Suzanne Vos studied systems engineering at Delft University of Technology before joining ING, a global financial institution, where she helped build ING Labs — a business unit focused on partnerships and technology-driven ventures. Today, she coaches individuals and teams using agile, design thinking, and lean startup methodologies across ING's wholesale banking business in Asia-Pacific.

What We Cover

• What innovation really means (and why most people have it wrong)
• How Suzanne overcomes resistance to change inside large organizations
• The power of listening before diagnosing — two ears vs. one mouth
• How to segment an organization by where people are on the adoption curve
• The role of coaching in sustaining mindset change at scale
• What a one-day innovation hackathon can do for skeptical employees

Timestamps

00:00 – Intro: balancing implementation with relevance
00:49 – Suzanne's background: from family business to ING Labs Singapore
02:30 – The mindset and attitude of an innovator
04:59 – Making innovation actionable for everyone
06:45 – Overcoming resistance to change: listening before diagnosing
09:07 – Using evidence and assumptions to reframe the conversation
12:33 – Demystifying innovation: the one-day hackathon
15:30 – If you had to start over: what comes first?
18:34 – Segmentation: the secret weapon of innovation programs
20:15 – Mindset change is a balancing act — that's where coaching comes in

Key Takeaways

1. Listen before you prescribe. Resistance to innovation almost always has a root cause — a bad past experience, unclear value, or feeling unheard. Diagnose before you prescribe, just like a good doctor.
2. Segment your organization like you segment customers. Not everyone is asking "why should we innovate?" — some are already asking "how?" Treat each group differently, with tailored programs for where they are on the adoption curve.
3. Tools don't stick without the why. Introducing new methodologies without first helping people understand why innovation is relevant to them personally leads to programs that fade within months.

Resources & Links Mentioned

• Be Less Zombie by Elvin Turner (mentioned in the episode)

Where to Find Suzanne Vos

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/suzannevos

Where to Find Yaniv Corem
Link in bio: sleek.bio/yanivcorem
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/yanivcorem

Subscribe & Follow
If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe to The School of Innovation so you never miss a conversation.
Listen on Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/5VOBVkueP7zg5ErNYtrmPL
Listen on Apple Podcasts: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-school-of-innovation/id1498420449

Have a guest recommendation or want to be on the show? Email [email protected]

For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email [email protected]

Nevo Hadas, Partner at DYDX, argues that digital transformation isn't about technology — it's about changing how people work. He shares why the human change piece is what makes or breaks every transformation, and how a vague project brief for Smollan became an unexpected smart dispensing unit.

About Nevo Hadas

Nevo Hadas is a Partner at DYDX, a digital transformation practice based in Cape Town with clients across Europe and Africa. DYDX focuses on product and service design, culture and future of work, and purchase journey automation. Nevo also teaches design thinking at Red & Yellow Creative School of Business.

What We Cover

• What digital transformation actually means — and why automation isn't the answer
• Why culture and the human change piece is harder than the technology
• The "Amazon was a terrible bookshop" argument and digital transformation
• What design thinking does well — and what it doesn't
• How DYDX runs fast, structured design thinking with weekly client feedback
• The Smollan project: from a vague brief to a smart dispensing unit

Timestamps

00:00 – Introduction
01:22 – What DYDX does: product design, culture, and purchase journey automation
04:45 – Amazon was a terrible bookshop — and why that matters
07:37 – Creating new rituals to replace the old in digital transformation
09:11 – The most misunderstood thing about design thinking
14:53 – The Smollan project: smart dispensing in informal retail

Key Takeaways

1. People need rituals — even in a digital transformation. The reason so many projects fail is they replace rituals without creating new ones. You can't just remove them; you have to build replacements that serve the same human needs.
2. Design thinking's real power is stopping premature decisions. It forces executives to keep listening to the market. An iterative approach builds certainty instead of pretending certainty exists upfront.
3. The problem you're asked to solve is almost never the real problem. The Smollan project started with a vague brief — and ended with a smart dispensing unit nobody imagined at the start. Research reveals what's actually possible.

Resources & Links Mentioned

• DYDX: dydx.digital
• Red & Yellow Creative School of Business: redandyellow.co.za

Where to Find Nevo Hadas

Email: [email protected]
LinkedIn: Search for Nevo Hadas

Where to Find Yaniv Corem

Link in bio: sleek.bio/yanivcorem
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/yanivcorem

Subscribe & Follow

Subscribe to The School of Innovation on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. Have a guest recommendation? Email [email protected]

Nevo Hadas is the founder of DYDX, a Cape Town-based company at the intersection of product strategy and pricing. A self-described pricing nerd, he's fascinated by how pricing decisions shape growth, adoption, and the user experience. He has spent years helping startups and innovative companies think more carefully about how they charge for what they build.

