Innovation versus Idiots How to stay on the right road

Still catching up with some of the older pending posts in my draft bin. Found some from Harvard Business Publishing, especially this one by Bill Taylor.

The article of particular interest was Wisdom of Warren Buffett: On Innovators, Imitators, and Idiots in which he provides a hour-long television interview with Buffett in which he talks about the "natural progression" of how good new ideas go wrong. The "three I's":

1. Innovators, who see opportunities that others don't.
2. Imitators, who copy what the innovators have done.
3. Idiots, whose avarice undoes the very innovations they are trying to use to get rich.

Taylor tells us that, the problem, in other words, isn't with innovation -- it's with the idiocy that follows.

So how do we as individuals (not to mention as companies and societies) continue to embrace the value-creating upside of creativity while guarding against the value-destroying downsides of imitation? The answer, it seems to me, is about values--about always being able to distinguish between that which is smart and that which is expedient. And that takes discipline. Can you distinguish between a genuine innovation and a mindless imitation? Are you prepared to walk away from ideas that promise to make money, even if they make no sense?

So if Buffet warns us of the path to economic destruction, but what do we need to do to keep on the right road? Scott Anthony provides another insightful post, again from Harvard Business Publishing in which he discuses the Three Steps to Innovating in Struggling Industries.

1. Lower the cost of testing.
2. Creatively tap into outside resources.
3. Ruthlessly prune the portfolio.

Kicking Butt: The New To Get Things Going After Building Your Organization

As a result of seeking paradigm shifts, I am becoming more open to the idea of creating and enhancing change-agent organizations beyond those found in the public sector. There are a variety of challenges though. Jessica Andors, one of the authors o, was part of a MIT panel DUSP 75 years diversifying cities. The article focuses on community development in cities. Paraphrasing what they said, rather than making a product or providing a service it is creating an organization that will build indigenous power and encourage engagement to energize a barren public landscape in our communities.

• Network Organizing: A Strategy for Building Community Engagement

  diigo tags: community-planning, networking, activism

  • Our response to this situation is a “network organizing” strategy that connects people to each other and to opportunities for people to step into public life – from the neighborhood group to the City Council – in a way that feels safe, fun and productive. Our approach is a hybrid of many of the established practices of community organizing. The principal twist is the application of network theory, a set of ideas that come from the technology and economics fields but that are proving useful for understanding and shaping our community environments. Applying this thinking to our work has helped us to challenge some of the common obstacles to genuine engagement, and shape a strong demand environment for change.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

It is not enough though just to build the organization regardless of how engaged and empowered everyone feels, it must also have an impact on its environment, political, social and economic to cause change.

Kicking Butt: The New Organizational Model? an article by Kristin Clarke was featured back on 10/30/08 in Acronym. It discussed how social movements start, stall, or succeed and used the success of the September 5, Stand Up to Cancer (SU2C;) telethon as a successful template. Here are the lessons that I took away from her article, it is a re-blogged summary. Acronym is a publication of ASAE (American Society of Association Executives) and the Center for Association Leadership. I am still having trouble with getting my head around who they are, while they seem to be an association of change-agents their scope seems to defy concise definition, still they consistently come up with great ideas.

• First, take radical steps to overcome barriers among the interrelated sectors to build an entirely new space in which leading professionals collaborate and take risks. Kristin termed this as, blow up the "let's all get along and just work better together" niceties in favor of "Dream Teams" rallied around a kick-butt attitude of "We're not leaving this war room until we solve this sucker!
  

• Second, create a heavy-hitting leadership team. Heavy-hitting means not only well-known but those who have a long term stake. With the SU2C's leadership team, Kristin points out, "Cancer has touched each of them personally in some manner, making them incredibly determined, knowledgeable, and impatient for progress (hence, the sparks for innovation)."
  

• Third, be smart enough to know that you are not smart enough to solve all of the problems. Partner with others who have been doing it longer and better. SU2C unsurprisingly chose the American Association for Cancer Research

• Fourth, leverage social networks in a big way. Hopefully you have considerable social networks or can get them allowing one , bringing in Kristin says, "the kind of major donors that cause envy among us all--AARP, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Alliance for Global Good, and the Milken Family Foundation, for instance—and then convinced an unprecedented number of media partners—from online powerhouses like WebMD, Facebook, and AOL to ye ole traditional Hearst Corporation and The New York Times Company—to help jumpstart "a new movement." It didn't hurt that more than 100 celebrities also leapt on board."
  

I am getting to appreciate her conclusion more now that the Obama campaign has succeeded. Unlike some, I see this as time to realize opportunities.

Maybe a wildly new bring-it-on attitude and fearlessness truly are the secret ingredients.

How to be a good manager: Be generous to everybody

One ongoing paradigm shift is looking to use my skills sets in new ways after I finish my current career. The question is not only what to do, but who to do it with. 50-plus entrepreneurs starting lifestyle businesses via RetirementRevised by Mark Miller back in May of this year provides some insights.

Ask someone over 50 what they want to do after retirement, and you may well get this answer: "Keep working!" Surveys suggest that more than 75 percent of the baby boom generation plans to keep working past traditional retirement age. But it's not likely that many will keep laboring away in Corporate America. Most boomers [...]

The "who" applies not only to the type of organization, which defines more than anything the what, the who is also the types of people within the organization as well. It has been discussed before, but Lela Davidson's article, also in May, on 4 Generations of Workers - Can You Relate? via Business Pundit provides another look at working in a multi-generational environment.

