The Innovation Show

Today's guest discovered that over 10 years, just 1 in 12 companies managed to jump from the middle tier of corporate performance—where 60% of companies reside, making very little economic profit—to the top quintile, where 90% of global economic profit is made. This movement does not happen by magic—it depends on your company's current position, the trends it faces, and the big moves you make to give it the strongest chance of vaulting over the competition. This is not another strategy framework. Instead, today's book shows, through empirical analysis and the experiences of dozens of companies that have successfully made multiple big moves, that you have to overcome incrementalism and corporate inertia to improve performance dramatically. We welcome the Chairman of the McKinsey Global Institute and Author of "Strategy Beyond the Hockey Stick", Sven Smit.

What is it about the top tech product companies such as Amazon, Apple, Google, Netflix and Tesla that enables their record of consistent innovation? Most people think it's because these companies are somehow able to find and attract a level of talent that makes this innovation possible. But the real advantage these companies have is not so much who they hire, but rather how they enable their people to work together to solve hard problems and create extraordinary products. Today's guest has long worked to reveal the best practices of the most consistently innovative companies in the world. A natural companion to his bestselling-book INSPIRED, today's book tackles head-on the reason why most companies fail to truly leverage the potential of their people to innovate: product leadership. It is a great pleasure to welcome the author of EMPOWERED: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Products, Marty Cagan

Disciplined Entrepreneurship will change the way you think about starting a company. Many believe that entrepreneurship cannot be taught, but great entrepreneurs aren't born with something special – they simply make great products. This book will show you how to create a successful startup through developing an innovative product. It breaks down the necessary processes into an integrated, comprehensive, and proven 24-step framework that any industrious person can learn and apply. You will learn: * Why the "F" word – focus – is crucial to a startup's success * Common obstacles that entrepreneurs face – and how to overcome them * How to use innovation to stand out in the crowd – it's not just about technology Whether you're a first-time or repeat entrepreneur, Disciplined Entrepreneurship gives you the tools you need to improve your odds of making a product people want. Author Bill Aulet is the managing director of the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship as well as a senior lecturer at the MIT Sloan School of Management. Lnks mentioned in the show: Entrepreneurship 101: Who is your customer? https://www.edx.org/course/entrepreneurship-101-who-is-your-customer? Book website: https://www.d-eship.com

Does this sound familiar? * Are you always one prototype away from a solution but never seem to get there? * Do you spend most of your time fixing problems you did not anticipate? * Does it seem like everything is going well until launch when it all falls apart? * Are you getting very little return on the resources you deploy? * Does the performance of your product in the market rarely meet the predicted targets? Intrigued? So was I. If you answered yes, then you are like a young version of our guest. Today, he will teach you both the science and art to innovation. It is a pleasure to welcome a friend of the show to share insights from his latest book, "Learning to Build: The 5 Bedrock Skills of Innovators and Entrepreneurs", Bob Moesta.

Very few large companies manage to avoid stalls in revenue growth. These stalls are not attributable to the natural business cycle. Our guest's careful analysis reveals that most such stalls directly result from strategic choices made by corporate leaders. In short, stoppages in growth are almost always avoidable. This extensively researched book analyses the growth experiences of more than 600 Fortune 100 companies over the past fifty years to identify why growth stalls and to discover how to rectify a stall in progress or, even better, avoid one. Board members and executives in companies of all sizes will find this book a practical and essential resource. Our guest investigated the incidence and consequences of growth stalls in major corporations and then probed the root causes. Examining hundreds of stall points, the authors conclude that the greatest threat to a company's growth is obsolete strategic assumptions that undermine market position and innovation and talent management breakdowns. It is a pleasure to welcome back our recent guest in the Clayton Christensen tribute series, the author of "Stall Points: Most Companies Stop Growing - Yours Doesn't Have To - Derek van Bever

