We’re all familiar with the legend of the entrepreneur. It’s a story of the creative genius who decides to fly solo and build an operation out of his (in the legend, it’s often his) garage. The completely innovative idea disrupts the market, takes hold, and changes the world as we know it.
Last week, the Outthinker Strategy Network (OSN) hosted our first in-person roundtable of the year at Cornell Tech on Roosevelt Island in New York City. The island, located in the East River between Manhattan and Queens, once a site of abandoned prison buildings and mental institutions, has been transformed into a hub of innovation.
To keep up with today’s rapid pace of disruption, every company feels the pressure to innovate. Most of them, when trying to shift to an innovative culture, feel like they have to pursue brand new ideas. But when I was recently invited to judge an innovation competition for Macmillan Learning, I saw that there is …
An Innovation Tournament Without New Ideas? Macmillan Offers a Fresh Twist Read More »
For human beings, language is a powerful connector. We use common vocabularies to interact socially, build communities, and facilitate understanding.
In her most recent book, Seeing Around Corners, innovation and strategy expert Rita McGrath teaches leaders to spot inflection points, or major industry shifts, before they happen. “Snow melts from the edges,” she explains. In winter, the first signs of spring appear at the edges of snowcaps. In business, radical innovation typically begins on the …
Banking at Walgreens: Innovation at the Edge Drives Unexpected Ecosystems Read More »
In March of 2008, the United States’ national public radio system (NPR) seemed to have a fatal and too common choice: to bet on the past rather than the future. It’s the kind of decision that has initiated the fall of many once-great companies: Toys “R” Us, Polaroid, Borders, Macy’s, RadioShack, and BlackBerry, to name …
If you want to predict the path of innovation in your industry, consider one unifying strategic concept: proximity. Introduced by innovation guru Rob Wolcott, proximity is the theory that the production and provision of value moves ever closer to the point of demand. Viewing your industry through this lens can reveal new opportunities, help you …
PillPack, Proximity, and the Amazon Future of Pharmacies Read More »
In the 1830s, an artist and tinkerer, Samuel Morse, directed his curiosity to a question few had considered before. Numerous scientists and inventors across the globe were working on the problem of how to communicate across long distances more quickly.
Twenty years ago, long before we had children, my wife and I decided to spend Valentine’s Day weekend in Tuscany. We were living just a two-hour flight away in London at the time, so leaving on a Friday and returning on a Monday would still mean two days and three nights of rolling hills, wineries, …
If people try to tell you that pivoting is the new thing, that it’s the fresh Silicon Valley approach to business designed for today’s fast-paced digital world, don’t believe them.