What We Cover

• What it means to be a "pricing nerd" and why pricing is often overlooked in innovation
• Why SaaS companies price too high early and what they should do instead
• The psychology of switching costs, inertia, and why free doesn't always mean adoption
• How to use personas and buyer journeys to figure out pricing
• Why you should price for what customers value — not what the product costs you
• The difference between the buying value proposition and the using value proposition

Timestamps

00:00 – Introduction: what is a pricing nerd?
01:30 – Money left on the table: pricing and the innovation strategy
03:00 – The SaaS pricing mistake: pricing too high, too early
05:00 – What to price for: value drivers vs. arbitrary limits
07:00 – The persona as a pricing tool: do a buying journey
08:30 – Why free doesn't guarantee adoption
09:00 – Enterprise SaaS: buying vs. using value propositions

Key Takeaways

1. Pricing is part of the user experience. The way you structure your price shapes how customers onboard, engage, and deepen their use of your product. Calendly is a masterclass in this — the pricing makes people want to use it more, not less.
2. Do a buying journey, not just a user journey. Personas are great for understanding behavior, but map that same persona through the purchasing decision — what drives them to click "pay," what holds them back, and what makes switching feel too costly.
3. The biggest SaaS mistake is putting too many price points on the product. Understand your top two or three value drivers and price for those — make the rest free to maximize adoption.

Resources & Links Mentioned

• DYDX: dydx.digital

Where to Find Nevo Hadas

Email: [email protected]
LinkedIn: Search Nevo Hadas on LinkedIn

Where to Find Yaniv Corem
Link in bio: sleek.bio/yanivcorem
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/yanivcorem

Subscribe & Follow
If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe to The School of Innovation so you never miss a conversation.
Listen on Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/5VOBVkueP7zg5ErNYtrmPL
Listen on Apple Podcasts: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-school-of-innovation/id1498420449

Have a guest recommendation or want to be on the show? Email [email protected]

For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email [email protected]

Daniel Rosenberg is a designer, researcher, and educator with a background spanning architecture in Chile and Israel, a master's and PhD from MIT's Design and Computation program, and co-founding Midnight Commercial — a Brooklyn-based experiential design studio that worked with Google, Target, and others. He now teaches at RPI's CASE in Brooklyn, where he is building a new entrepreneurship program for architects.

What We Cover

• Why Daniel sees architects primarily as designers — not builders
• What architecture school actually teaches: iteration, uncertainty, and how to take feedback
• How the MIT Media Lab is essentially an architecture school without buildings
• Why design thinking is a "placebo" — and why that's not entirely bad
• Design doing vs. design thinking: the recipe vs. the ingredients
• Why architects are missing the conversation around spatial computing and immersive tech

Timestamps

00:00 – Introduction: architects as exceptional entrepreneurs
11:00 – Midnight Commercial: from 3 to 25 people — and then what
15:00 – Why architects excel in multidisciplinary design teams
22:00 – Design thinking: what it gets right and what it misses
40:00 – What architects should do: expand beyond the building

Key Takeaways

1. Architects learn to design — buildings are just the medium. The real skills from architecture school — tolerating uncertainty, iterating under pressure, presenting to hostile critics — are directly applicable to innovation and entrepreneurship.
2. Design thinking works as a permission structure, not a process. It doesn't describe how design actually happens — it describes a placebo that makes non-designers comfortable enough to start.
3. The next big opportunity for architects is spatial computing. As technology moves into physical spaces, architects are uniquely equipped to contribute — but only if they stop seeing themselves as building designers and start seeing themselves as experience designers.

Resources & Links Mentioned

• CASE at RPI: case.rpi.edu
• MIT Media Lab: media.mit.edu
• Google Ara project

Where to Find Daniel Rosenberg

Email: [email protected]

Where to Find Yaniv Corem
Link in bio: sleek.bio/yanivcorem
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/yanivcorem

Subscribe & Follow
If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe to The School of Innovation so you never miss a conversation.
Listen on Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/5VOBVkueP7zg5ErNYtrmPL
Listen on Apple Podcasts: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-school-of-innovation/id1498420449

Have a guest recommendation or want to be on the show? Email [email protected]

For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email [email protected]

Marius Ursache is the co-founder of MetaBeta, a platform designed to help startup investors track the progress of their portfolio companies. A designer and entrepreneur by background, Marius has spent years studying how teams set goals, stay accountable, and build the habits that make organizations actually function. He is a practitioner and advocate of OKRs — Objectives and Key Results.

