E125 | How To Drive Innovation Inside Your Organisation with Pete Newell

Are you wondering how your business can innovate better? Are you confusing methodologies and activities with the process of actually keeping and creating a pipeline of innovation? 

Then don’t miss this hugely insightful episode all about innovation, with the internationally recognised innovation expert, Pete Newell. 

Pete finished his 32-year military career with a 3-year tour running the US Army’s skunkworks - or in layman’s terms, he was the Director of the US Army’s Rapid Equipping Force (REF). He had a remit to go and find problems and solve them, using commercial technology to solve a battlefield problem. 

Out of the 300 problems he was tasked with solving, he found resolutions for 20 of them. An incredible hit rate.

When he realised he couldn’t stay in that role indefinitely, Pete retired from the military to found BMNT, an innovation consultancy and early-stage technology incubator that helps solve some of the hardest real-world problems in US national security, state and local governments, and beyond. 

Pete is also founder and co-author, with Lean Startup founder Steve Blank, of Hacking for Defense (H4D)®, an academic programme originally taught at Stanford University. 

“[This is] the only class they take in their academic career that allows them to use everything they use in university or network they build to work on a real problem with real people to give them real experience that leads to real jobs.”

So to find out what the fundamental things are inside an organisation that you need to do to drive innovation in your business, don’t miss this fantastic conversation. 

On today’s podcast:

• The work of BMNT
• Rapid Equipping Force (REF)
• Hacking for Defence (H4D)®
• H4X® - the operating system
• When Silicon Valley met the military
• The innovation pipeline