The Innovationist

We are often asked if the best way to structure for innovation is top-down or bottom-up? The answer is both if you are going to succeed in the long run.

Bill Belichick is widely regarded as a football genius, contrarian, and grump. He is also an innovator. All of the X's and O's of design thinking can be found under the hoodie.

Looking for a way to energize your team and teach them how to approach and see things differently?  How about getting them out of the office and teaching them some new skills?  Perhaps a scavenger hunt!  The same elements that ensure a successful scavenger hunt can also help companies build a more innovative culture. So when creating your scavenger hunt teams and letting them go, think about the following:

“OK, fun’s over gang.  Yeah, yeah, we’ve got a billion new ideas, whoop-de-doo, now how on earth are we going to get to a number we can actually do something with?”

Social media is a giant cocktail party. I am not the first person to point this out, as the existence of this book would suggest (I haven't read it but since the author's title confirms my opinion, I am inclined to believe it's brilliant).  I recently attended an interesting presentation at the Business Innovation Factory by Francois Gossieaux, author of The Hyper-Social Organization: Eclipse Your Competition by Leveraging Social Media. His main theme was that in order to successfully leverage web 2.0, you need to understand human 1.0. According to Gossieaux, businesses should worry less about what the latest and greatest technology can do and think more about the fundamental human behavior it can facilitate. He argues that humans are instinctively social creatures and the same basic principles apply online as they do in face-to-face interactions. I could not agree more. Yet so many social media marketing efforts ignore common courtesy and exhibit behavior you couldn't get away with at a cocktail party. I must admit I am guilty of committing some of these sins myself, but hey, we are all still learning the best way to play in the world of social media, aren't we? Here are 5 personality types that are sure to ruin the party.

Good afternoon folks!

Here's Part Two in our three-part series on Business Model Mapping, with insights from Creative Realities' President, Jay Terwilliger:

This past week I got sucked into what I thought was a pretty weak online debate. The question posed was, "Is Incremental innovation the enemy of Breakthrough Innovation?"

Mark Gallagher of Blackcoffee suggested I take a look at this new book by Vijay Govindarajan and Chris Trimble, and I'm glad I did.  Vijay and Chris are associated with the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth.  Vijay a professor and Chris an innovation speaker and consultant who is also on the faculty at Tuck.