Don’t Pretend You’re a Startup When You’re Not
Steve Blank once famously said: "We now know something we didn’t know before: startups are not smaller versions of large companies.” He goes on to expound on the difference between searching for a repeatable and scalable business model (a core startup activity) and executing a known business model (a core big company activity). This distinction is…
The Incumbent’s Dilemma: How Large Organizations Are Being Disrupted by Their Own Assumptions
When it comes to developing successful products and making smarter business bets, the truth is an evolving concept. What is true about market conditions, consumer behavior and your product/market fit can change over time. Businesses built on assumptions will be disrupted by these forces, so you may need to disrupt your assumptions. The lifecycle…
One Human at a Time - 10 Lessons Learnt From Changing Organizations
“Each one of us is responsible to all others for everything”. Dostoevsky’s message, carved into a wall at the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Geneva, reminds us that everything is connected. That no individual can abdicate their conscience or find excuses in the collective. Each and everyone’s actions have consequences. It is…
Strategy of Innovation vs. Innovation Strategy
Whether the companies are private or public, shareholders are demanding a vision for the future. How will these old, inflexible companies survive in industries facing disruption from scrappy, nimble, three person startups with zero budget that are miraculously gaining market share? Blockbuster CEO Jim Keyes, speaking to the Motley Fool in 2008…
Innovation: More Than Just Ideation. Where to Play? How to Win? How to Execute?
Digitization, new business models and disruptive technologies are driving complexity in every single industry. For businesses today, effective strategy and innovation management is critical for driving digital transformation, and that requires robust approaches and tools that enable collaboration and agility. Yet the word ‘ideation’ has been…
Five Reasons Why Los Angeles Became The Most Innovative City in the US
I recently came across a mainstream media article entitled: billions pour into LA as it gears up to be the next Silicon Valley. It’s true, billions are pouring into the city and there is a vast amount of innovation, however I don’t agree with the second part of the statement: Los Angeles isn’t the ‘next Silicon Valley’ it’s very different and…
Four Common Corporate-Startup Screw Ups - And How To Avoid Them
Corporate and startup partnerships are more prevalent and more necessary than ever before. While the unique symbiosis of the corporate/start-up relationship can be exciting and incredibly fruitful for both parties, the huge variants in culture, capital, and resources can throw some turbulence into things. Add screw-ups by either party into the mix…
The Greenhouse Approach: Flourishing Organizations Through Intrapreneurship
Innovation is infectious. Its roots lie in debate and contention and it flourishes in an environment that welcomes the challenging of assumptions, risk taking, and creativity. That’s the focus of Chitra Anand’s new book, The Greenhouse Approach: Cultivating Intrapreneurship in Companies and Organizations, which re-imagines what corporations can…
Is Creativity Really That Important For Innovation?
Creativity is probably the most discussed component of innovation. People and teams want to have more of it. Leaders want to discover how to direct and amplify it. Researchers try to define and measure it. Innovation companies sell their ability to develop it, thereby boosting the quantity and quality of ideas in an organization. That’s why, when…
Innovation Accounting - The Anti-Procrustean Approach To Key Performance Indicators
In Greek mythology, Procrustes (in translation ‘he who stretches’) was a rouge blacksmith and bandit from Attica, owning a house by the side of the road where he offered hospitality to passing strangers. His guests were invited in for a pleasant meal and a night’s rest in his very special bed — a bed that allegedly had the unique property that its…
Necessary Disruption: The Path to Adaptive Spaces
In order to survive in the increasingly frenetic, rapidly evolving world of business, organizations must disrupt or be disrupted- even when that means disrupting your own business. That can’t happen without a paradigm shift in the way companies approach innovation and change. Corporations must recognize that organizational adaptation is social.…
The Six Values of High-Performance Innovators
There is no long-term correlation between the amount of money a company spends on its innovation efforts and its overall financial performance. That is the outcome of an analysis by Barry Jaruzelski, Robert Chwalik, and Brad Goehle for Strategy+Business. During an evaluation of 1,000 publicly held companies (the Global Innovation 1000) with the…
