The Daily Innovator

Quotations to innovate by #37

Here's another great quotation to inspire your work today!  Tim is absolutely right, of course.  The question is whether we will choose to think about our work in this way, as well as convince others to do the same.  If innovation naysayers are left with no alternative but to reframe their own thinking, we've made a step in the right direction!

"Where you innovate, how you innovate, and what you innovate are design problems."                               
                                                                    —Tim Brown, CEO, Ideo

(From Fast Company First Impression newsletter)

Quotations to innovate by #36

Okay, I've promised to fill in the archive with posts for all the days I've missed in the last couple of months.  It is my intention to do that, and so I'm projecting ahead on the number of quotations I'll include from the middle of October to the middle of December in order to catch up.  I'm figuring it will be 24 quotations, including this one from Sir Winston Churchill, which I just heard from author Frans Johansson at ASAE & The Center's Great Ideas Conference in Orlando:

If you're going through hell, keep going.

I think these words should be something of a mantra for daily innovators.  It can be hellish trying to persuade people to embrace innovation.  But when things get tough, we cannot simply give up on our efforts.  Doing so will leave us in right where we don't want to be:  frustrated, disappointed and without having made any real progress on the work of innovation.  So my advice is to not lose sight of the big picture.  The naysayers will try to distract you, but in the long run, the daily innovators will prevail!

Quotations to innovate by #12

For some time now, I've been using the following quotation from former Czech Republic president and playwright Vaclav Havel in my presentations:

Vision is not enough, it must be combined with venture. It is not enough to stare up the steps, we must step up the stairs.

I love this quotation, not only because of what it means, but also that it comes from a true leader rather than a business and management guru.  The link between vision and venture is particularly important to the community I serve.  Associations are very good at articulating vision statements, but they are less good at venturing to make those visions come true.  The connection between vision and venture is absolutely essential in the pursuit of innovation, and it is one the daily innovator must live everyday. 

Advice:  take a look at the total picture of the work you're doing today, this week or this month and try to identify where the relationship between vision and venture is at its strongest. Look for common characteristics among these projects so you can use them to understand how you like to innovate and also as a filter for other opportunities that might emerge. 

Quotations to innovate by #11

Bill Gross is a quite successful serial entrepreneur who has some sage advice for all daily innovators, by way of the Fast Company website:

Try a lot of things to find all the dead ends, and learn from them.

What I love about this quotation is that it highlights the essential weakness of the naysayers and provides the strategy to defeat them.  The weakness:  innovation naysayers aren't interested in learning, because learning might actually disconfirm what they "know" to be true about the world. The worst-case scenario for the naysayer is having no alternative but to confront his/her embedded prejudices, which is precisely what learning demands.

The strategy:  broaden the depth and breadth of your experiences and your learning so you can beat the naysayers at their own game.  Look in every direction for new ideas and new insights.  Read voraciously, particularly about future trends and new science and technology developments.  Take your learning and put it into action as often as possible, looking for things that work and isolating what doesn't.  You can defeat the closed-mindedness of the naysayers with your knowledge of what's next.  Ignorance is a powerful enemy to be sure, but it can (and must) be defeated. 

Quotations to innovate by #10

Another powerful innovation quote, this time from US Navy Admiral Hyman G. Rickover, the "Father of the Nuclear Navy":

Good ideas and innovations must be driven into existence by courage and patience.

Courage and patience...qualities that I find in desperately short supply among many of today's organizational leaders.  In their place, what I see is a commitment to the safe and expedient, reflecting a desire to avoid risk at all costs.  We cannot allow this way of thinking and acting to dominate our workplaces. As daily innovators, we need to be shining examples of courage and patience in the pursuit of innovation each and everyday.  My advice: embrace fully your commitment to innovation and act accordingly. The alternative is to lead a work life that is totally ordinary, wholly unsatisfying and, in all likelihood, rather undistinguished.  Is that the legacy you want to leave behind?

Quotations to innovate by #9

Another great quotation for your consideration, this time from George Bernard Shaw:

Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine and at last you create what you will.

Are you using your gift of imagination?  What was the last creation you willed into being?  Share your stories!

Quotations to innovate by #8

In my Wednesday post, I mentioned that the October issue of Fast Company includes an excerpt from Tom Kelley's new book, The Ten Faces of Innovation.  I've read the article and I'll be posting on it more next week.  But I wanted to go ahead and share a very interesting quotation from Tom about "devil's advocates" that should generate considerable conversation.  He writes:

In fact, the devil's advocate may be the biggest innovation killer in America today.  What makes this negative persona so dangerous is that it is such a subtle threat.  Every day, thouands of great new ideas, concepts, and plans are nipped in the bud by devil's advocates.

What has been your experience with the devil's advocates in your organization?  Are they offering sincere pushback or are their comments thinly-veiled attempts to subvert your ideas?  What strategies have you used to defuse the arguments of devil's advocates?  Please share your thoughts!

Quotations to innovate by #7

Yet another fantastic innovation quotation, this one from former Harvard Business Review editor Ted Levitt, submitted for your consideration:

Just as energy is the basis of life itself, and ideas the source of innovation, so is innovation the vital spark of all human change, improvement and progress.

Let me direct my comments on this particular quotation to the "bosses" out there, i.e., those individuals who are responsible to managing/directing/leading the activities of others.  Take a close look at this quotation and then ask yourself the following question:  do you believe it is true?  Do you believe that innovation is "the vital spark of all human change, improvement and progress?"  I certainly hope you do, because genuine innovation leadership demands a core belief that innovation itself is actually about much more than making money off of cool, new stuff.  Innovation is about advancing ourselves, our organizations, our communities and our society in ways that make a brighter future possible.  The alternative--the failure to innovate--leads to the inevitable stagnation and inexorable decline of the entire system.

If you do not believe in the message of Ted Levitt's quotation, please share your thinking as a comment below.  If you do believe it, tell us how you live this perspective in your work.  This is an important conversation for all of us, especially when we occupy positions of leadership.  Please engage.

Quotations to innovate by #6

Great quotation that came through today from Fast Company.   

"If you're frightened of making a mistake, you won't make a thing."
—John Taylor, Director of Design, GM's APEx

True words indeed.  Are you scared to fail?  Thinking about your last 12 months at work, what types of products, services or experiences have you created that included the distinct possibility of making a mistake or failing outright?  To put it another way, when was the last time you took a chance at work?  Share your story with us...and take a few moments to read John Taylor's story as well.  It's well worth it!

Quotations to innovate by #5

Another great innovation quotation from Dee Hock, a man whose work I very much admire:

The problem is never how to get new, innovative thoughts into your mind, but how to get old ones out. Every mind is a building filled with archaic furniture. Clean out a corner of your mind and creativity will instantly fill it.

What do you do to get the "archaic furniture" out of your mind? What assumptions and biases are you willing to let go so that new ideas can flow freely and energize your day?  Don't worry at the moment whether you can implement all of those wonderful ideas.  There's time for that.  For right now, just let them fill you with passion and excitement. 

Now, don't you feel better?