Gregg Fraley

I get letters. A colleague of mine, Lisa Baxter, alerted me to an article recently published in Fast Company’s online Design section. The article, titled “Do Innovation Consultants Kill Innovation?” suggests that in fact, innovation consultants do indeed kill innovation. Authors Jens Martin Skibsted and Rasmus Bech Hansen argue that innovation is too messy to be captured in any process. So how can big firms innovate? I could write 5000 words in response to the article, but let me keep it simple: BS. In their defense I would agree that an over emphasis on process is often a failing of an average innovation consultant — and even those very high priced firms who do innovation consulting. I also resonate with

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As the son of a coach, and full-on sports participant in years past, I am not a stranger to exercise. I was doing push-ups daily before I entered kindergarten. I was an average athlete at best, but Dad was proud of how fit I was. The modest success I had was entirely due to good conditioning. Once upon a time! I’m back into an exercise program again and after just a couple weeks of very hard work I’m feeling the positive effects. While far from perfectly fit, I’ve made progress, I feel more prepared for life! It occurred to me, as I reached near maximum heart rate last night, that there is a huge parallel between the concepts of exercise

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Jeffrey Phillips is a respected innovation consultant and a noted blogger (Innovate on Purpose). I saw him speak at the MindCamp conference and it’s clear he has an uncommon breadth of knowledge about innovation and a focused results orientation. He’s just released an impressively good book. Relentless Innovation, What Works, What Doesn’t–And What That Means For Your Business is the somewhat lengthy title. Now, I didn’t really read this book — I studied it — highlighter in hand. This book is the perfect primer for those who wish to change a corporate culture into a more innovative one. It answers, in a comprehensive way, the complex question of: How does a company consistently innovate? In this well analyzed, logically written, well-paced

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Shareholders, have patience. Be advocates for innovation, it’s in your long term best interest. My business partner Kate Hammer sent me a piece yesterday by Steve Denning, published in Forbes, titled “The Dumbest Idea in the World: Maximizing Shareholder Value”. The title is provocative, and goes against a commonly held belief. Still, I have to agree with Denning. Actually, I’m agreeing with the research he based the article on, done by University of Toronto professor Roger Martin. Read the piece, it is totally convincing that the idea of maximizing shareholder value has upper management acting, not to innovate, but to simply juggle expectations and short term profits. This of course has a long term negative impact as it actually suppresses

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Smokey Robinson and Barry Gordy, 1981I’ll briefly note here the passing of Motown Records founder, Barry Gordy, and make four points about creativity along the way. I never met him, but I certainly experienced, and continue to experience, the results of his prolific creativity. In his amazing career he created songs, records, stars, companies, good will, and films. First lesson in creativity from Barry Gordy: Create a lot and keep creating a lot. Perhaps his greatest creative skill was simply finding and developing talent. He had a hand in the careers of Jackie Wilson, Mary Wells, The Jackson 5 (and Michael Jackson), Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, The Supremes, The Temptations, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, The Four Tops, and many

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Occupy Wall Street (OWS) is a creative and innovative endeavor. OWS has reinvented the concept of a protest. This post is a look at the creativity and innovation aspects of OWS, and not a political commentary. Public protest did need to be reinvented. As a brand, protests had lost shelf space — media attention. Protests of the last, say 30 years, have been decidedly ho-hum and almost completely ineffective. Between permits, gates, fences, and area exclusions, they were useless as means of democratic self-expression. The media hasn’t seen protests as news for years, but now that’s all changed. OWS is a big story and it will only get bigger until something — the conditions, government, authorities, laws, change. How did

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  Sir Richard Branson, the uber entrepreneur of Virgin fame, contributed a provocative editorial to Sunday’s edition of The Independent. Essentially Branson is making some strong suggestions about how to put the 1 million unemployed young people in the UK to work. Radical ideas Sir Richard. They make so much sense it’s almost guaranteed they won’t happen. Why I think so: They upset the status quo. They require quick action from government. They require big business to step up and help young people for the good of society. So, call me a cynic, but great big radical ideas like his are usually tough sledding to get done. However, the good news is things are so desperate right now common sense

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There is growing attention to the idea that innovation is supported, or not, by that amorphous beast organizational culture. It’s not a new idea, Mel Rhodes defined “Press” as one of his “4 P’s” of group creativity in 1953 (the others being People, Products, and Process). Who knows where Rhodes came up with “Press” — Press is really culture. Stop yawning! The wrong kind of organizational culture can kill innovation. If you’re an individual, consider that you have a personal culture you’ve built up around you (some might call it your life) so in a way the following applies to You to. Get the best engineers and managers and marketeers, have great product ideas, and great process…and you can still

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When I was a young boy I drifted in and out of my imagination. I day dreamed about sports fantasies, the future, space, the nature of God, angels, the lives of movie stars and famous people like JFK, games of my own making, and inventions. And no surprise, I was routinely punished for day dreaming. In order to escape the browbeating I made efforts to stay focused and pay attention. I also started thinking of that “state” as a bad thing and to be avoided. It got me into trouble with those women wearing the Catholic version of a burka. I reminisce here because I want to make the point that imagination is a practice. Like yoga, meditation, guitar, or

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I’ve heard some rather direct and harsh criticism of President Obama’s recent comment about the USA being a “bit lazy” the last few decades. I’ll agree his comment is a bit unfair from one perspective: The USA has had nearly non-stop increases in productivity, and this for many years. Americans are working harder and doing more with less people, that’s true. And most workers are also doing it for less money. This squeeze is creating a tension that runs parallel to, and resonates with, the Occupy movement — but that’s another discussion. The fair part of Obama’s remark is that in the last 30 years the USA has watched it’s manufacturing base, and many of its competitive advantages, such as

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