Every Business Manager asks itself the same key strategic question about how to approach innovation: what do I do?
Having gone through the experience of having to figure out an answer to that question Greg Satell, the author of the very popular blog Digital Tonto, wrote his new book Mapping Innovation: A Playbook for Navigating a Disruptive Age to help Managers do the same. …
How do you lead and manage for innovation?
Not all cultures where innovation thrives look the same, but they all have things in common. One of them is they all unleash their black sheep; the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers. …
Empathy, collaboration, creativity, leadership are future-proof skills everyone needs to have; which are in short supply. So, how do we embrace, develop and put these skills to work in a world where collaboration is an imperative?
We can begin by setting expectations about ourselves, clarifying our intentions and being accountable. How?…
New challenges require new approaches. All organizations have new challenges on the table all the time, but most are not equipped to come up with new approaches to conquer them because they can’t think and act differently.
This is a specialization challenge.
As a rule of thumb, your business needs more generalists than specialists if it wants to innovate. Don’t get me wrong, specialists are valuable. But Generalists are the innovators, the ones who are most capable of dealing with complexity; the ones that connect that dots.
Yesterday I joined Innochat to chat about T-Shaped people and culture for collaborative innovation (see transcript). I’ve written quite a lot about Generalists (here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here), so I won’t touch on here the well known factors about being a Generalist, hiring and managing.
Instead, I’ll touch on the challenges……
2016 is over. What a year. In terms of writing, this year was was my most varied and productive yet. As 2016 comes to a close, I want to share the 10 most popular posts from the year. These posts cover a range of topics, but the overall theme is hard to miss: being future-proof is more important as ever as we enter the Next Economy. Economies are undergoing the greatest shift since the industrial revolution, and it’s time for organizations to work together and chart a new course forward.
Enjoy!
2016 might have been the year AI finally came of age, and from here on out it will only get more interesting and more annoying because everyone will pitch it forth and center as a unique competitive advantage.
AI underpins all technologies, including AR and VR, genetics, and drones. The Next Economy is going to look very different as new technologies will enable new interactions and business models.
Innovation doesn’t happen in a straight line, the greatest enemy is corporate culture. In this post I lay out 10 common innovation challenges inside organizations and how to solve them.
Innovation isn’t a job, it’s a mindset. A better way to look at “innovation is everyone’s job” is: Not everyone is cut out to be an innovator, but everyone can point out things that can be done better.
Hiring 101 says that one should hire for culture-fit. The problem with this idea is it leads to complacency and closed mindedness; which blocks innovation. If you want innovators you have to hire for cultural contribution.
A culture of innovation is a culture of learning. In this post I lay out a few ways how you can become better at learning…
To manage for innovation is to manage for creativity. In this post I lay out 6 things that companies and managers can do to support and inspire creative work.
On this episode of the Big Bang podcast I chat with Geopolitical Futurist Abishur Prakash about his new book Next Geopolitics where he lays out how technology is changing geopolitics.
What are the most important leadership skills? According to a study, the ability to inspire and motivate others is most important at all levels. Yet, most leaders don’t understand how to inspire…
Education is ripe for reinvention. With the rise of AI, many jobs will eventually be automated. That means we need to sharpen and further develop the skills at which AI is not good at: empathy, creativity and collaboration.
Best forecasters (& innovators) have ability to keep changing their minds. “Experts” are overrated.
I’m writing this post for my friend Julio, who I hope takes the leadership challenge head on…
Innovative leaders are cut from a different cloth from traditional ones. It’s why you just can’t assume that giving leaders a set of tools to help their organization innovate will work; it goes deeper than that.
All businesses at some point become addicted to stability, and the people leading the organization become “maintainers of the status quo”; don’t break it or you’ll get fired.
It’s all about avoiding difficult times and enjoying stability.
On the other hand, innovative leaders who push their organization to achieve breakthrough performance know that tough times are inevitable, they just come with the territory. …
Established organizations want to better their operations, find a new way to go to market, increase customer loyalty or any other positive outcome that betters the business; with a predictable strategy.
But better and different outcomes are not achieved in a straight line; chaos is the norm. …