What We Cover

• How Marius went from designer to startup ecosystem builder to MetaBeta
• What OKRs are and why they work better than traditional goal-setting
• The critical difference between accountability and responsibility
• How to build a self-managing team that doesn't need micromanagement
• The weekly, quarterly, and daily routines that make OKRs stick
• Why the problem statement canvas matters before you set any goals

Timestamps

00:00 – Introduction
01:30 – Marius's background and the origin of MetaBeta
05:00 – What OKRs are and how they differ from KPIs
10:00 – Accountability vs. responsibility: why the distinction matters
15:00 – How to build a self-managing team
20:00 – The routines: quarterly reviews, weekly all-hands, daily standups, 1:1s
27:00 – The problem statement canvas: why start with the problem?

Key Takeaways

1. Accountability is chosen; responsibility is assigned. The most important distinction in goal-setting is that accountability has to be voluntarily taken on — it can't be imposed from above. When teams confuse the two, you get finger-pointing instead of ownership.
2. Self-managing teams still need structure. The goal isn't to remove all management — it's to replace top-down control with shared rituals. Regular standups, weekly reviews, and quarterly reflections give teams the rhythm they need to stay aligned.
3. Start with the problem, not the goal. Before writing a single OKR, teams should invest real time in understanding the problem they're solving. Skipping this step is why most OKR implementations produce metrics that nobody cares about six months later.

Resources & Links Mentioned

• MetaBeta: metabeta.com
• Measure What Matters by John Doerr (referenced in episode)

Where to Find Marius Ursache

Search Marius Ursache on LinkedIn

Where to Find Yaniv Corem
Link in bio: sleek.bio/yanivcorem
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/yanivcorem

Subscribe & Follow
If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe to The School of Innovation so you never miss a conversation.
Listen on Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/5VOBVkueP7zg5ErNYtrmPL
Listen on Apple Podcasts: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-school-of-innovation/id1498420449

Have a guest recommendation or want to be on the show? Email [email protected]

For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email [email protected]

Most corporates say they want to innovate. Far fewer build the conditions that actually make it possible. Christine Wang joins Yaniv to talk about what a venture architect really does, why top management support is the single biggest predictor of innovation success, and what startups need to know before betting on China.

About Christine Wang

Christine is a Managing Director, board advisor, and speaker with over a decade of experience bridging the corporate and startup worlds. She has led innovation at the Lufthansa Innovation Hub, built ventures at BCG Digital Ventures, held a leadership role at Alibaba, and served as China CEO at Meero. A native of Shanghai, Christine is fluent in five languages and operates across Europe, Asia, and beyond.

What We Cover

• What a venture architect actually is — and why the title had to be invented
• The hustler, hipster, hacker model and how it maps to venture building
• Why innovation appetite without organizational support is worthless
• The real cost of entering China: influencer economics, long timelines, and lock-in effects
• Why Southeast Asia might be the smarter bet for startups right now

Timestamps

(01:03) How you become a venture architect

(02:13) The venture architect role explained: co-founder meets strategist meets business operator

(04:16) Why corporates need venture architects — and when they don't

(08:06) Challenges and lessons from BCG Digital Ventures

(15:28) China — a separate ecosystem, not just another market

(17:24) What startups need to know before entering China

(21:05) Southeast Asia as the next frontier for growth-stage startups

Key Takeaways

1. A venture architect is a startup co-founder inside a corporate — without the freedom of one. The role only works if leadership creates the environment for it to succeed.
2. Top management support isn't a nice-to-have — it's the variable that decides whether innovation ever shows up on the balance sheet.
3. China is not just a harder market — it's a fundamentally different ecosystem. Different design logic, different customer behavior, different growth mechanics. Treat it as such, or don't enter.

Resources & Links Mentioned

• Ping An — case study in corporate digital transformation
• LinkedIn's China entry strategy (2014) as a model for long-term market commitment
• ChrisRodMax.com
• Faces of the World, Faces of the Earth — Christine's documentary photography project

Where to Find Christine Wang

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/christinewang0

Listen to the Episode open.spotify.com/episode/5qG1FxwKY09qh7bbgEKDrL

Where to Find Yaniv Corem

Link in bio: sleek.bio/yanivcorem

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/yanivcorem

Subscribe & Follow

Subscribe to The School of Innovation on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

Have a guest recommendation? Email [email protected]

Michael Fenn, Director of Health and Life Sciences at Harvard Innovation Labs, shares how Harvard iLab turns cutting-edge biomedical research into fundable startups — and which biotech trends are generating the most excitement right now.

