Minimizing the cost while maximizing the return on investment in customer research is critical to an organization's innovation efforts. The HBR article "When a Prototype Isn’t Enough, Use Theatrical Tricks to Sell Your Idea," offers some great examples of doing some powerful testing at low cost, leveraging "stagecraft." While the title is a bit misleading (it's about testing ideas more than selling them), the creative ways that organizations have used theatrical production ap

I admit it. Click-bait titles often suck me in. You know the kind: "The One Thing You Need to Know About Brussels Sprouts (And it's Not What You Think)". Oh my God! There's something I don't know about Brussels Sprouts?!? What could it be? If I don't read this article, I may never know! So, naturally, I had to read the Inc. magazine article, "There's One Question You Must Ask Before Solving Any Problem (It's Also the Most Underrated Management Skill)," As it turned out, the

One of the best people I've known at helping me identify and fix my mental ruts, Dr. Lyssa Menard, recently shared an article that captured some needed mindset shifts we all need to make, if we are to strategically innovate effectively. In "5 Mindset Shifts That Are Needed For Success," the author elaborates on drive, focus, work ethic, self-awareness, and service (at least as I would call them), articulating their meaning, and dispelling some myths. These mindset shifts are

Welcome to the present moment, where today is yesterday’s tomorrow. Is the day going exactly the way expected it to go when the day began? Think back to the first time you got the classic interview question “where do you see yourself 5/10/20 years from now?” Are you exactly where you told the interviewer that you would be? Unless your other car really is a Tardis, odds are that your vision of the future at any given time is about as clear to you as an eye chart is to Mr. Mago

In a world where disruption can happen in any industry at any time, the value of transformational leadership is increasing rapidly. Transformational leadership is correlated with all sorts of organizational success factors, not least of which is innovation success. What is "transformational leadership?" In their article, "What the Best Transformational Leaders Do," Scott Anthony and Evan Schwartz present a few characteristics of transformational leaders that enable their orga

Do you REALLY want people thinking "outside the box" in your organization? If so, what are you doing to find, support, and retain people who do? The recent PwC survey of CEOs points out that "nearly a quarter of those surveyed singled out innovation as their top priority for the coming year, far outstripping other concerns such as human capital, competitiveness, customer experience, and even technological capabilities." So we all want innovation. But are we willing to have re

Want more innovative ideas? Focus more attention on the problem, rather than on the solution. This article contains many good examples of how reframing the problem can lead to a variety of solutions -- and many will prove to be better than the solution on which we tend to get focused. With my clients, I do a variation on the opening example in this article: "what is 5+5?" It's a simple example of how reframing the problem you are trying to solve can lead you from thinking of

Louis CK on Innovation? Well, yes, in a sense... This hilarious rant perfectly captures the dynamics of the Kano Model and the challenge of delivering great customer experience. No, seriously, it does. My favorite line (at least on that point): "How quickly the world OWES him something he knew existed only ten seconds ago!" That's the nature of customer experience. Once people have had a taste for something great, amazing, and even miraculous, it very quickly becomes a minimu

Robert C. Wolcott gets it right in his article on strategic planning and execution, "Speed is Not a Strategy." Some quotes that are particularly impactful: "I’ve seen many examples at corporations of 'long-term strategic plans' that are really just operating plans extrapolated out a few years..." Real strategy converts the mission of our company — why we exist — into our vision for our future..." "Foresight isn’t about prediction, it’s about defining multiple plausible future

For organizations, operational excellence is necessary for survival. Innovation is necessary for really living. I was struck by that thought yesterday as I ran a new route, which took me past a cemetery. My thoughts were surprisingly not morbid. I saw the etched grave markers, the wreaths, the flowers, the flags, and the thought that occurred to me was that each of these people made a difference in someone’s life. Each of these people, though now passed, had moved beyond mere