The Innovators Studio with Phil McKinney

When it comes to innovation, there are a collection of unwritten rules of thumb and myths of innovation that both help and hurt innovators. We all use rules of thumbs and myths in our everyday lives such as estimating how long something will take to complete. At the same time, rules and myths can be […]

When it comes to innovation, there are a collection of unwritten rules of thumb and myths of innovation that both help and hurt innovators. We all use rules of thumbs and myths in our everyday lives such as estimating how long something will take to complete. At the same time, rules and myths can be misapplied and hold us back from doing something.  For example, using a “rule” to estimate that something will “take to long to complete” and therefore we never start.

In this weeks show, we dispel the 5 myths of innovation that get in the way of innovators.

5 Myths of Innovation

* The Myth of the Eureka Moment: This thought that ideas come as a bolt of lightning undermines the importance of influence and hard work. Innovation is not easy and requires preparation and practice so that when those sparks of inspiration appear, you are ready to take advantage of them.

* The Myth the Best Ideas Win: Our passion as innovators for an idea sometimes gets in the way. We are the first to defend our idea when success is not just about the idea. While you need a great idea to start with, other influences will determine if that great idea is a market success or a market bomb. One influence that continues to trip me up is “timing“. Is the market ready? Is the cycle of technologies needed ready?, etc.

* The Myth of the Magic Method: There are consultants who will try to claim that they have derived the magic formula to innovation by studying major innovators. In my opinion, it bogus. Each individual, team and organization is unique and you have to steal, modify and test methods to find what works for you. There is no single one size fits all process to innovation.

* The Myth of the Lone Inventor: Just look at the leading, highly innovative companies. A vast majority came into existence because of a partnership. HP had Bill Hewlett and David Packard, Apple has Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak and Google had Larry Page and Sergey Brin. Innovation is a team sport. Find partners who fill in your innovation skills gap.

* The Myth That Your Boss Knows More Than You: Talk about being uncomfortable. As  CEO, this is one myth that my team reminds me of. We all would like to think we have it all together. The reality, in today's work, the pace of change is accelerating which requires flexible, dynamic teams to keep up the pace of innovation needed. The result is that the skills needed for innovation success are constantly changing. As leader, your role is to recruit. mentor and coach your talent to success.

Update: Credit for the original names for the myths of innovation was inadvertently left off the original blog post. Credit should be given to Scott Burken and his book, “The Myths of Innovation“. Our apologizes.

Additional Resources

Below are additional resources mentioned during the show and ones I thought may be helpful around the subject of dispelling the myths of innovation.

* 9 Daily Exercises that I Do to Keep My Creative Muscle in Shape

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Innovation is everywhere – in our pockets, in our cars, in our work and in our home. Where do these new ideas come from? New ideas are the foundation of our future and growing economic driver of society. This emerging innovation economy, which value ideas over anything else, is quickly overtaking the information/knowledge economy that […]

Innovation is everywhere – in our pockets, in our cars, in our work and in our home. Where do these new ideas come from? New ideas are the foundation of our future and growing economic driver of society. This emerging innovation economy, which value ideas over anything else, is quickly overtaking the information/knowledge economy that we've all been apart of for the last four decades.

In this weeks show, we discuss:

* The historical impact of innovation investment on the margins of products and services.

* The role of innovation by acquisition to play catch-up when organizations ignored the need to invest in what creates value in the innovation economy.

* The impact on gross domestic product (GDP) growth from innovation over the last decade.

* A definition of the emerging innovation economy and innovation economics.

* CEO view of the importance of innovation.

* The role innovation plays in determine the value attached to an organization.

* Do CEO's consider their organizations ready to deliver the innovations their organizations need?

* The role of critical thinking and problem solving skills on a teams readiness to innovate.

* The readiness of individuals today in the job market to have a career in the emerging innovation economy.

* What are you to do about it?

Announcing The Innovators Network

As a result of the growing number of individuals, organizations and governments asking for help with their innovation initiatives, I've been searching for a way to meet the demand while not ignoring my other commitments.  Up till now, I've been able to do both but the requests are growing and my time is limited. My day-job is to drive the innovation economy in my role as a CEO at the R&D/Innovation lab for a global industry and I am 100% committed to my team and the companies that fund my innovation work there.

So how do I “pay it forward” to as many as possible?

During today's show, we announced the formation of The Innovators Network LLC which will be run by Mark Varricchione.  Mark and I have worked together for more than 20 years. He has taken, and been certified, in all of my workshops and courses over the years and is in the best position to build a team and take my work and help as many individuals and companies as possible.

