The Innovator’s Guide to Growth…a new bible for Innovation Managers

This post is part of the Post2Post Virtual Book Tour, my Innovise Guy pardner Doug Stevenson is also reviewing the book on The Innovise Guys Blog (the post-tour tour). He’s posting Wednesday, October 1.

I do a bit of reading. I try to have one business book and one fictional book going at all times. This last month my pair has been The Innovator’s Guide to Growth and Salmon Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children. It has proved to be a month of intense learning about innovation – and India! The Innovator’s Guide to Growth, which I am reviewing here, I predict, will become as important a book in the business world as Rushdie’s Booker Prize winning novel is in fiction. Quite simply, IG2G is the new bible for innovation managers and leaders.

Business leaders: do not pass go, do not collect 200 stock options, go immediately to Amazon and buy this book. I haven’t read such an eye opener since picking up Geoffrey Moore’s Crossing the Chasm in the early 90’s.

Business books are often a slog to read. Even those with good content can be sleeping pill substitutes. IG2G is quite dense with information about how to “do” innovation – particularly disruptive innovation. However, it’s no sleeping aid, you are compelled to keep reading because it’s just so damn insightful, fresh, and filled with important advice on all aspects of the innovation puzzle.

I’ve been saying for some time that innovation is a holistic organizational activity; it’s not one thing it’s many intertwined factors. There is no silver bullet! Many business books address some aspect of it, call them silver-bullet-centric; virtually none are holistic in nature. IG2G is the exception, it’s womb-to-tomb about innovation management and process. It sorts out the complexity and removes the mystery for innovation leaders. It’s truly a guide – they didn’t use that word in the title just for the alliteration! Leaders take note: what they say in IG2G – the first chapter – “there is no silver bullet for companies interested in enhancing their organization’s ability to innovate.” IG2G is what managers really need, a full-process tool kit.

Speaking of titles, the subtitle of IG2G is “…putting disruptive innovation to work”. This is key because one of the great things about this book is how it clears up the concept of disruptive innovation. It presents a valuable and persuasive case as to why disruptive innovation is so essential for growth. Growth is the point of innovation after all isn’t it? In watching many organizations continue to extend product lines incrementally it’s clear that they are avoiding the risk of bigger, new-market type innovation. Innovation leaders often fall prey to what I call the Pete Rose trap, that is, settling for singles instead of swinging for the fences (note to international readers: forgive the baseball analogy, it means “not taking enough risk”). Falling for the Pete Rose trap means that organizations fail in the long run. IG2G gives leaders the tools they need to justify, plan, create, and execute a balanced innovation strategy that includes the all-important disruptive element. This book could save your company.

I love that the book is peppered with real world examples. For instance, it tells the story of Best Buy’s development of the Geek Squad service. It’s a great example of disruptive growth through acquisition and development. J&J, P&G, Dow Corning, and Intel are just a few of the many success stories cited to flesh out the books guidance. The team of author’s are Scott Anthony, Mark Johnson, Joseph Sinfield, and Elizabeth Altman. The men on the author team are all part of Innosight a premiere innovation consultancy that uses the concepts articulated in IG2G. Innosight owes a lot of its brilliance to Harvard professor Clayton Christensen, one of the founders, who has done much of the deep research that backs up this book. Indeed, he wrote the foreword to IG2G. Altman is a Motorola strategy executive and adds real world experience in innovation to this guidebook.

This is clearly a book written by experts who know all aspects of innovation. I was paying particularly close attention to what the author’s said about “how” to do the creation part of innovation. Ideation is something I specialize in so I was hoping to catch them out on something! Instead, I read advice on ideation that I’ve been preaching (to mostly deaf ears) for years. I keep saying that ideation takes time, that it can’t all be done in one big brainstorming session. It made me feel good to read that they suggest that a team take “several weeks developing and exploring opportunities.” Amen brothers! They further suggest that if you do an ideation session you should combine fresh groups of people. Good suggestion. I would go one better and suggest you bring in folks from outside the organization and I’ll bet they would agree.

They are also quite insightful when it comes to on-going innovation idea programs. They believe that reinforcement is critical. This is so right, I’ve seen this time and again, where organizations ask for ideas, get thousands, then ignore them.

