For a company the size if IBM, innovation is everything. Dell recognized the need to be more transparent in its product offerings, and IBM is following suit. Thinkplace, ‘a web application for facilitating innovation through idea generation, collaboration, and refinement,’ appears to be on the right track. What Thinkplace does is provide a place for … Continue reading Thinkplace – Facilitating Innovation
Month: May 2007
Schumpeter: Prophet of Innovation
Joseph Schumpeter started analyzing innovation management more than seventy years ago, and his theories and ideas are still influential among academics and business men. Recently, in fact, Harvard Business School’s professor Thomas McCraw released a book titled “Prophet of Innovation: Joseph Schumpeter and Creative Destruction.” In the HBS Working Knowledge website there is an interesting … Continue reading Schumpeter: Prophet of Innovation
Horizontal Integration
Horizontal integration refers to a strategy of seeking ownership of or increased control over a firm’s competitors. One of the most significant trends in strategic management today is the increased use of horizontal integration as a growth strategy. Mergers, acquisitions, and takeovers among competitors allow for increased economies of scale and enhanced transfer of resources … Continue reading Horizontal Integration
Innovation Quotes: Windows
The only thing that I’d rather own than Windows is English, because then I could charge you two hundred and forty-nine dollars for the right to speak it. Scott McNealy (Co-Founder of Sun Microsystems)
The Benefits of a Diverse Workforce
Companies all over the world are positioning themselves to adopt a more diverse workforce. When I was at Pepsi, plans were in place to achieve diversification from about 10 years out. They knew that there would be no ethnic majority by the year 2075, so they got the ball rolling early. Here are 13 Benefits … Continue reading The Benefits of a Diverse Workforce
Creative Writing for the Rest of Us
Over at Daily Writing Tips, one of my blogs, we just published a very detailed article about creative writing. What is it all about? Here is a definition: Creative writing is writing that expresses the writer’s thoughts and feelings in an imaginative, often unique, and poetic way. So if you would like to know more … Continue reading Creative Writing for the Rest of Us
Building an Innovation Team
Oftentimes, in both corporate structures and small business, it is necessary to build teams to accomplish one thing or another. This is equally true in innovation. The thought is when you have a team, the collective experience of all of those people will be greater than just one individual. I want to take a minute … Continue reading Building an Innovation Team
Gauss versus Pareto
It looks like we are shifting from a Gaussian world to a Paretian one, or so claims John Hagel on a recent article titled “The Power of the Power Laws”.
Leadership Traits
Many corporations today use the controversial Myers-Briggs Type Indicator personality test, based on the work of psychologist Carl Jung, to label managers on four dimensions – as extroverts or introverts, thinkers or feelers, sensors or intuitors, and judges or perceivers. The current research on leadership traits suggests that some factors do help differentiate leaders from … Continue reading Leadership Traits