As a result, I have granted The Innovators Network the exclusive worldwide license to all of my content, books, podcast, radio shows, workshops, courses including the Killer Questions.

Mark will be the President and CEO while I take on the Non-Executive Chairman role. I have also invested my own money in to this new venture.

Over the next few weeks, other worldclass innovators will be joining the network and bringing their expertise, content, courses and other tools with them.

Mark's vision for this new entity is ..

Stay tuned as Mark launches a number of exciting programs over the next few months ..

Slides Used In Today's Show

Many make the mistake of thinking that their lives are going to work out as planned. It never does. What would happen if you treated your life like a startup? The guest for this weeks show, Dr. Anna Akbari, discusses her book, "Startup Your Life: Hustle And Hack Your Way To Happiness." As an entrepreneur, […]

Many make the mistake of thinking that their lives are going to work out as planned. It never does. What would happen if you treated your life like a startup?

The guest for this weeks show, Dr. Anna Akbari, discusses her book, “Startup Your Life: Hustle And Hack Your Way To Happiness.”

As an entrepreneur, Anna Akbari learned that one of the best things about startups is their ability to “pivot” quickly — basically a euphemism for failing and trying again. She quickly found that personal success is no different.

Anne had the unfortunate timing of finishing college just as the job market went into one of worst downturns anyone has seen. Any plans she had were out the window and her new plans would require her to prototype, test, fail, pivot and try again. Just like a startup.

In her book, she shares the lessons that entrepreneurs learn through the school of hard knocks and applies them to ways you can and should look at your life.

In this weeks show on how to treat your life like a startup, we discuss:

* Her early years and the decision at a young age that show would be a Dr.

* Her college experience of searching for what she wanted to be.

* The expectations that if you follow the rules of going to school, work hard and get good grades — then you would be successful.

* What happens when the expectation can't be met?

* The lessons learned from failure.

* How startup thinking can be applied to education.

Two Pieces of Advice From the Book:

* Life VC: Just as startups have venture capitalists, you need life VC's. These are the people who come alongside and who invest in your life. These are not the coaches and mentors you may have but people who invest in your life by being there.

* Make Time For Fun: Get away and have fun. Use that time away to recharge yourself so that you can make the next milestone.

About Anna Akbari:

Anna is a sociologist, entrepreneur, and writer. She is the founder of Sociology of Style, an image and life coaching company, and a partner in HVCK, a Silicon Valley innovation consultancy. A former instructor at New York University and Parsons School of Design, she is a frequent speaker and media personality and has written for and been featured by Forbes, CNN, The Atlantic, The Economist, Financial Times, TED, Bulletproof Executive, TIME, and dozens more.

How to follow Anna:

* Anna's website

* Ann's book, Startup Your Life: Hustle And Hack Your Way To Happiness on Amazon

* Anna on twitter

* Anna on LinkedIn

This time of year, I take a moment and look at innovations that were announced in the last year whose impact will be significant in the next 12 to 24 months. This year's list contains some intriguing innovations that are less about "new tech" and more about human ingenuity to look at problems and opportunities […]

This time of year, I take a moment and look at innovations that were announced in the last year whose impact will be significant in the next 12 to 24 months. This year's list contains some intriguing innovations that are less about “new tech” and more about human ingenuity to look at problems and opportunities in unique and different ways. These 6 high impact innovations will change the world.

Here is this weeks show …

This weeks show notes/links:

#6: Edible Drones

Pouncer™, an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), is the brainchild of Nigel Gifford OBE, who was one of the innovative team behind the unmanned Ascenta™ high altitude, long endurance platform that was acquired by Facebook in 2014 as part of their internet global connective programme.

“Pouncer™ addresses the fast reactive need to deliver food aid into remote, difficult, damaged and broken infrastructures by overflying the difficulties and placing life-sustaining nutrition exactly where it’s needed”, said Nigel, who thought of the concept by combining his “far flung food” expedition background with his aerospace skills. The Pouncer™, covered by patent application, has an airframe skin made from biodegradable starch-based thermoplastic, filled with spars of compressed and vacuum sealed foodstuffs. The Pouncer™ fuselage is filled with the staple diet of those receiving supplies and carries water and fuel for cooking. It is to be produced in various weights to meet differing requirements.

