Innovation Watch - Innovation Bookshelf

Imagine: How Creativity Works. By Jonah Lehrer. Allen Lane.

iw — Thu, 31 May 2012 19:36:33 +0000

Did you know that the most creative companies have centralized bathrooms? That brainstorming meetings are a terrible idea? That the color blue can help you double your creative output? From the New York Times best-selling author of How We Decide comes a sparkling and revelatory look at the new science of creativity. Shattering the myth of muses, higher powers, even creative “types,” Jonah Lehrer demonstrates that creativity is not a single gift possessed by the lucky few. It’s a variety of distinct thought processes that we can all learn to use more effectively. Lehrer reveals the importance of embracing the rut, thinking like a child, daydreaming productively, and adopting an outsider’s perspective (travel helps). He unveils the optimal mix of old and new partners in any creative collaboration, and explains why criticism is essential to the process. Then he zooms out to show how we can make our neighborhoods more vibrant, our companies more productive, and our schools more effective. … Read more

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Jugaad Innovation: Think Frugal, Be Flexible, Generate Breakthrough Growth. By Navi Radjou, Jaideep Prabhu and Simone Ahuja. Jossey-Bass.

iw — Sat, 26 May 2012 14:03:15 +0000

Innovation is a major directive at corporations worldwide. But how do you drive innovation and growth as the global business landscape becomes increasingly unpredictable and diverse? Western corporations can no longer just rely on the old formula that sustained innovation and growth for decades: a mix of top-down strategies, expensive R&D projects, and rigid, highly structured innovation processes. Jugaad Innovation argues that the West must look to places like India, China, and Africa for a new bottom-up approach to frugal and flexible innovation. Building on their deep experience of innovation practices with companies in the United States and around the world, the authors articulate how jugaad (a Hindi word meaning an improvised solution born from ingenuity and cleverness) is leading to dramatic growth in emerging markets — and how Western companies can adopt jugaad to succeed in our hypercompetitive world. … Read more

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The Rainforest: The Secret to Building the Next Silicon Valley. By Victor W. Hwang and Greg Horowitt. Regenwald.

iw — Sat, 12 May 2012 05:04:37 +0000

What makes places like Silicon Valley tick? Can we replicate that magic in other places? How do you foster innovation in your own networks? Discover the answers in this groundbreaking book from two of the world’s leading experts at the intersection of venture capital and global development. Victor W. Hwang and Greg Horowitt propose a radical new theory to explain the nature of innovation ecosystems: human networks that generate extraordinary creativity and output. They argue that free market thinking fails to consider the impact of human nature on the innovation process. This ambitious work challenges the basic assumptions that economists have held for over a century. The authors argue that such ecosystems — what they call Rainforests — can only thrive when certain cultural behaviors unlock human potential. … Read more

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Need, Speed, and Greed: How the New Rules of Innovation Can Transform Businesses, Propel Nations to Greatness, and Tame the World’s Most Wicked Problems. By Vijay V. Vaitheeswaran. Harper Business.

iw — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 22:28:10 +0000

Over the past few decades, globalization and Googlization have kicked off the first phase of an innovation revolution more profound and more powerful than any economic force since the arrival of Europeans on North American shores half a millennium ago. These developments have brought us such advances as the Web, social networking, 24/7 connectivity, and global markets. How can the extraordinary benefits of the innovation revolution be shared more equitably among all of society? In Need, Speed, and Greed, global correspondent for the Economist Vijay V. Vaitheeswaran answers that question, offering the essential insider’s guide to this new world of innovation. Drawing on the best of the academic and field work in this emerging area, Need, Speed, and Greed inspires and empowers readers to improve their lives, their work, and perhaps even the world. … Read more

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Inventing the Medium: Principles of Interaction Design as a Cultural Promise. By Janet H. Murray. MIT Press.

iw — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 15:16:44 +0000

Digital artifacts from iPads to databases pervade our lives, and the design decisions that shape them affect how we think, act, communicate, and understand the world. But the pace of change has been so rapid that technical innovation is outstripping design. Interactors are often mystified and frustrated by their enticing but confusing new devices; meanwhile, product design teams struggle to articulate shared and enduring design goals. With Inventing the Medium, Janet Murray provides a unified vocabulary and a common methodology for the design of digital objects and environments. It will be an essential guide for both students and practitioners in this evolving field. Each chapter includes a set of Design Explorations — creative exercises for students and thought experiments for practitioners — that allow readers to apply the ideas in the chapter to particular design problems. Inventing the Medium also provides more than 200 illustrations of specific design strategies drawn from multiple genres and platforms and a glossary of design concepts. … Read more

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The Little Black Book of Innovation: How It Works, How to Do It. By Scott D. Anthony. Harvard Business Review Press.