The only downside to IG2G is simply that it is, like Midnight’s Children, not a glazed doughnut to consume. It’s as dense as a bourbon laced holiday fruit cake – plan on reading it slowly, studying it really, for the next quarter. Perhaps with a nice port…

USA Financial Crisis: The Danger of Unbridled Innovation

A simple point I want to make today, in light of all that went down last week: Innovation can be dangerous. We saw it when Enron collapsed – creativity without regard for legality. This time it’s much worse.

Back when the financial markets were deregulated a lot of folks, on both sides of the aisle, thought that it was a good thing. They thought it was innovation, and, it was. For years, it appeared to be a genius move, as new financial products were created, more competition was introduced, and folks got mortgages they wouldn’t have in earlier days. The people who architected and pushed for deregulation had a real vision of the upside, and indeed it came to pass.

The bad news is not enough lawmakers looked at the downside to deregulation. And, folks, it was there to be seen, many people saw it, it was ignored. The deregulation laws that got passed were simply not properly evaluated. And further blame should be put on those who, with more data, didn’t re-evaluate and make adjustments.

It’s textbook: When you implement a new innovation, before it goes online, you need to judge/critique the idea based on criteria. One criteria that wasn’t looked at properly was risk. More precisely, nobody knew the risk, or how to calculate the risk.

If this were a Vegas sportsbook, they wouldn’t make odds, they wouldn’t take the bet.

The unintended (but I would say predictable) consequences hit the fan when factors beyond our control de-stabilized the system, and now the taxpayers of the USA are bailing out the banking industry. What happened to capitalism? I always thought like, if you failed, you were SOL (“Situation Out of Luck”). I guess that’s only true for guys like me! I’m an entrepreneur and I’ve been part of several ventures that have fallen flat on their face, and no rich Uncle named Sam bailed me out. It was months and years of eating an apple for breakfast, bologna for dinner, and bartending or taxi driving all night to pay the rent.

If you got one of those easy mortgages and don’t have the income to manage them, I feel for you, but personally, I don’t want to pay it for you. And I don’t want to bail out the banks who loaned it to you either. Looks like I’m going to do both! I’m SOL! We’re SOL! We’re SOL because our leaders didn’t generate criteria and take a hard look at the downside to regulation.

So, enough with the rant, and back to the main point: Innovations of any kind need to be critically evaluated before being put into action. Everyone considering a new innovation of any kind, hey, here’s my suggestion: Do an Evaluation Matrix. Develop some precise and measurable criteria and evaluate your idea. If you don’t know what an evaluation matrix is, well, buy Jack’s Notebook and find out!

USA Financial Crisis: The Danger of Unbridled Innovation

A simple point I want to make today, in light of all that went down last week: Innovation can be dangerous. We saw it when Enron collapsed – creativity without regard for legality. This time it’s much worse.

Back when the financial markets were deregulated a lot of folks, on both sides of the aisle, thought that it was a good thing. They thought it was innovation, and, it was. For years, it appeared to be a genius move, as new financial products were created, more competition was introduced, and folks got mortgages they wouldn’t have in earlier days. The people who architected and pushed for deregulation had a real vision of the upside, and indeed it came to pass.

The bad news is not enough lawmakers looked at the downside to regulation. And, folks, it was there to be seen, many people saw it, it was ignored. The deregulation laws that got passed were simply not properly evaluated. And further blame should be put on those who, with more data, didn’t re-evaluate and make adjustments.

It’s textbook: When you implement a new innovation, before it goes online, you need to judge/critique the idea based on criteria. One criteria that wasn’t looked at properly was risk. More precisely, nobody knew the risk, or how to calculate the risk.

If this were a Vegas sportsbook, they wouldn’t make odds, they wouldn’t take the bet.

The unintended (but I would say predictable) consequences hit the fan when factors beyond our control de-stabilized the system, and now the taxpayers of the USA are bailing out the banking industry. What happened to capitalism? I always thought like, if you failed, you were SOL (“Situation Out of Luck”). I guess that’s only true for guys like me! I’m an entrepreneur and I’ve been part of several ventures that have fallen flat on their face, and no rich Uncle named Sam bailed me out. It was months and years of eating an apple for breakfast, bologna for dinner, and bartending or taxi driving all night to pay the rent.

