in Innovation, Success
What are the personal characteristics of successful innovators?
Anyone can change his or her behavior to improve creative impact in a company, according to some new research by Jeffrey Dyer, Hal Gregersen which included a six-year study surveying 3,000 creative executives and conducting an additional 500 individual interviews they found five ‘discovery skills’ that distinguish them:…
The world is littered with thousands of products and services that are considered innovative but don’t mean much to people who actually use them, why is this? The reason is because most products and services are designed to extract profits from consumers first as opposed to ‘wowing’ them first and then seeking the profits second.
In the first must read innovation story of the week Umair Haque makes his case that we need to innovate innovation and provides some guidelines on how we can do it.
Listen up: A corporation’s goal should be to create more value, not more profit. It should strive to be relevant tomorrow and not just today. It should inspire whom it serves as well as the people who serve. It should breed competition to make things even better, not take it out.
Umair says that innovation needs to be innovated, couldn’t agree more! What is awesomeness? Awesomeness happens when thick — real, meaningful — value is created by people who love what they do, added to insanely great stuff, and multiplied by communities who are delighted and inspired because they are authentically better off. That’s a better kind of innovation, built for 21st century economics.
Key Takeaway: Create more value than you capture.
Here’s a very cool campaign by the Panamericana School of Art and Design, the objective is to draw as many things as possible that originate from X’s or O’s. How far does your creativity go? Checkout the pictures!
If you ask 5 people to define leadership you’ll probably get 5 different answers. There’s are enough leadership books to teach all there is to know about leadership, yet there isn’t one singular answer to what leadership really is.
In an effort to answer this question Norm Smallwood, Dave Ulrich and Kate Sweetman synthesized all the ideas of leadership into 5 rules they call the ‘leadership code’. These 5 rules account for 70% of the fundamentals of leadership, making it a good starting for leadership development.
Rule 1: Shape the future.
Rule 2: Make things happen.
Rule 3: Engage today’s talent.
Rule 4: Build the next generation.
Rule 5: Invest in yourself.
Looking to differentiate their products, HP has tapped the fashion world for technical ideas for their new line of netbooks. What HP acknowledges is that looking for growth opportunities in the same place is unlike yield anything new. They went out and looked elsewhere for new ideas on how to differentiate their products.
Key takeaway: Get out of your box. Understand than looking in the same place for ideas will always result in the same old ideas. Look elsewhere:
If you want your firm to innovate you must first change the way it’s organized. Most firms today can’t innovate because they’re structured in a way that favors predictability, not creativity.
Jeffrey Philips writes: Many firms can’t innovate because their structures, processes and compensation models are rigidly organized for the work world of the 1950s and 1960s and haven’t shifted the organizational structures, processes and compensation models to reflect what’s necessary today.
So what’s necessary today? There isn’t a real clear answer, but doing less of what worked before is a good start.
Predicting the future is one of those things that people think they can do, the problem is they obsess about it so much that the future ends up taking them by surprise.
The best we can do is to anticipate what could happen. Jamais Cascio helps companies and governments anticipate the future so they can make the right decisions and he presents a few guidelines we can follow to be prepared and many possible outcomes.
While anticipating is great, creating the future is what innovators do. The key is to mix both and imagine what you would like to see in the world.
Key takeaway: The future is for us to make, we must imagine what we can make happen and write our own future.
From one of my favorite blogs on innovation, Innovation in practice, Innovation consultant Drew Boyd shares a simple template to create your company’s innovation strategy.
List of some prominent innovation people on Twitter, automatically follow them all with one click!
in Innovation
Trend Hunter founder Jeremy Gutsche released his new innovation book Exploiting Chaos to the masses and just recently shared with Businessweek 24 ideas on how to exploit chaos from the book which I’ve added in this post:
In February 1930, as unemployment spiked in the early months of the Great Depression, Henry Luce launched Fortune magazine with the then steep cover price of $1. Eight years later, the magazine boasted 460,000 subscribers.
Lesson: Innovation is not about market timing. It is about creating something that fills an unmet need.
In the 1950s, RCA was a leading maker of vacuum tubes, the electronic device critical to the development of radio, television, and, ultimately, computers. But as transistors and, later, semiconductors were being developed, the company didn’t adapt, losing its dominant position in what would become the computer chip industry.
Lesson: Your focus should not be on protecting what you have but rather on adapting to the next big thing.