iw — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 18:30:12 +0000

Innovation transforms companies and markets. It’s the key to solving vexing social problems. And it makes or breaks professional careers. But for all the enthusiasm the topic inspires, the practice of innovation — how to do it — has remained stubbornly impenetrable. No longer. In The Little Black Book of Innovation, leading thinker Scott D. Anthony draws from research, Innosight fieldwork with global giants such as Procter & Gamble, and personal experience launching and investing in start-up companies to demystify the discipline of innovation. With wit and remarkable insight born of years of both leading and teaching innovation, Anthony presents a simple definition of the concept, breaks down the essential differences between its various types, and illuminates its vital role in organizational success and personal growth. … Read more

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The Wide Lens: A New Strategy for Innovation. By Ron Adner. Portfolio.

iw — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 05:37:48 +0000

How can great companies do everything right – identify real customer needs, deliver excellent innovations, beat their competitors to market – and still fail? The sad truth is that many companies fail because they focus too intensely on their own innovations, and then neglect the innovation ecosystems on which their success depends. In our increasingly interdependent world, winning requires more than just delivering on your own promises. It means ensuring that a host of partners -some visible, some hidden- deliver on their promises, too. In The Wide Lens, innovation expert Ron Adner draws on over a decade of research and field testing to take you on far ranging journeys from Kenya to California, from transport to telecommunications, to reveal the hidden structure of success in a world of interdependence. … Read more

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Reverse Innovation: Create Far From Home, Win Everywhere. By Vijay Govindarajan and Chris Trimble. Harvard Business Review Press.

iw — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 03:28:07 +0000

Reverse Innovation introduces the idea of developing in emerging markets first, instead of scaling down rich-world products, to unlock a world of opportunities for your business. Written by Vijay Govindarajan and Chris Trimble of the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth, and stemming from a pivotal article in Harvard Business Review, the book offers an important next step for companies looking to derive long-term value from emerging markets. According to the authors: “Reverse innovation is a potent force that will transform the global economy over the next few decades. It will redistribute power and wealth to countries and companies who understand it and diminish those who do not.” There is no one industry that needs to reverse innovate; instead, all industries must have interest in the needs and opportunities in the developing world in order to thrive in tomorrow’s global marketplace. … Read more

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Twentieth-Century Design. By Jonathan M. Woodham. Oxford University Press.

iw — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 03:03:43 +0000

Drawing on the most up-to-date scholarship (not only in design history but also in social anthropology and women’s history), Jonathan M. Woodham takes a fresh look at the wider issues of design and industrial culture throughout Europe, Scandinavia, North America, and the Far East. He explores themes such as national identity, the ‘Americanization’ of ideology and business methods, the rise of the multi-nationals, Pop and Postmodernism, and contemporary ideas of nostalgia and heritage. In the history which emerges design is clearly seen for what it is: the powerful and complex expression of aesthetic, social, economic, political, and technological forces. … Read more

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The Tale of the Scale: An Odyssey of Invention. By Solly Angel. Oxford University Press.

iw — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 03:51:00 +0000

The Tale of the Scale is a rare first-person account of the process of invention and design as it unfolds in the remaking of the familiar bathroom scale. It is rare because inventors seldom have the inclination to articulate their thought processes and to recount their experiences in great detail. Written by an inventor, the book stands apart from recent books about inventors. Angel, an urban planner by profession, had no mechanical skills as he embarked on his journey. The Tale records his transformation, over the course of a decade, from a bungling ignoramus to an expert on thin scales. Readers know as much about scales — or about invention for that matter — as Angel does at the beginning of the journey. Listening to Angel’s unfolding story, they learn about the intricacies of invention and design as Angel finds out about them. … Read more

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Terence Conran on Design. Terence Conran. Raincoast Books.

iw — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 00:23:30 +0000

Every single thing that has been made by man or woman has been designed. We are quick to recognize the designer’s imprint in the cut of a couture dress, in the facade of a landmark building or in the shape of the latest motorcar. Less visible are those designers who shape and fill our daily lives with everything from the paperclip to the personal stereo, the flatpack shelving unit to the supermarket label. Design is all around us, in the shape of our houses and in the disposition of our interior space, in the way we shop and entertain ourselves, and in the ease with which we move from place to place; and it is about function every bit as much as it is about form. In this personal and campaigning book, Terence Conran argues the case for design as much more than the superficial application of styling; rather, it is intrinsic to the development of new technologies and to the success of one product over another. … Read more

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CULT-URE: Ideas Can Be Dangerous. By Rian Hughes. Fiell.

iw — Sat, 29 Oct 2011 22:27:23 +0000

Written and designed by celebrated graphic designer and illustrator Rian Hughes, CULT-URE represents a new experiment in ‘authored design,’ a unique melding of graphics and text that provides a thought-provoking exploration of the media age, the pervasive language of signs, symbols and meaning, and the ideas — both benign and dangerous — that travel through them. The ‘Gideon’s Bible for the boutique hotel,’ CULT-URE examines the changing the changing nature of communication, perception and identity, and is set to become a cult publication for the digital generation — the 21st century answer to Marshall McLuhan’s The Medium is the Massage. … Read more

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