Hand Dryer or Paper Towels / Collaboration or Competition
At the Open Innovation Summit last week, I had a lively conversation with a few individuals. The debate was about which model of open innovation is most effective – competitive or collaborative. Kevin Boudreau and Karim Lakhani wrote an excellent article earlier this year in the MIT Sloane Management Review on this very topic. They […]
Toothpaste Innovations
I never really thought much about toothpaste. But at the last two innovation conferences where I spoke, toothpaste was one of the hot topics. At the FT Innovate conference in London, Unilever discussed their “Signal White Now” (and other brands) toothpaste. Instead of using harsh bleaches and abrasives, they borrowed an optical-effect technology from their […]
Shooting for Mars May Help Us on Earth
At the TEDx NASA conference, I had some amazing conversations with people in the “green room” while preparing to take the stage. One individual had spent his entire career with NASA focused on travel to Mars. This was his life’s passion. But now that he has moved out of the space program into the private […]
Innovation @ TEDx NASA
This past Friday I had 6 minutes to share a message about innovation with the world at TEDx NASA. It was a fantastic event with 29 speakers, authors, musicians, aerospace engineers, a neuroscientist and more. 1,700 people were in attendance and it is reported that nearly 100,000 people watched via video streaming on the internet. […]
TEDx NASA
I am now in Newport News, Virginia preparing for my speech tomorrow at TEDx NASA. There will be 1700 aerospace engineers and scientists in the audience. My topics is titled “Innovation is in the Space.” I have only 6 minutes for my presentation. This may prove to be my most challenging speech yet! Blaise Pascal […]
Content is No Longer King…Long Live the King (Part 2)
In an earlier blog entry on content, readers provided a number of interesting comments. If you haven’t already read that article (and the comments), you may want to do so in order to understand this new article. Many did not agree with my point of view. And that is great. I only wanted to stimulate […]
Content is No Longer King….Long Live the King (Part 1)
We often hear that content is king. But I wonder if this is still true. Let’s take some very simple examples. I am sure most of you know that the iPod was not a revolutionary invention. It was merely a new spin on the already existing MP3 player. The real innovation was the integration of […]
GCLS Quotes – Day 1
I am in NYC participating as a delegate in the Global Creative Leadership Summit led by the Louis Blouin Foundation. Attending are 100 fascinating people ranging from Prime Ministers to business leaders. Over the course of 3 days there are a number of conversations on topics related to improving the world. Here are some of […]
Weight of Soft Drinks Shipped > Weight of Cars Shipped
Last week I had a fantastic meeting with the CEO of a mid-sized energy company. We had a number of fascinating conversations ranging from Personality Poker, Open Innovation, and alternative energy. In the meeting, I was drinking my “caffeine in a can” – a diet cola. The CEO pointed at my soft drink and said […]
What Businesses Can Learn About Innovation from Cultural Anthropology
My good friend, Jeff Salz, is a fantastic speaker and a Doctor of Cultural Anthropology. Lately we have had some fascinating conversations about what businesses can learn about innovation through the study of cultural anthropology. To get things rolling, I suggested that there were two areas where the innovation world would benefit from his expertise: […]