After the Internet bubble popped in the early 2000s, Apple CEO Steve Jobs was criticized for not trimming his research and development budget. But that investment led to the 2003 launch of iTunes, and Apple now sells more music than Wal-Mart.
Lesson: An undying focus on the future can lead to invention.
“Culture eats strategy for lunch,” notes Gutsche. He cites a study of monkeys that shows how strongly behaviors are imprinted on new arrivals—whether newborn or adult. In other words, a company can’t change strategy or adapt without changing its culture, which is embedded in the language employees use, their expectations, and their general sense of “how things are done.”
Lesson: The “old way of doing things” and fixed expectations are the enemies of adaptation.
“On the eighth day, God created Smith Corona.” So reads the Web site of the company that introduced so many innovations in its first 100 years—the first portable typewriter, first electric typewriter, first electric dictionary, first laptop word processor—that it took itself for granted, unable to envision a world without typewriters.
Lesson: Accomplishment blinds us to the urgency of reinvention.
Remington Rand, a Smith Corona competitor, did move into the computing business in 1950, and by 1975 the company had declared bankruptcy. Smith Corona executives that had been pushing the company to expand into computers were haunted by Remington’s fate, failing to realize that those Remington execs might have been right on strategy and wrong on execution.
Lesson: Don’t let the failure of others reinforce inaction.
In the 1970s, Royal Dutch Shell developed two future strategies, one based on stable oil prices and the other based on a spike. When oil prices rocketed in 1973, Shell was ready.
Lesson: By developing multiple scenarios, you can avoid the certainty of being incorrect and instead prepare for disruptive change.
In 2001, the Recording Industry Association of America sued Napster and, says Gutsche, “anyone with a cutting-edge approach to music distribution.” The music industry’s focus on protecting CD sales prevented it from imagining a legal system for online distribution. Yet it still didn’t solve the problem: The demise of Napster only inspired more illegal file-sharing companies.
Lesson: You will only answer the problems you are trying to solve.
John Grisham was rejected by a dozen publishers before getting a deal. As a startup, Cisco was rejected by 76 venture capitalists before landing money. Thomas Edison, in his words, “discovered 1,000 ways not to make a light bulb” before hitting on a design that worked.
Lesson: Successful ideas first require excessive testing and experimental failure.
In the late 1990s the BBC had no hit shows and was losing viewers. A new chief executive and chief financial officer introduced one small change to the broadcaster’s innovation process: They created a gambling fund to bet on risky ideas. Read on to get key tips for playing online slots for real money, you can discover the website Volpebonus lists online casinos and casino bonuses in Italy to make money. The first big winner: Ricky Gervais’ series, The Office, which had failed the normal screening process, and if you’re really into gambling, there are sites such as sbobet online where you can also get some great gambling options.
Lesson: A simple gambling fund can be one of the most effective ways to earn money while playing at an online slots casino.
IBM founder Thomas Watson Sr. refused the resignation of a manager who had just lost the company $10 million, saying, “You can’t be serious. We just spent $10 million educating you.” Former Warner Bros. Chairman Steven Ross went even further, firing people for not making mistakes.
Lesson: Fire people for not failing.
General Motors was surprised when the Escalade, an SUV targeted at older, affluent males, became an icon for hip hop culture. To learn about his new customers, Cadillac’s head of external design went to a gritty corner in Detroit, waited for an Escalade to roll by, and asked the driver if he could join him.
Lesson: Customer obsession can be the fastest ways to gain perspective.
A senior leader can unintentionally squelch the creativity of a group. Instead, he or she should throw out a wild, impractical idea at the start of a brainstorming session. That will help others in the group to think more freely (and to feel free to express themselves).
Lesson: The role of a leader is not to suggest great ideas, but to create an atmosphere that fosters the ideas of others.
As Tom Peters says, “freaks are the only—only—ones who make it into the history books.”
Lesson: Nontraditional thinkers offer the maverick ideas and the personality a company needs to adapt.
Rigid, centralized structures can squelch creativity. Organizations in which employees or members share a common mission and the freedom to pursue it are better incubators of new ideas and will grow and adapt more quickly. Two examples: 3M and Alcoholics Anonymous.
Lesson: To navigate chaos, organizations require the speed and capabilities that can only exist when employees are empowered.