About Michael Fenn

Michael Fenn holds a PhD in biomedical engineering and is Director of Health and Life Sciences at Harvard Innovation Labs. A former faculty member and lab director, he has supported startups from concept to Y Combinator and Series A funding, including Luminous Labs, which reached Y Combinator and exited successfully.

What We Cover

• How Harvard iLab evaluates and supports early-stage life science founders
• The four pillars of a successful venture: people, unmet need, IP, and capital
• How Harvard iLab's wet lab space and network drive startup success
• Bridging the gap between academic research and industry commercialization
• The most exciting trends in biotech: biomanufacturing, AI/ML, cell and gene therapy

Timestamps

00:00 – Introduction
01:01 – Michael's background: from faculty lab to Harvard iLab
03:28 – Harvard iLab's approach to evaluating ventures
07:31 – How Harvard iLab compares to MIT, Stanford, and others
12:04 – Building investor relationships and making introductions
18:45 – Biotech trends: biomanufacturing, AI, cell therapy, digital health

Key Takeaways

1. People first, always. Before evaluating the science, ask: are these the right people? The best technology in the wrong hands rarely reaches patients or markets.
2. Start with the unmet need, not the technology. The most successful life science ventures begin by deeply understanding a patient need — then matching it with science, not the other way around.
3. The academic-industry gap is a people problem. Bridging it requires mutual understanding of incentives. When academia understands what industry needs, both sides win.

Resources & Links Mentioned

• Harvard Innovation Labs: innovationlabs.harvard.edu
• Lab Central: labcentral.org

Where to Find Michael Fenn

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/michaelfenn

Where to Find Yaniv Corem

Link in bio: sleek.bio/yanivcorem
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/yanivcorem

Subscribe & Follow

Subscribe to The School of Innovation on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. Have a guest recommendation? Email [email protected]

What happens to talented, entrepreneurial people inside large companies who can’t get their ideas to fly? Jan Kennedy built an entire business around answering that question. Jan and Yaniv talk about intrapreneurship as a genuine innovation strategy and what it looks like to run an internal startup accelerator inside a Fortune 500 — including Bayer, whose programs generated over a billion euros of annual revenue potential.

About Jan Kennedy

Jan Kennedy is the founder of the Academy for Corporate Entrepreneurship (ACE), a Munich-based firm that helps Fortune 500 companies run internal startup accelerators. He previously directed the Munich chapter of the Founder Institute before launching ACE with Allianz as its first client.

What We Cover

• Why only about 15% of any workforce has intrapreneurial DNA
• Why intrapreneurs should ask for forgiveness, not permission
• When top-down support matters — and when it doesn’t save you
• Bayer’s results: 1 billion euros of annual revenue potential
• The portfolio problem: who owns a portfolio of intrapreneurship projects?

Timestamps

(00:30) Origin story: frustrated managers at the Founder Institute
(03:30) Bootstrapping ACE and landing Allianz
(10:30) Ask for forgiveness, not permission
(15:00) The 15% thesis
(17:00) Bayer: 1 billion euros of annual revenue potential
(19:00) The portfolio problem: who owns it?

Key Takeaways

1. Intrapreneurship is innovation, not a program. Entrepreneurship = invention × commercialization. Intrapreneurship brings that equation inside existing organizations.
2. Only ~15% of your workforce has intrapreneurial DNA. Crowdsource ideas from everyone — but run the journey with the right people.
3. The portfolio problem is real. Nobody is responsible for a portfolio of intrapreneurship projects in most organizations. Someone needs to own this — or it dies.

Resources & Links Mentioned

• Academy for Corporate Entrepreneurship
• Founder Institute
• Intrapreneur DNA Test — email [email protected] (mention this podcast for free access)

Where to Find Jan Kennedy

Email: [email protected]
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/jankennedy-afce

Where to Find Yaniv Corem

Link in bio: sleek.bio/yanivcorem
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/yanivcorem

Subscribe & Follow

Subscribe to The School of Innovation on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. Have a guest recommendation? Email [email protected]

What does it actually take to build a startup ecosystem — and what happens when government tries to help without getting in the way? In Part 2, Oded Barel-Sabag breaks down the anatomy of an ecosystem, the three ingredients every city needs, and what made Jerusalem's bottom-up story work.

About Oded Barel-Sabag

Oded is a serial community builder and innovation ecosystem architect based in Jerusalem. After four and a half years helping grow SIFTECH into Jerusalem's leading accelerator, he joined Jnext — the Jerusalem Development Authority's startup ecosystem program — to scale what the community had built from the institutional side.