Today's workforce is a diverse mix of generations that each come with their collective background and value systems. Understanding their unique perspectives is important in a large organization where they are likely to be working side by side. Professor at the Instituto de Empresa in Madrid, Spain, Cristina Simón's study Generation Y and the Labor Market: Models for HR Management, address differences in generational values. Simón looked at our generations of workers, analyzed their values and suggested ways for businesses to get people working together.

Four Generations and Their ValuesTraditional Workers(born before 1946/over 60)

• Value loyalty and discipline.
• Tend to respect authority.
• Accomplished a lot
• Contributed to success under hierarchical systems of the past.

Baby Boomers (1946-1960/late 40s and up)

• Expect success.
• Created strong social change including
• The hippie movement,
• Feminism, and
• Civil rights.
• Optimistic and self-motivated.

Generation X (1961-1979/30s and 40s)

• Best academic training and international experience in history.
• Breaking with traditional patterns, including
• Creating informal work environments
• Transforming corporate structures from hierarchical into horizontal and flexible entities.
• Personal initiative and a healthy dose of skepticism toward large organizations
• Produced a lot of entrepreneurs from this generation.
• Key value achievement of balance between career goals and quality of life.

Generation Y (starting from 1980/under 30)

• Lived their entire lives with information technology
• Have a hard time comprehending a world without it.
• Tend toward individual needs in favor of the community good
• Often demand a high level of autonomy.
• Lacks in loyalty, makes up for with the the value they place on relationships with co-workers and supervisors.

So this gives me potentials for what to do and who to do it with, next is how to do it in a ideal environment. One of my favorite sources of insight is Brazen Careerist by Penelope Trunk who wrote on How to be a good manager: Be generous again this past May. I am just summarizing what for me are some of the high points here. For the details, you need to go to the original post.

So the first rule, and probably the only rule of management, is to be respectful. A lot of questions I get from managers can be answered the same way: ask yourself if you are really being respectful.

Most people don't see management as listening and thinking, but that's what it is. Because that's what caring about someone looks like. Once you get to the point where you are connecting with the people you manage, and you are helping them get what they want from their job, you are in a position to change the world. Really.

All this reminds Ms Trunk of Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

She comes up with her own version of Pseudo-Maslow Hierarchy of Job Needs in which you start with get a job, and you figure out, eventually, how to use your job to make the world a better place.

1. Physiological - Take care of keeping yourself fed and clothed.
2. Safety - Work on feeling secure that you can keep yourself employed, if something happens.
3. Love and belonging - Figure out how to get a job that respects your personal life.
4. Esteem – perform well at your job because you have the resources and the security to do so
5. Self-actualization – help other people reach their potential through creative and moral problem solving

I am at the point where I am directly quoting the original article more than I prefer for these posts, but Ms. Trunk says it so well that re-writing does not seem to be of any service.

So really, management is an opportunity to self-actualize. Some people will self-actualize by being artists, or writing code. Some people will self-actualize through management. Some, a combination.

But the point here is that being in management is an opportunity to grow spiritually and give back to the world in a way that is enormously fulfilling. If you allow it. You will need to set aside real time to make this happen. And you need to give generously. No big surprise there, though, because why else are we here, on this planet, except to give to each other?

Encouraging Innovation

From the Christian Science Monitor

How companies can encourage innovation
Many workers admit they are not living up to their creative potential. Workplace experts say there are ways to narrow this 'creativity gap.'

Starbuck Wisdom

Seth Godin has a rather simple post on the following great story. This sounds like a personal paradigm shift to me. I am not able to judge how well Starbucks instills this set of paradigms into its employees. Behind the story are the perspectives of Branding Guru John Moore who has some rather interesting insights from his time at Starbucks.

This site's scope does try to reach the philosophical even spiritual wisdom but the practical lessons of effective business practices are still to be learned and respected. Especially when implementing them results in the very objectives this site seeks to obtain, paradigm shifts that benefit both the individual and the organization.

Change agents by their nature have a message that they need to get out. Both to convince others of the need for change and to have them participate actively in that change. Other interesting bits from John Moore.

Espresso Shots of Business Wisdom

Tribal Knowledge

BizDev for the Non-Biz Too

If the concepts of partnerships, traffic exchanges, joint ventures and co-promotions live in a netherworld for businesses then it is be suspected that it does even more so for change organizations as well. If Non-governmental Organizations (aka change organizations) begin as I predict start take a more forward role in initiating change without the connection to governmental entities then they will need to learn not only the social aspects of working together but the legal and often times regulatory roles as well. More on Bizdev by Seth.

Seth's Blog: Business development. Found under Paradigm Pathways Business & Economic Development

Learning from Businesses

An important part of this concept of intentional paradigm shifts is that there is a great deal change organizations can learn from businesses, more in my opinion than they can learn from local governmental entities. If the following works in business then it should work for others as well.

From The Entrepreneurial Mind
While each company is very different, we encountered some common themes: These small businesses tend to let employees at all levels make key decisions, and they groom their future leaders from within. They offer generous traditional and untraditional benefits (how about a six-week sabbatical?). And they constantly hunt for new ways to improve the employee experience or engage employees.

And many share a sizable slice of their profits with employees, teaching them to read company financial statements so they grasp how their job is connected to the success of the organization.