When Goldcorp, a small mining company, published the data for a site its geologists thought was barren, it received 110 new strategies for finding gold. The ideas came from chemists, mathematicians, military officers, and others, and the new methodologies helped the company find 8 million ounces of gold.
Lesson: The problems you are addressing have likely been tackled in parallel industries. Open the door to new methodologies.
Ask Brett Wilson, the CEO of FirstEnergy Capital, how his startup became No. 1 in the energy-trading industry, and he’ll tell you it’s because his office has no walls. He believes that formal offices and fancy chairs are a detriment to teamwork.
Lesson: Remove the walls that separate people and ideas.
The Benton Foundation didn’t let Microsoft digitize its Encyclopedia Britannica for fear of cannibalizing book sales, creating the opportunity for Microsoft Encarta. Years later, Microsoft was slow to move to the Web for fear of cannibalizing Encarta CD sales, which in turn created the opportunity for Wikipedia. If either the Benton Foundation or Microsoft had been willing to sacrifice the sales of their existing product in order to forge a new marketplace, they might still be the most-sourced encyclopedia today.
Lesson: Destroy value. It may seem impossible, but resistance will cause your organization to be displaced.
Whether it’s a rough foam core model of a product or a video representing a service, prototypes allow you to interact with a developing idea and uncover problems that could hinder its success.
Lesson: The act of creating a physical prototype allows you to visualize the concept and obtain useful feedback.
When Michael Eisner took over a money-losing Disney, he imposed strict project budgets, insisting that employees fit their creative ideas inside the financial box. When the opening scene of the movie Outrageous Fortune required an additional set, for instance, the writers were forced to rewrite—and came up with a cheaper and more effective opener. Eisner’s philosophy helped Disney grow from a $2 billion market cap to more than $60 billion.
Lesson: Be creative within the box.
Scanning the collapsing economy in 2009, Virgin Atlantic founder Sir Richard Branson saw opportunity: The price of planes was sure to come down, making it a good time to expand into Brazil and Russia.
Lesson: Uncertainty makes innovation less expensive.
In 2007 violinist Joshua Bell, who earns some $1,000 a minute when he’s on-stage at a high-end performance space such as Carnegie Hall, played Bach in the DC Metro during rush hour. Just seven people stopped to listen, and he earned $35. Bell is one of the world’s best violinists, but when he wasn’t packaged right, he didn’t sell well.
Lesson: The medium can ruin your message.
Of the 15 major airlines flying in 1982, only one is profitable today: Southwest Airlines. That success is largely attributable to its founder’s relentless focus on being “the low-fare airline.” The mantra guides every employee’s actions and decisions, helping Southwest consistently deliver on its brand promise.
Lesson: A powerful mantra helps a company stay focused during times of dramatic change.
From product names to brand promises, strive to be simple, direct, and “supercharged.” The “I’ve got to tell someone” factor leads things to go viral. The Las Vegas restaurant Fleur de Lys missed an opportunity when they named their super deluxe hamburger the Fleurburger. A more simple, direct, and supercharged name: The $5,000 Hamburger.
Lesson: In traditional marketing, there is an emphasis on cliché, clever wording, and invented words. Instead, adopt a message that is simple and direct.
in Creativity, Innovation
How did Apple come up with the idea of the iPod and later iPhone? How did Google come up with a way make money from their search engine?
While there are enough books that can tell you the story of how it happened, they won’t tell you what happened inside the minds of the people or individual who came up with the idea.
While I was pondering this question I also posted it on Yahoo Answers to gauge people’s opinion, here’s the best answer I got:
New business concepts come from people. Those who have the ambition and where with all to discuss open topic issues with others, those who are willing to step outside the box of comfort and ask questions, research and try to think as if they are in the other persons shoes. Putting yourself “out there” and being focused at the same time while trying to figure out how your idea can benefit from your thoughts.
So where do new business concepts come from?
The profound insight doesn’t come out of any strategic planning process nor does it come from some brainstorming session, it comes from a mix of individual desire, curiosity, ambition and need. But there also needs to be some foresight, a sense of where things might go.
Key Takeaway:
New business concepts come out of a mix of unexpected problems, novel experiences, random conversations and newly discovered facts. The fact is there is no predictable and mechanical process for creating a bold new business concept.
Where do you think new business concepts come from?
How often do you either read or have an insightful conversation that makes you think and question your assumptions about the future? No often I’ll assume.
Why is this?
Because more people have a chance to express their ideas to the world but most of it is worthless blabber!