#5: Wheelchair For Developing Countries

SafariSeat is the first project from the social enterprise, and is designed to be low cost, all terrain and open-source, so that it can be made in basic workshops using bicycle parts. Unlike existing wheelchairs, SafariSeat uses a patented mechanism mimicking a car suspension, so that all of the wheels are able to remain on the ground for better stability. As well as costing little to make, the designer will make the blueprints for the wheelchair completely free. This will act as part of an open source toolkit which will enable any workshop to manufacture SafariSeats to be used in the local community.

#4: Reusable Rockets

Thousands of rockets have flown into space, but not until 2015 did one return like this: it came down upright on a landing pad, steadily firing to control its descent, almost as if a movie of its launch were being played backward. If this can be done regularly and reusable rockets could be used over and over, spaceflight could become a hundred times cheaper.

#3: BOTS

An artificial-intelligence lawyer chatbot (DoNotPay) has successfully contested 160,000 parking tickets across London and New York for free, showing that chatbots can actually be useful.  The future of chat bots is accelerating and soon will be the primary (and I would argue preferred) way for us to engage with many of the companies, support services and information sources we interact with regularly.

#2: Ambient Backscatter

Ambient backscatter uses existing radio frequency signals, such as radio, television and digital telephony, to transmit data without a battery or power grid connection. Each such device uses an antenna to pick up an existing signal and convert it into tens to hundreds of microwatts of electricity.[1] It uses that power to modify and reflect the signal with encoded data. Antennas on other devices, in turn, detect that signal and can respond accordingly.

#1: ???

This time of year, I take a moment and look at innovations that were announced in the last year whose impact will be significant in the next 12 to 24 months. This year's list contains some intriguing innovations that are less about “new tech” and more about human ingenuity to look at problems and opportunities in unique and different ways. These 6 high impact innovations will change the world.

Here is this weeks show …

This weeks show notes/links:

#6: Edible Drones

Pouncer™, an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), is the brainchild of Nigel Gifford OBE, who was one of the innovative team behind the unmanned Ascenta™ high altitude, long endurance platform that was acquired by Facebook in 2014 as part of their internet global connective programme.

“Pouncer™ addresses the fast reactive need to deliver food aid into remote, difficult, damaged and broken infrastructures by overflying the difficulties and placing life-sustaining nutrition exactly where it’s needed”, said Nigel, who thought of the concept by combining his “far flung food” expedition background with his aerospace skills. The Pouncer™, covered by patent application, has an airframe skin made from biodegradable starch-based thermoplastic, filled with spars of compressed and vacuum sealed foodstuffs. The Pouncer™ fuselage is filled with the staple diet of those receiving supplies and carries water and fuel for cooking. It is to be produced in various weights to meet differing requirements.

#5: Wheelchair For Developing Countries

SafariSeat is the first project from the social enterprise, and is designed to be low cost, all terrain and open-source, so that it can be made in basic workshops using bicycle parts. Unlike existing wheelchairs, SafariSeat uses a patented mechanism mimicking a car suspension, so that all of the wheels are able to remain on the ground for better stability. As well as costing little to make, the designer will make the blueprints for the wheelchair completely free. This will act as part of an open source toolkit which will enable any workshop to manufacture SafariSeats to be used in the local community.

#4: Reusable Rockets

Thousands of rockets have flown into space, but not until 2015 did one return like this: it came down upright on a landing pad, steadily firing to control its descent, almost as if a movie of its launch were being played backward. If this can be done regularly and reusable rockets could be used over and over, spaceflight could become a hundred times cheaper.

#3: BOTS

An artificial-intelligence lawyer chatbot (DoNotPay) has successfully contested 160,000 parking tickets across London and New York for free, showing that chatbots can actually be useful.  The future of chat bots is accelerating and soon will be the primary (and I would argue preferred) way for us to engage with many of the companies, support services and information sources we interact with regularly.

#2: Ambient Backscatter

Ambient backscatter uses existing radio frequency signals, such as radio, television and digital telephony, to transmit data without a battery or power grid connection. Each such device uses an antenna to pick up an existing signal and convert it into tens to hundreds of microwatts of electricity.[1] It uses that power to modify and reflect the signal with encoded data. Antennas on other devices, in turn, detect that signal and can respond accordingly.

#1: ???

It can be extremely frustrating when your ideas can't seem to secure support or backing. Why? Is it the idea or is it you? In this weeks show, I share some of my personal lessons learned along with the collection of frustrations and lessons learned from my mentoring and coaching clients on the challenges of securing […]