Andrew Hargadon “How breakthroughs happen”
In "How breakthroughs happen" (Harvard Business School Press 2003) Andrew Hargadon , professor of technology management at UCLA, takes us into the history of radical innovations, from Edison’s incandescent lamp to Reebook shoes. He takes into pieces the complex mechanisms at play behind the "lonely inventor" myth. After studying for ten years the companies which demonstrated their ability to bring radical innovations to the market, Andrew Hargadon concludes that the ones which succeed are "technology brokers". It’s the ability to understand and integrate previous or exogenous technologies, to creatively recombine ideas and concepts, which enables a few companies to work as "innovation factories". A unique and well-researched point of view really worth reading.