in Leadership, Strategy

How does a leader build a sustainable company cultureCulture tells us what to do when the leader isn’t in the room. We’ve all heard this before, and being able to achieve this is one of the daunting challenges of leadership.

It is not unusual to be in a strategy session and come up with all kinds of great quotes and soundbites, that are quickly forgotten when everyone leaves the room. The key is to be able reduce those great quotes into “concrete behaviors” that happen on a daily basis.

For me, the challenge is ongoing. And to face this challenge, I use a code: FLUSH.…

To innovate better to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission

in Innovation, Leadership, Strategy

Cultures of innovation are naturally dynamic. Employees think of new ideas and try them on the fly. Processes and procedures are fluid. There often is no one right answer to a problem, but rather experimentation drives many projects, efforts, assignments, and ultimately opportunities for improvement.

With that said, in my neck of the woods, businesses are the complete inverse.

Take a recent experience I had with the marketing manager of a telecommunications company based in Tijuana. With Startup Weekend Tijuana 4 coming this week, this marketing manager enthusiastically let me know that she signed up to participate. “Great!”, I said. But there was one minor problem: she didn’t want me to tell her boss about it.

Sucks!

According to her, the boss doesn’t want people to have their head occupied in anything other than what they’re supposed to be doing at work.

Sound familiar?…

5 Lessons Learned From 10 Years of Blogging

in entrepreneurship, Leadership

5 Lessons Learned From 10 Years of Blogging

I’m fast approaching the 10 year anniversary of Game-Changer in a few weeks. Yes, I’ve been writing here for 10 years! Time flies. I remember when I started blogging and had 16 different topical blogs at one point; insane. That was me finding my way around my interests and deciding what to focus on and learning how to blog with a how to create a blog article; otherwise I was everywhere and nowhere at the same time.

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What can business leaders do to ensure they are enabling and not blocking innovation?

in Innovation, Leadership, Question-To-Innovate

What can business leaders do to ensure they are enabling and not blocking innovation?

Paul Hobcraft recently reviewed a couple of innovation reports. One implies that executives say that innovation is important for growth, and the other says that executives nods their heads in agreement but don’t follow through.

I’m not surprised by this. Of course, it all comes back the the beloved ROI. And, innovation outcomes, like everything else, are hard to predict. This is a classic case of analysis paralysis, and by being in this state, these leaders are blocking innovation.

If they were to commit, what would “enabling innovation” look like?

In our current interconnected and transparent world, there are a few things that immediately signal that management is enabling innovation:…