Have you ever wished that the process of innovation could be more reliable? Predictable? Scalable?
That it was easier to dream up the new products or features that your customers would go crazy for?
That you could come up with brilliant ideas like we’ve seen from Thomas Edison, Steve Jobs, Henry Ford and other “born innovators”?
As it turns out, innovation can be predictable, and you can think like the … Read on
I hate to break it to you (again), but you are probably not a born innovator like Edison, Jobs or Ford. They’re exceedingly rare.
Fortunately, that doesn’t mean you can’t think like one. It’s a choice. A lens you can choose to put on.
This innovation lens is based on the Jobs-to-be-Done theory and understanding the 5 types of jobs customers are trying to complete when they use … Read on
One brand we’ve worked with keeps adding features to their products without knowing for sure if they’ll sell or not.
Another has made pivotal decisions about where to innovate their product line based on what they’re good at.
A third came up with a new product in their incubation lab—it looked interesting enough on the surface, but no one is buying it.
Do these scenarios sound familiar? They should. We … Read on
Recently, MIT Technology Review and Bill Gates curated a list of the next 10 breakthrough technologies.
MIT has been putting a list like this together each year since 2001.
Are MIT and Bill Gates wrong?
Thomas Edison. Steve Jobs. Ben Franklin. Henry Ford.
Some people are born innovators. They innately understand how to come up with solutions that solve our challenges in new and better ways.
The first product Thomas Edison produced was a failure—it was a voting tabulation machine that the legislation didn’t want. He famously said after that, I will never again build a product people don’t want. And he didn’t.
How did … Read on
“…the average expert was roughly as accurate as a dart-throwing chimpanzee.”
—Philip Tetlock and Dan Gardner, in their masterwork, Superforecasting: The Art and Science of PredictionIf the average expert is only as accurate as a dart-throwing primate, why should we hire experts? Why are those who have invested years developing comprehensive knowledge and skill no better than someone with limited or potentially none at … Read on
“To-do lists tend to be long; success lists are short. One pulls you in all directions; the other aims you in a specific direction. One is a disorganized directory and the other is an organized directive.”
—Gary Keller, founder of Keller Williams, entrepreneur and best-selling authorIdea Lists are long. Success Lists are short.
Idea Lists pull us in … Read on
“The more books we read, the clearer it becomes that the true function of a writer is to produce a masterpiece and that no other task is of any consequence.”
—Cyril Connolly, literary critic and writerToday’s innovation inspiration comes from the world of writing.
To adapt Cyril’s words, the more solutions I see, the clearer it becomes that the true function of an innovator is to … Read on
You need to evolve your product line and grow your business. But how will you go about getting there?
Add a new feature set to your existing offering? Develop a new low-cost product? Create a new platform-level solution that gets the job done significantly better? Or significantly cheaper?Something else entirely?It can seem like a guessing game.
… Read on
Early in my career as a product engineer, I experienced the ultimate professional disappointment: for 18 months I put my heart and soul into creating a product that failed in the marketplace.
It was 1984, and I was part of the IBM PCjr development team. We were working on a product that was supposed … Read on
