Innovation Insights
by Stephen Shapiro
Last week Apple announced their new lineup of iPhones: the 5S and the 5C. In the subsequent days, their stock dropped like the apple that fell from a tree and hit Newton on the head. Why? Most analysts were expecting
This week we launched some changes to the website. A revised home page with links to two new pages, one for meeting planners and one for innovation leaders. We also streamlined the look and feel slightly. We revised the look
In Best Practices are Stupid, I discuss the need to “innovate where you differentiate.” That is, discover what you do better than everyone else and rally all of your innovation efforts around that. In the book I discuss one company
For those of you interested in making internal collaboration a reality within your organization, I am conducting a free webinar in conjunction with InnoCentive, the premier open innovation platform. Although some of the content will be similar to what I
From my experience, 80% of innovations within most companies are “dot solutions.” That is, innovations are typically developed by individuals from a single domain of expertise. Deep expertise is valued. Dig deep wells. (for more on my perspectives on dot
In the September issue of “Speaker Magazine” (published by the National Speakers Association), I have a 3-page article. It is called: Do Less, Make More: Work Only One Hour a Day by Mastering Leverage. Here’s the beginning… I’ve been trying
Do you run a small business? Or does your small business run you? As entrepreneurs, there are countless things we could do to grow or improve our businesses. It’s easy to keep busy 100 hours a week. I know—I’ve done
The question, “Do you really think for yourself?” isn’t as easy to answer as you might think. When a challenge or problem arises at work and you’re unsure of an answer, you probably rely on the judgment of others. But
I’ve had a recurring conversation with quite a few friends and colleagues lately. They’re unhappy in their current jobs and want to do something different. For many, this means becoming an entrepreneur and launching their own business. Conventional wisdom suggests
Jake Sorofman, a Research Director at Gartner, just reviewed “Best Practices Are Stupid.” His review started… Don’t let its compact size—or snarky title—fool you. It’s a worthwhile read. Unlike so many other books in this particular genre, it doesn’t disguise
It seems that all too often, innovation has become synonymous with technology. I was recently working with a company that had a number of challenges they wanted to solve. Most of them looked something like this… “How can we use
Do you feel overworked? Do you feel as though you never have time to relax? What if you needed to work only one hour a day? I was recently interviewed by Dorie Clark for Forbes.com and discussed how I do
Back in 1996, I was conducting an important three-day “train the trainer” session for a program we were launching at Accenture. I was personally training 200 top client partners and managers. It was critical that we got everyone’s buy-in. At
On my Monday July 22 at 11AM EDT free webinar, I will be giving attendees my latest creation: The 10x Innovation ROI Quick Reference Card. This 2-page checklist summarizes four important innovation concepts: Ask the Right Challenge [FOCUS] Frame Challenges
I recently had a problem with my Bose bluetooth headset. I called their customer service department and they solved the problem quickly. They had me return the old one (postage paid) and they sent me a new one. I
In previous blog entries, I discussed why you need to make your innovation a form of experimentation. Doing this redefines the meaning of failure. Experiments (and as a result, innovation) only fails when you don’t have enough data to support
What if almost everything you know about improving innovation ROI is wrong? The expensive and inefficient reality is most organizations are working on ideas that don’t really matter. Everyone talks about innovation, but few know how to do it. In
Back in 2006, I wrote a book called Goal-Free Living. Last year I wrote an article for American Express OPEN Forum, How Oprah Nearly Killed my Business. And recently I wrote a blog entry titled, Do Not Develop Breakthrough Innovation.
When Skyfall, the latest James Bond movie hit the theaters, I was first in line to watch it. There was a scene where Bond receives a very sensual shave with a straight edge razor from an attractive woman. The process
During a recent speech in Copenhagen, I tried an experiment. With the help of 5 individuals, we explored the 5 traits of all successful people. I think you will agree that we identified some traits that ALL successful people share.
We have all heard that smiles are contagious. Is that really the case? There have been numerous studies that show that not only does a smile physiologically change your own mood, but it can also alter the mood of those
A client recently asked me why large companies never develop “breakthrough” innovations, and instead rely on buying small companies or licensing their technologies. He felt that the game changing innovations were always the result of someone “tinkering in a garage,”
Time is a fixed commodity. We all get to enjoy the same 24 hours a day as everyone else. But for some, this is not enough to do everything they want. Therefore, whenever I am on the road and I
I recently spent 2 days with various groups at Shell in the Netherlands. Afterwards, Pieter Pulleman wrote this two page article on my presentation and other innovation activities at Shell. As you can see the title of the article is
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