Innovation is Dead

On ABS CBN News we discuss  “Businesses counter political risks with innovation”

Later in the day in  the Manila Times Paddy Miller suggests with it’s proclivity to establish entrepreneurs with their ranks,  big organizations are not solving the innovation challenge.  Something radical has to be done..maybe it’s about creating more innovation architects?

 

 

 

Heist Proof? Not likely.

We’ve all seen heist movies and know their predictable plot. Some scoundrel from central casting, Tom Cruise (MI3) or George Clooney (Ocean’s 11) and his team crack the vaults of the Bank of England, the headquarters of the CIA or some creepy villain’s Rome casino and proceed to haul off the loot.

All these movies have one thing in common; our target has assumed that his closely guarded possession is heist proof. Or at least, he has accounted for any combination of heists that could take place. We, the audience, sit back to relish that inevitable moment when the villain finally realizes that he has got his comeuppance.

How many businesses could we identify as having believed the same thing, that they were heist proof? The taxi industry until Uber came along? The travel agency industry until Expedia came along? The music industry until MP3 came along? The airline until SouthWest and Ryan arrived? 

Zero to One versus Innovation as Usual

I manage to get Peter Thiel, founder of PayPal and author of Zero to One, together with Reid Hoffman, founder of LinkedIn on stage to talk about their thoughts (and books)…….at CEIBS (Snow Zhou in the centre) on May 26th 2015.

Corporate Disobedience

This Thomas at his best – “How many Stealth Stormers would you want running around your organisation?” None is what many senior executives would say – Thomas disagrees. See below

The Case for Corporate Disobedience

At Harvard Business Review

On the Insight Centre this is the lead feature. How Samsung gets innovations to market is based on the case we’ve recently tested on our MBA course. Some very potent learning from a well researched case that has been nailed down by Thomas and the Samsung EU Team.

The New York Times short report on Disruptive Innovation – it’s simple really

We find people often get tied up with lots of definitions on what is or isn’t disruptive innovation. The whole discussion of incremental versus radical innovation can be confusing. This excerpt captures the whole story without any frills.
(Hat tip to Vox.com)

The Innovation Architect in Australia

At the end of the month, you’ll be able to attend our exec programme in Sydney.
It’s two days of intensive involvement in innovation. Block those dates – 1st and 2nd May.

Stealth Innovation – our HBR article

Harvard Business Review published our article on Stealth Innovation, detailing how to make innovation happen under the radar inside a company.

The article is adapted from our book Innovation as Usual. Excerpt of the article below:

The Case For Stealth Innovation

by Paddy Miller and Thomas Wedell-Wedellsborg

You have an idea for a daring, innovative project that could have a significant impact on your business. However, you suspect that your idea will meet with internal resistance: The innovation would upend the status quo, and chances are good that other parts of the organization will try to stop it. What’s your next step?

The conventional answer is simple: Get a mandate from the top. As many innovation experts rightly point out, only the most incremental ideas pass through the corporate-approvals gantlet unscathed. The more unusual your idea, the larger the risk that it will fall victim to turf wars, myopic incentive systems, or simple resistance to change. For this reason, innovators are often counseled to go straight to the top, secure backing at the highest possible level, and build a corporate sense of urgency around their ideas.

The “top first” strategy, however, carries its own risks. CEOs of large organizations are constantly barraged with proposals for new, untested projects, and typically, the ideas get a five-minute perusal followed by a “no.” And even if your idea does win support from the C-suite, early exposure is a double-edged sword: It buys you legitimacy and resources, but it also thrusts you squarely into the corporate spotlight—and that can be a dangerous place for young, unproven ideas. Our experience working with innovative managers has revealed an alternative approach: innovating under the radar. […]

Read the full article on HBR.org

Our new study on Innovation Officers

Our new study of Chief Innovation Officers, surveying 260 innovation executives and done in collaboration with CapGemini, has now been released and has been picked up by Wall Street Journal, Forbes and others.

Among the main conclusions:

• 43 percent of companies now have a Chief Innovation Officer, up from 33 percent last year, but the role is still nascent and undefined.
• The number one obstacle for innovation is the lack of an explicit innovation strategy – something that 58 percent of companies do not have.
• Only 26 percent of companies have clear Key Performance Indicators for innovation

Read the full report online or download the PDF or the PowerPoint version on SlideShare.