If we try to avoid short-term risk, we actually increase the long-term risk of catastrophic failure for our organisations. If risk-aversion keeps us from innovating, we’re thinking about risk all wrong.
“The Googles, Amazons, Apples, Netflixes, and Capital Ones … don’t insist on performing lots of interesting experiments because they’re rich; they’re rich because they insist on performing lots of interesting experiments.”
“Official culture still strives to force the new media to do the work of the old media. But the horseless carriage did not do the work of the horse; it abolished the horse and did what the horse could never do.” Thoughts on this and other provocations from Marshall McLuhan.
We often think that great new ideas get adopted rapidly. Unfortunately, this is untrue. In order to innovate effectively, we must understand the role that time plays in innovation.
Can we predict which disruptive innovations will win? No. What should we do then? Here are some ideas from Nassim Taleb, Vinod Khosla, Marc Andreessen and Tren Griffin that give us some guidance.
The business environment is changing – adapt or perish, some say. But there’s a third choice – invent the future ourselves. Here are three skills that we need to help us do this.
If we want to be more innovative, learning how to ask better questions is a key skill to develop.
What happens if we think of our organisations as idea-processing networks instead of widget-producing machines? To start with, everything changes…
Things don’t always go the way we plan – and if we’re innovating, we shouldn’t expect them to. Here are some ideas for coping with this.
This week’s collection of the best innovation posts includes ideas on open innovation, purpose, hiring the best people, and the theremin.
Here’s the secret to innovation: there are no secrets. The only way to get better at innovating is to do the work – get better at experimenting.
Creating space in your head for creativity is an important part of innovation – I hope that these resources will help you clear that space, and do great work!