If you got one of those easy mortgages and don’t have the income to manage them, I feel for you, but personally, I don’t want to pay it for you. And I don’t want to bail out the banks who loaned it to you either. Looks like I’m going to do both! I’m SOL! We’re SOL! We’re SOL because our leaders didn’t generate criteria and take a hard look at the downside to regulation.

So, enough with the rant, and back to the main point: Innovations of any kind need to be critically evaluated before being put into action. Everyone considering a new innovation of any kind, hey, here’s my suggestion: Do an Evaluation Matrix. Develop some precise and measurable criteria and evaluate your idea. If you don’t know what an evaluation matrix is, well, buy Jack’s Notebook and find out!

Stay Tuned For "The Medium At Large"

The irrepressible Julia Cameron is at it again. Does this woman define the word prolific or what? She's been cranking out a good book at least once or twice a year for ages, and now, with her eppervescent partner in crime, Emma Lively, she's just turned out a musical.

The Medium At Large will debut in Chicago at the Village Players Performing Arts Center on October 17th and will run through November 16. If you live in the area you'd be crazy not to check it out. I'll stick my neck out here -- I wouldn't be surprised if this does so well in Chicago (okay, it's Oak Park technically) it will re-open in NYC. Can a movie be far behind? Call it intuition on my part but I feel this is the start of something big.

Rumor has it the musical is all about ghosts, romance, and general mischief, all set in NYC circa 1938. Julia is no stranger to the New York setting, I believe she helped out on making the movie New York, New York, and also Taxi Driver, two quintessential New York films. The main character of the new musical is Bruce, a medium, who will be played by Tony award winning actor, John Herrera.

Carl Occhipinti, Artistic Director of Village Players is directing the show, he says, "I'm drawn to the idea that we can break through the veil that separates the two (physical and spiritual worlds) and connect with someone we've lost."

If anyone can break through the veil, it would be Julia Cameron. If anyone could make it musical in the process -- it would be Emma Lively. This musical is well suited to their spiritual, creative, and fun oeuvre.

Julia Cameron is the best-selling author of The Artists Way and is well known for that empowering book on creative process. My personal favorite of her many books is her autobiography, Floor Sample. Floor Sample is an inside peek at what makes this interesting woman and prolific artist tick. Doug Stevenson and I (the Innovise Guys) had the pleasure of interviewing her just after the book was released, take a listen! Meanwhile, guys, put on a Fedora, ladies, get your hair bobbed. Bundle yourself into the Packard, and get yourself out to Oak Park to check out The Medium At Large.

My Starbucks Idea, A “C” At Best

I keep an eye on Starbucks — as readers of this blog are well aware. I do this not as an investor, but as a student of all things innovative, and as a bona fide coffee lover. Starbucks is a fascinating study because it’s a combination of good practices and not so good practices when it comes to innovation. Their recently slide into hard times and 600 shop closings indicates trouble in paradise; sadly, I see them as an on-going case study in innovative failure at this point. I don’t think they are listening to their consumers, the key to incremental innovation. Nor do I see them making any radical departures, or starting any new ventures, the key to disruptive innovation and growth. Howard Schultz is like a quarterback who’s suddenly been traded to another team. The plays he’s calling are sincere attempts to score, but they don’t fit the team. He may have some plays up his sleeve we don’t know about. If he doesn’t, I don’t see their stock price, or their growth rate improving any time soon.

As I mentioned in my June post on Starbucks (Starbucks is Dead), they put together a website for consumer suggestions called “My Starbucks Idea” (otherwise known as MSI). I saw the site as a hopeful sign that they were listening to consumers and making an effort to re-create the vaunted experience that made them great in the first place.

I’ve been watching the site for about three months now and I’d like to report what a great success it is, unfortunately, I can’t. It seems to be a sincere effort but it’s flawed and therefore it slides into mediocrity.