What We Cover

• How Oded discovered SIFTECH through a letter to the mayor about a co-working space
• The community initiatives that extended SIFTECH's reach: hackathons, Creative Mornings, and more
• Why Oded left SIFTECH after four and a half years — and what he learned from the transition
• What Jnext is and why only Jerusalem has something like it
• How the Jerusalem Development Authority shifted from grants and industrial zones to ecosystem thinking
• The three ingredients of a thriving startup ecosystem: capital, know-how, and rebellion culture
• Why ecosystems are rainforests — organic, not over-planned
• The generosity mindset institutions need to adopt — and where tension still shows up

Timestamps

(02:35) Community initiatives beyond the accelerator: hackathons and Creative Mornings

(07:01) What the Jerusalem Development Authority does — and how it evolved

(11:16) The anatomy of a startup ecosystem — people, bottom-up energy, and institutions

(16:00) Three ecosystem ingredients: capital, know-how, and rebellion culture

(18:02) How Israel built its VC industry by identifying what was missing

(21:36) Generosity vs. control: what governments need to get right

(23:12) Why conflict and misalignment can be healthy

Key Takeaways

1. Ecosystems need rebellion, not just resources. Capital and know-how aren't enough. A culture that challenges the status quo is the third — and often missing — ingredient.
2. Government's job is to enable, not control. The JDA's most effective move was backing community-led initiatives rather than imposing top-down programs.
3. Build platforms for collision. Hackathons, meetups, and informal events aren't soft activities — they're the mechanism through which ecosystems compound.

Resources & Links Mentioned

• Rainforests: The Secret to Building the Next Silicon Valley — Victor W. Hwang & Greg Horowitt

Where to Find Oded Barel-Sabag LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/oded-barel-sabag-b442736/

Listen to Part 2 open.spotify.com/episode/1GuqfP8b7c7p4DMxIgv7yD

Where to Find Yaniv Corem

Link in bio: sleek.bio/yanivcorem

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/yanivcorem

Subscribe & Follow

Subscribe to The School of Innovation on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

Have a guest recommendation? Email [email protected]

Jerusalem isn't Tel Aviv. But that might be exactly why it became something special. Oded Barel-Sabag joins Yaniv to talk about building trust before building anything else, what it actually takes to grow a startup ecosystem from scratch, and how a group of passionate people in a basement changed the innovation culture of a city.

About Oded Barel-Sabag Oded Barel-Sabag is a serial community builder and innovation ecosystem architect based in Jerusalem. He co-founded and sold a startup, opened a neighborhood bar, helped launch SIFTECH — Jerusalem's first startup accelerator — brought Creative Mornings to Jerusalem, and now serves as Executive Director of Jnext, the high-tech and entrepreneurship program of the Jerusalem Development Authority.

What We Cover

• Why Oded's superpower isn't hustle — it's trust
• The difference between picking your team and getting lucky with people
• Why entrepreneurship is always a team sport
• Jerusalem's identity problem and the "negative migration" narrative
• The origin story of SIFTECH — born underground, literally
• How early community events like Off the Record created the social glue for an ecosystem
• The tipping point when Jerusalemites went from doubters to believers

Timestamps

(00:00) Opening — on building ventures for fun, not money

(01:16) Oded's background and the Jerusalem ecosystem

(03:51) Trust as the foundation of every partnership

(06:10) How Oded establishes trust: gut feeling vs. process

(07:42) Running multiple ventures in parallel — and washing dishes

(10:08) Jerusalem's startup identity and what was missing

(12:28) The origin of SIFTECH — two founders, one mission, floor minus one

(14:50) Off the Record events and the startup social layer

(16:00) Critical mass, Made in Jerusalem, and the shift from doubters to believers

(17:10) SIFTECH moves to JVP Media Quarter and formalizes

Key Takeaways

1. Trust before tasks. Every venture Oded built started with people he already had a relationship with. The project comes second.
2. Ecosystems need social glue, not just infrastructure. Jerusalem had VCs and universities — what was missing was people talking to each other.
3. Community initiatives are ecosystem infrastructure. Meetups, intimate events, and shared spaces aren't nice-to-haves. They're what tips an ecosystem from potential to momentum.

Where to Find Oded Barel-Sabag LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/oded-barel-sabag-b442736/

Listen to Part 1 open.spotify.com/episode/5QtbdMntWoqZYIHPMu0CDI

Where to Find Yaniv Corem

Link in bio: sleek.bio/yanivcorem

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/yanivcorem

Subscribe & Follow

Subscribe to The School of Innovation on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

Have a guest recommendation? Email [email protected]