C.S. Lewis once said, "Good and evil increase at compound interest. That's why the little decisions we make every day are of infinite importance. the smallest good act today is the capture of a strategic point from which, a few months later, you may go on to victories you never dreamed of" This quote came to mind as I pondered today's book. Just as the good things we do compound over time, so too do the not-so-good things, it was jinn Dryden who wrote first we make our habits then our habits make us. This is the case for the daily stresses we tolerate, our guest calls these microstresses. "Microstress: tiny moments of stress triggered by people in our personal and professional lives; stresses so routine that we barely register them but whose cumulative toll is debilitating." In its annual State of the Workplace survey, Gallup concluded that only 33 per cent of those surveyed were"thriving" in their well-being, with 44 per cent of employees reporting experiencing "a lot" of stress in a typical workday—a record high.1 But little recognised or adequately studied is the toll of this new form of stress. The toll is so subtle that we barely register it, but the cumulative effect can derail even high performers, both personally and professionally. We welcome the author of "The Microstress Effect" Karen Dillon

This is my guest appearance on The Disruptive Voice Podcast. Exploring the theories of disruptive innovation across a broad set of industries and circumstances with academics, researchers, and practitioners who have been inspired and taught by Professor Clayton M. Christensen. In his book, Undisruptable: A Mindset of Permanent Reinvention for Individuals, Organizations, and Life, Aidan McCullen writes about how, centuries ago, sailors would set out to sea with maps labelled with the Latin words hic sun dracones - here be dragons - which meant that they didn't know much - if anything - about the uncharted waters and unexplored lands that awaited them. In today's volatile and uncertain world, there are parallels to be drawn between the odysseys of past and present. There are also strategies that can be employed, both by corporations and by individuals, to thrive amidst challenging circumstances, and they center on the intentional development of a mindset of permanent reinvention. Aidan himself exemplifies this mindset, having built capabilities as a professional rugby player, a digital media specialist, an innovation and change consultant, a professor at Trinity College Dublin, and host of The Innovation Show podcast, where he's in the midst of a three month series dedicated to the life, work, and theories of Clayton Christensen. In this Disruptive Voice episode, he joins Katie Zandbergen to discuss the experience of putting the series together, including not only re-reading all of Clay's books but also having in-depth conversations with his co-authors; the necessity of building capabilities before we need them; lessons we can learn from immortal jellyfish; insights gleaned from making the time to read eclectically; finding assets in ashes; and, above all, the importance of facing the dragons in our lives and of always becoming - the concept of permanent reinvention.

Today's book offers over eighty assignments, countless ideas, and memorable stories collected throughout The Stanford d.school's decade-plus history. Today's guest painstakingly curated this collection from some of the world's most inventive minds, including d.school and IDEO founder David Kelley amongst others. She is with us today to share some of those assignments to spark our creativity because a common characteristic of our audience is - without a doubt - curiosity. It is a pleasure to welcome the Executive Director of the Stanford d.school and the author of Creative Acts for Curious People: How to Think, Create, and Lead in Unconventional Ways, Sarah Stein Greenberg. Find Sarah here: http://www.sarahsteingreenberg.com Find d School here: https://dschool.stanford.edu/books

In Chapter 5 of Tushman and O'Reilly's "Lead and Disrupt", the authors share how Cypress Semiconductor used a similar venture funding model, complete with a one-page business plan, for initial funding to grow $40 million in businesses. With their approach called a "Federation of Entrepreneurs", Cypress is a great case study in ambidextrous leadership. In June 2019, Infineon Technologies announced it would acquire Cypress for $9.4 billion. The deal closed in April 2020, making Infineon one of the world's top 10 semiconductor manufacturers. We are joined today by that ambidextrous leader, the former CEO of Cypress TJ Rodgers and the author of Lead and Disrupt, Charles O'Reilly III.

In Chapter 5 of the Corporate Explorer, Binns, Tushman, and O'Reilly share how a Corporate Explorer created a new business inside the consulting and accounting firm Deloitte. His new unit, Deloitte Pixel, uses the "wisdom of crowds" to solve complex management problems. His first experience of the power of crowds came when he was part of a self-organised community that came together to provide relief for victims of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. This taught him that communities of people could self-organise and do work that traditional organisation structures might struggle to perform. He then started to apply similar principles of crowds to management consulting. It is a pleasure to welcome that very Corporate Explorer, joined by his friend Andrew Binns.