Tag: disruptive innovation

innovation, Management

Why asking a innovation unit to be more disruptive is not a good idea

That innovation units created within large organizations have a difficult life is not new. Most of them disappear after three years on average, because after the euphoric start, they fail to become part of the life of the organization. But those that survive are not out of the woods yet, because they are caught between a top management that demands “more disruption” and an organization that, through its budgetary and control processes, removes any chance for a disruptive project to see the light of day. Getting out of this difficult situation requires being very clear about what “disruptive” means, and understanding the real nature of innovation.

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innovation, Management

Disruptive Innovation: The Legacy of Clayton Christensen

Clayton Christensen, the man behind the work on the notion of disruption, died on January 23, 2020 at the age of 67 of cancer. He was a major management theorist, like giants such as Peter Drucker or Michael Porter, and his work is more relevant than ever at a time when large companies continue to find it difficult to respond to the multiple ruptures in their environment. In what follows, I propose a synthesis of his work to show how it can be very useful.

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innovation

What the Dismissal of Jeffrey Immelt (GE) Tells us About the Limits of a Tactical Approach to Innovation

GE has just dismissed its CEO, Jeffrey Immelt, who has been in office for sixteen years. Despite considerable work in transforming the business, an ambitious innovation drive, and a big push on some hot topics such as the Internet of Things and sustainable “eco” development, which together seemed to represent the ideal transformation strategy, the results have been disappointing, and the company is now in the hands of activist investors who may soon be dismantling it. If GE has done what looks on paper like the ideal transformation program, and yet fails in the end, what lessons can we draw from its story for innovation and management in times of disruption in general?

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innovation

Five mistakes to avoid when managing a disruptive project: 5- Choosing the wrong people

This article is the last part of a series of fives articles on mistakes to avoid when managing a disruptive project, extracted from my new book “A Manager’s Guide to Disruptive Innovation”.

One of the mistakes that companies wishing to develop innovative programs often make is to think only in terms of organization and processes: “how can we do it, how can we organize it”, etc. They forget that, as we have pointed out, innovation is a social process and that the human dimension of this process is paramount. Therefore, an important question arises: who should manage an innovation project?

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innovation

Five mistakes to avoid when managing a disruptive project: 2-Imitating entrepreneurs in failing fast

This article is the second part of a series of fives articles on mistakes to avoid when managing a disruptive project, extracted from my new book “A Manager’s Guide to Disruptive Innovation”.

Because the innovation process is so complex and uncertain, entrepreneurs continually ponder over the ideal approach to an innovation project. Today, some recommend an approach called “fail fast, fail early”. In essence, the idea is that since entrepreneurs cannot really know where they are going, then they should just try something quickly to see if it works, and if it does not work, give up and try something else. This idea is appealing: it calls for open-mindedness and flatters the entrepreneur by highlighting his or her ability to make difficult decisions. However, for a start-up entrepreneur as well as for an existing business, this attitude is dangerous because it is built on an implicit but erroneous premise concerning the innovation process.

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innovation

Five mistakes to avoid when managing a disruptive project: 1-Trying to go too fast

This article is the first part of a series of fives articles on mistakes to avoid when managing a disruptive project, extracted from my new book ‘”A Manager’s Guide to Disruptive Innovation”.

One of the cardinal errors with disruptive innovation is to seek to scale up too quickly. In most cases, this condemns the project to fail.

There are two reasons why a company pushes for rapid growth: the first is that large companies need big markets to grow, and the second is that there is an underlying belief that the development of a disruptive innovation project is linear.

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innovation

How Top Management Kills Disruptive Innovation: Death by a Thousand Cuts

We often think that innovation is not successful within an organization because top management puts an end to the project or denies the project the means necessary for its development. This happens, but this is rarely the case. Very often, innovation, especially disruptive innovation, dies when the project is discovered by top management, and the latter, for the price of its support, requires that the project fit within the current organization, thereby removing its disruptive aspects.

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