Don’t get me wrong, the fact millions of people can communicate their ideas through a blog, Twitter, Facebook and such is great for society. The problem is that there is a lot of repetition and old ideas get amplified.
The only thing different is the name of the person who said it and how the message was packaged.
Repeating the same stuff is easy because there’s no real thinking involved and blending in easier that standing out.
The fact is most people stand for nothing more than more of the same!
The quest of any innovator is to stand out from the crowd and the way to do that is to have your own point of view of the future. A unique of view of how things could be better or different (we definitely know the future is going to be different) is like a light in the fog, it points the way to a clear view.
Any individual who has a well developed point of view about an opportunity is like a beacon pointing to the sky that attracts people to his ideas.
To start building our point of view we can start by asking ourselves some questions about what might the future hold:
Innovation is what distinguishes between a leader and a follower. If you can’t create a sense of future, no one can follow you.
Your business will fundamentally look different tomorrow than it does today. Don’t believe me? Look at the newspapers business, the digital music business, the airline business, the auto sales business, we can go on and on.
Your only option for survival is to innovate, to recreate yourself and your business.
The Hazing film But before you innovate you have to accept that what made you successful in the past, will not make you successful in the future.
You have to stop fighting the last war. Consciously wage war against the past and force yourself to react to the present moment.
Never take it for granted that your last successes will continue into the the future. Actually, your past successes are your biggest obstacle: every battle, every war, is different, and you cannot assume that what worked before will work today. You must cut yourself lose from the past and open your eyes to the present.
in Creativity, Innovation, Thinking
I just finished reading The Genius Machine by Gary Sindell. This is the shortest, most simple, useful book on creative thinking that I’ve ever read!
As Gary puts it, his work is to help people think.
This is not a book with yet another creative thinking technique to add to your arsenal, you can get those elsewhere. What this book gives you is an 11 step process to help you think through your ideas and turn them into reality.
A process he calls the Endleofon.
According to Gary, in order to develop our innovations to their highest possible level and to facilitate their acceptance by the people who would benefit most from our creations we need to answer The Endleofon questions which I share with you here.
1. Distinctions.
What do I see? New ideas are the result of perceiving new distinctions.
2. Identity
Who am I? Why are these ideas important to me, and why am I driven to share them with the world? Have I made my identity clear to my audience so they know where I am coming from?
3. Implications
Reverb move When the Wind Blows dvdrip
Where do my ideas lead? If what I am saying is true, then what are all the consequences I can imagine?
4. Testing
What am I blind to? Have I imagined how my ideas might impact a variety of situations, places and people? Have I questioned everything about my assumptions? What would prove me wrong? Can I create a model of my work and find precise analogues?
5. Precedent
Who else has seen something like this? By asserting that I have something to say, I am entering into the great conversation of ideas that stretches back through the centuries. We cannot know everything that has been said about our area of focus before we began our work, but we must try to be aware of important, precedent thought.
6. Need
Who needs this knowledge? If what I am saying is so, for whom would this knowledge be valuable? This question forces us out of focusing solely on our own area and may lead us to find the universals in our thinking. Understanding who needs us most will also help us in crafting what we say.
7. Foundation
Are there underlying principles? What is the world I’m working in? What are the underlying values expressed here? What are the applicable rules or structures that obtain here? Can I pull these together into a coherent group or body of law?
8. Completion
Is everything here? If the idea or product is valuable for someone, am I giving my audience everything they need for it to be useful? If everything they need is not here, have I explained what other information they will need in order to know enough to take action or teach others?
9. Connecting
Who am I addressing? Do I understand my audience’s frame of reference? Am I writing for my readers, speaking to my listener, carefully guiding the experience of my user?
10. Impact
Thunderbolt and Lightfoot hd Where do I want to go? In creating this work I have launched an alter ego that will eventually take on a life of its own. If this development or body of knowledge succeeds in the marketplace of ideas, will it help me fulfill my goals for my life? Are the identities of creators, the creation and the users aligned?
11. Advocacy
Am I supporting the adoption of my ideas? My thinking stands for me. Now I must stand for what I have created.
Help yourself in developing your breakthrough thinking by reading this book, it’s easy to read and simple to put to use.
You can follow Gary at his blog where he continues the exploration of the Endleofon innovation process.
UPDATE: Listen to this Businessweek podcast with an interview with Gary talking about his book.
