The Innovation Show

More than a decade ago, Mark Johnson, SAP’s Henning Kagermann, and Clayton Christensen hashed out the principles of business model reinvention in the pages of the Harvard Business Review. Essentially, a business model can be broken down into four distinct elements: A value proposition 2. Resources  3. Processes, 4. A profit formula  This means in practice that the new and different must be separated and even protected from the tried and true. As Mark says, “To play a new game on a new field requires a new game plan.” —Clayton M. Christensen It is a pleasure to welcome the author of multiple titles, a great friend of the show, and the co-author of that 2008 paper Clay mentioned, a Top 50 HBR article of all time, Reinventing Your Business Model; Mark W. Johnson. That HBR article: https://hbr.org/2008/12/reinventing-your-business-model

Disrupting Class is an unsettling title for a book about the schooling process. The title conveys multiple meanings. The principal message is that disruption can usefully frame why schools have struggled to improve and how to solve these problems. Welcome to another episode in our series to celebrate the life work and theories of Clayton Christensen; today’s episode Is on his 2008 book, Disrupting Class. We welcome the co-author of “Disrupting Class, How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns: Michael B Horn Video of Clay https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbAGRSPw8ZI Timestamps: 00:00:00 Intro  00:03:02 Clayton Christensen Relationship 00:05:53 The Why of Disrupting Class 00:08:14 What Does The Theory Have to Say? 00:10:37 Intrinsic v Extrinsic Motivation and Jobs Theory 00:14:47 Interdependence and Modularity 00:22:15 Organisational Design and Authority 00:28:40 Train people how to think not what to think 00:29:37 Model of Disruptive Innovation 00:32:42 Non-Consumption Contexts 00:37:42 Resistance from the Status Quo 00:41:02 Cramming 00:46:06 RCA, Vacuum Tubes, Sony and Transistors  00:49:09 Incubation Outside the Core  00:53:43 Value Network and Ecosystem 00:56:28 The Role of Regulation 01:02:13 Jobs To Be Done Theory 01:06:12 Democratising the theories 01:10:10 Final Thoughts on Disrupting Education 01:10:10 Final Thoughts on Clayton Christensen

Some essential lessons in "Seeing What’s Next" relate to disruptive innovations. Four critical lessons are:  1. Disruption is a process, not an event.  2. Disruption is a relative phenomenon. What is disruptive to one company may be sustaining to another company.  3. Different or radical technology does not equal disruptive.  4. Disruptive innovations are not limited to high-tech markets. Disruption can occur in any product or service market and can even help explain competition among national economies.  Today’s book shows how to use the theories of innovation developed in The Innovator’s Dilemma and The Innovator’s Solution—and introduces some new ones as well. The book argues that it is possible to predict which companies will win and which will lose in a given situation--and provides a practical framework for doing so. We are joined by a long-time collaborator, friend and student of both Clayton Christensen, and he is a long-time friend of this show,  Scott D. Anthony The HBR article Scott mentioned: https://hbr.org/2022/01/persuade-your-company-to-change-before-its-too-late

The Innovator’s Dilemma summarised a theory that explains how, under certain circumstances, the mechanism of profit-maximising resource allocation causes well-run companies to get killed.  The Innovator’s Solution, in contrast, summarises a set of theories that can guide managers who need to grow new businesses with predictable success—to become the disruptors rather than the disruptees—and ultimately kill the well-run, established competitors. To succeed predictably, disruptors must be good theorists. As they shape their growth business to be disruptive, they must align every critical process and decision to fit the disruptive circumstance. We are joined to share some concepts from The Innovator’s Solution by Clayton Christensen's co-author Michael E. Raynor Articles mentioned Skate to Where the Money Will Be by Clayton M. Christensen, Michael E. Raynor, and Matthew Verlinden https://hbr.org/2001/11/skate-to-where-the-money-will-be   Of waves and ripples: Disruption theory’s newest critic tries to make a splash by Michael E. Raynor https://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/insights/topics/innovation/disruptive-innovation-theory-lepore-response.html

Join Paul Carlile, a Professor at Boston University and co-author of a key paper on theory building in management, as he dives into the intricacies of disruptive innovation and the need for a shared language among scholars. He emphasizes the importance of collaboration and interdisciplinary approaches in navigating innovation challenges. The discussion also highlights the role of neurodiversity and local context in driving impactful business models, particularly in education and technology. Carlile critiques management fads, advocating for boundaryless collaboration.