What’s good about it is a lot of consumers have jumped in and suggested thousands of ideas. Like any unfocused brainstorming session, the ideas range from the sublime to the silly. There is also lively discussion about various hot issues (like Wifi fees, food, and of course the various coffee drinks). This discussion is rich with consumer data, it’s a real asset for Starbucks — if they use it! The problems with the MSI site, in my opinion, are the following:

1. Very, very few of the ideas are actually being taken into action. The site has an Ideas Into Action blog. What I see reading the entries is a great deal of Starbucks spin – usually reasons why they can’t do an idea (and therefore can’t innovate). You read lots of PR-ish statements about new drinks or food items from Starbucks employees — which is not bad information — but it’s not about Ideas In Action. This blog should be about ideas that have been done, or, how to get an idea done, and could be more productively used in that fashion. What’s the use of a consumer site if you don’t move forward with the best ideas? I realize the percentage of ideas implemented will be very low, but there ought to be some winners, and consumers should know what they are.

2. Starbucks Is Not Really Listening. Some key issues, particularly Wifi and Bold Coffee All Day Long (Not Pikes Peak!) get consistent consumer feedback saying basically the same thing: Wifi should be free and there should be a Bold Coffee option all day long. This is Very Clear consumer feedback and I find it amazing that Starbucks would ignore it. In my many visits to various Starbucks sites, it’s clear they are ignoring it. Surely their qualitative research bears out both of these desires, I would be shocked if it didn’t. And yet, these unpopular decisions (charging for Wifi access, and, a weaker non-bold afternoon brew option) remain in place. This is, IMHO, a classic mistake. They are leaving the door open for competitors to provide what they don’t.

3. Poor Convergence Tools. The site makes it easy to enter a new idea, that’s good. The problem is there is no place to easily compare ideas with each other, no rank ordering, no easy way to sort through all the ideas. What it suggests is that Starbucks wants to leave the consumer out of the convergence process. I get that Starbucks needs to make final decisions, of course, but they are leaving a lot of consumer wisdom on the table by not providing better viewing, voting, sorting, and ranking tools.

I’m still hopeful that MSI can evolve into a more meaningful site for consumer-based ideation, but now, I’d have to give it a “C” grade and just barely that. The moderators and site managers are doing the best they can but I get the sense they are not really empowered to take the site to the next level. My suggestions:

1. Focus the ideation on more specific problems. These would be problems that Starbucks really wants solved, and are motivated enough to make real changes. Take control! So, get the ideas for the problems You Want To Solve, pick one, and put it into action. Then tell us about it.

2. Put the discussion of ideas into a separate area. Separate ideation from discussion. Then list ideas in categories so you can see them at a glance. It’s impossible to scan quickly through ideas on the MSI site.

3. Hire the best ideators and pay them. Use the site to find prolific ideators.

4. Improve the convergence tools, and use consumers for convergent activities.

5. Empower the MSI team to do more.

Why Is God Laughing? A Review.

I was recently gifted a copy of Deepak Chopra’s book, “Why Is God Laughing? The Path to Joy And Spiritual Optimism.” I don’t often read books related to spirituality, probably an over-reaction to being inundated with religious instruction as a youth. Frankly, I’m one of those people who believe the more you talk about spirituality the less likely you are actually spiritually connected. I must confess that in the past I had less than an open mind about all things new age, but that’s changed. Chopra’s book helped me make more connections between my expertise area of creativity, and something I am still mystified about, spirituality.

The fact that Mike Myers (yes, of SNL and Wayne’s World fame) wrote the foreward helped me get over myself and start reading.

In recent years I have become more and more convinced that the deepest root in the innovation tree is, in fact, spirtuality. I’ve tried time and again to find a way to say this in a way that people, particularly business people, understand. I see spirituality as the most important part of a person’s creative environment, the source from which all innovation flows. I cite the spirituality of Einstein and Elvis as examples of how that foundation can lead to creative greatness. Still, for most people, it’s a tenuous link.

Why Is God Laughing fills in a lot of cracks in the linkage between the soul and personal creativity. It’s written as a story. The main character is Mickey, a successful stand-up comic who has just lost his semi-estranged father. His father’s character, Larry, reaches back from the dead (I won’t say how here) and finds a way to show Mickey a path to spiritual optimism. In the process Mickey learns more about the nature of fear, the roles we play in life that aren’t who we really are, and how the ego gets in the way of leading a more joyful life. It’s a quick read — only a day or two for most people I suspect, and, it moves quickly and without a lot of new-age double-speak. It’s a light weight story, and it is nonetheless a powerful book.

