Course 3: Tom Peters' Innovation

“We made mistakes, of course. . . . We fixed them by doing it over and over, again and again. . . . While our competitors are still sucking their thumbs trying to make the design perfect, we’re already on prototype version #5. By the time our rivals are ready with wires and screws, we are on version #10. It gets back to planning versus acting: We act from day one; others plan how to plan—for months.”

—Michael Bloomberg, Bloomberg by Bloomberg

“You can’t be a serious innovator unless and until you are ready, willing and able to seriously play. ‘Serious play’ is not an oxymoron; it is the essence of innovation.”

—Michael Schrage, Serious Play

Innovation is “all important” now more than ever. No doubt about that. But my goal in this course is to demystify innovation. And Michael Bloomberg, offers a worldview that perfectly matches my own. I call it—as you’ll see—WTTMSW (Whoever Tries The Most Stuff Wins). The rub is: It’s no walk in the park to implant a “WTTMSW culture.” You must cheer useful failures—and even dumb ones. “It is not enough to ‘tolerate’ failure—you must ‘celebrate’ failure”—the word according to Richard Farson. But perhaps the best description of the WTTMSW culture comes from MIT Media Lab guru Michael Schrage who devotes an entire book to “serious play.”

“Bottom line”:

Try a lot of stuff/Bloomberg

WTTMSW/Peters

Most mistakes wins/Farson

Serious play/Schrage

Q.E.D.

There’s a second critical piece of the innovation puzzle. My version thereof: Hang out with cool, and thou shalt become more cool; hang out with dull, and thou shalt become more dull. Crazy times call for intimate and continuous contact with crazy people. Too many organizations are loaded to the gunnels with “same-same.” That’s the kiss of death for innovation.