Our guest’s award-winning research introduces a new perspective on value creation and competition when industry boundaries break down in the wake of ecosystem disruption. His two books, The Wide Lens and Winning the Right Game, have been heralded as landmark contributions to strategy literature. Clayton Christensen described his work as “Path-breaking”, and Jim Collins has called him “One of our most important strategic thinkers for the 21st century.” It is a pleasure to welcome Ron Adner.  Find Ron here: https://ronadner.com

  In 2003, media companies and newspapers were in free fall, when American newspapers earned only a tiny percentage of revenue from digital. The Deseret News and Deseret Digital Media were the envy of others, with more than 50 percent of the organization’s combined net income coming from digital sources. All this a little more than three years after a former Harvard Business School professor took over the company. How did he do it? He developed his strategy thanks to his work with Clayton Christensen and employed the research to recalibrate how Deseret is organised and does business. Today, he has recalibrated his life and reallocated his resources to causes other than the business world. More about that shortly. First and foremost, he is with us to pay tribute to his friend, share how his theories helped him perform a spectacular turnaround in the media industry and share insights from his book, “Dual Transformation, How to Reposition Today’s Business While Creating the Future.” It is a rare treat and absolute honour to spend time with the author of “Dual Transformation” with Scott D Anthony and Mark Johnson and “From Resource Allocation to Strategy” with our previous guest Joe Bower. Clark Gilbert, welcome to the show.

We covered the Innovator’s Dilemma with Matthew Christensen in the first part of this series, but we did not cover Chapter 7 of the Innovator’s Dilemma,that chapter Is entitled “Discovering New and Emerging Markets” It opens as follows: “Markets that do not exist cannot be analyzed: Suppliers and customers must discover them together. Not only are the market applications for disruptive technologies unknown at the time of their development, they are unknowable. The strategies and plans that managers formulate for confronting disruptive technological change, therefore, should be plans for learning and discovery rather than plans for execution. This is a crucial point to understand because managers who believe they know a market’s future will plan and invest very differently from those who recognize the uncertainties of a developing market.” You may know those to be the words of Clayton Christensen, but what you may not know is that this concept of discovery-driven growth stems from the work of a very special friend of the Innovation Show, it is an immense pleasure to welcome Rita McGrath. Topics Covered on this episode:  00:00:00 - Intro and Sponsor 00:02:28 Rita McGrath Welcome 00:04:15 Clayton Christensen Relationship 00:07:35 Discovery-Driven Planning 00:12:05 Client Example of Too Attached to Outcome 00:13:23 Redefining Failure: Failing Fast is Not Always Failing 00:14:04 Example of Varo Bank  00:18:51 KittyHawk Example 00:20:54 The Role of Luck 00:24:51 Honda SuperCub and NonConsumers 00:27:50 Jobs To Be Done and The McLean Hamburger 00:29:51 Origins of Discovery-Driven Planning 00:31:41 Most Mutations in Nature Fail, as do most ideas 00:32:47 Origins of Innovation Thinking From Schumpeter to Today 00:34:08 Discovery-Driven Planning Overview in a Nutshell 00:37:55 Disasters: EuroDisney 00:42:09 Disasters: PolaVision 00:43:15 Organisational Capabilities, Arenas and Kao 00:46:23 Selling an Idea to a CFO/Incumbent Gatekeeper  00:51:06 UPM Example: United Paper Mills Example 00:55:00 R.A.C.E. Find Rita here: https://www.ritamcgrath.com/ Find Valize here: https://www.valize.com/  

In part 2 of our series to honour the work, life and theories of Clayton Christensen, Joseph Bower unpacks that famous HBR article, "Disruptive Technologies: Catching the Wave" This article spawned the book, "The Innovator's Dilemma" Joe Bower s the father of "Resource Allocation theory" included in his 1970 groundbreaking book, Managing the Resource Allocation Process. He has been a leader in general management at Harvard Business School for over five decades where he is the Donald K. David Professor Emeritus. He was Clayton Christensen’s doctoral thesis adviser and worked with Clay to develop and stress-test his theories. Just some of the topics covered in this episode:  00:00:00 Intro 00:01:46 Managing Resource Allocation 00:02:57 Dissertation Supervisor for Clayton Christensen 00:04:11 Traits of Great Leaders 00:06:19 Resource Allocation 00:08:44 Group Decision Making 00:26:56 The Human Element of Change 00:46:46 Advice for Changemakers and Leaders 00:51:25 Getting People to Change Their Mind 00:56:29 Final Thoughts on Clayton Christensen  

Matthew Christensen, expert on management decisions and leadership in the face of disruptive technologies, discusses the innovator's dilemma and the challenge of balancing established businesses with disruptive technologies. Also explores the importance of family, teaching children independence, sustaining and disruptive innovations, creating solutions before identifying problems, and the importance of sustainability in innovation.