For me, a key insight is how much fear gets in the way of how we live. I’ve always said that removal of fear, or at least recognition of it, is the first step in creative problem solving. If you are paralyzed with fear there will be no creativity, there will be no innovation. Chopra does a great job of showing how fear is a dead end and provides a way of looking at it that helps remove it from our thinking. Likewise, he does a fine job of showing how ego interferes with authenticity. The learning for me is that recognizing how your ego rules you is the first step in letting that go and the positive result is greater, and more authentic, self-expression.

I would encourage anyone who wants a fresh perspective on the connection of spirituality to creativity, innovation, and joyful living to read this subtly enlightening book.

Ideation First Aid, 7 Ideas to Unblock Yourself

Professional creative people often find themselves needing a brilliant idea -- and simply not having one. We’ve all been there, a deadline is looming, you’ve tried this and that, and you know in your heart it’s not there, you don’t have something you can use. Anxiety, frustration, and fear creep into your being, and the harder you try, the worse things get.

Don’t push the panic button, reach for the ideation First Aid Kit and triage your challenge. Here are seven tools for coming up with an idea under pressure:

1. Think positive. Even if you’ve been stumped for days, even weeks, start telling yourself that you are going to have a great idea, and start believing it. Take a moment and imagine things working out perfectly and explore in your head, in your mind’s eye, what success might look like, how it might feel. Get into as much sensory detail as you can, how does it taste, smell, feel? Don’t know? Make it up! Your brain tends to follow the instructions you give it, even the non-intentional ones. So if you say to yourself “I am having a great idea about the Wesley account,” your brain will give it to you. If you say, “I’m stumped” your brain will stay that way. Brainwash yourself! Allow for all possibilities to emerge.

2. The next thing to do is relax. Do something physical. Shake the anxiety out of your body and shoulders, pretend you’re Elvis for a few minutes. Stretch, do some yoga, go for a short walk, take some deep breaths. If you have time, do something that gets you out of breath or makes you work hard physically. This will help get you “out of your head” and return you to a mental space that is more grounded. The key here is to still your mind.

3. Try looking at your challenge from a new angle. Pretend you are someone else – even a historical person like Frank Lloyd Wright, or Lincoln, or a fictional character like Miss Jane Marple. How would they look at this challenge, how might they address it? To break through to something fresh you have to think differently, so, why not use another persona to start getting imaginative. How would a child see it? Do anything you can to have “fresh eyes” – you’ll then have fresh thoughts. So, leave the past, your habits and assumptions behind and work at being in the present.

4. Seek out the overlooked facts in the situation. Something obvious that you are taking for granted might be re-examined and used as the basis for a fresh idea to solve your problem, to meet your challenge. Make a list of facts and feelings and include the obvious, the obscure, the irrelevant – you’ll get some ideas in the process.

5. Get out of the pattern of having an idea and then immediately critiquing it. You’ll never get into an imaginative flow that way. Instead, make a list of possible solutions and just keep writing up, or doodling/sketching new options, even listing the silly, stupid, obvious, and downright “bad” ideas. If you keep listing options/ideas, a new and fresh idea will eventually pop up, but you have to believe you can, you have to drop all negative thoughts, and just keep listing! Allow yourself to be truly spontaneous.

6. Make a forced connection. To get a fresh idea you can sometimes surprise or jog your mind into giving it up by using a forced connection or association. Look around your workspace or outside the window and pick an object at random. Then ask yourself what, say, an Oak Tree, has to do with your challenge. To help yourself make a connection, list words about the Oak Tree, like, strong, old, flexible, productive, kind, enduring, etc. Then use those “attribute” words as stimulus for ideas about your challenge. Be playful in exploring possible connections and let your mind go, suspend disbelief. Something unexpected and highly useful often arises from forced connections.

7. Final ideation first aid tip: Slow Down. You can’t be very creative when full of anxiety. Be thoughtful, deliberate, focused, and playful with your ideation -- without rushing. Rushing and hurry will put your mind right back into panic or urge mode and nobody works very well in that state of mind. As Napoleon once said to his valet: “Dress me slowly, I’m in a hurry.” When you rush you make mistakes that ultimately waste even more time. Grace under pressure is a hallmark of great leaders – and of great creative people.

Best of luck!