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Why Innovation Fails: Hard-Won Lessons for Business
Just because it's great idea doesn't mean it will succeed. Drawing on the expertise and firsthand experience of inventors, financiers, market researchers, psychologists and sociologist and using examples as diverse as the Classic Coke, Napster, WebVan, the Mars Climate Orbiter and Voice recogniton software.
232 pages, Hardcover
First published July 25, 2003
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May 22, 2012
The director of advanced technology at Tennant Company, who also supports the FIRST robotics team I coach, highly recommended Why Innovation Fails: Hard-Won Lessons for Business to me last summer. It was very difficult to find the book, but Mandy was able to arrange it as a birthday gift from Granny. Interestingly, the source of the recommendation and rarity of the book created a substantial amount of hype in my mind about the book. Having finished it now, I'll admit I feel a little let down. While it certainly had its moments, it was not the life-altering, eye-opening testament to creating truly innovative products I imagined it would be.
Why Innovation Fails' strongest moments were the definition of innovation (pgs 38-40), characteristics of adopters (pgs 43-44), the checklist for critiquing hype (pgs 81-82), the dangers of "bad thinking" (chap 6), emphasis on and techniques for market research (chap 7), the correlation between the source of ideas and probability of success (pg 208), description of the Stage-Gate(TM) process (pg 209), and the gentle reminder that failure is an option (chap 13). As mentioned in my status updates while reading the book, I felt reminded a number of times of the importance of the Universal Design Principles - to keep the end user as the focus throughout the design process. Likewise, one must also be mindful of the the resources used develop the innovation - that is, not to throw them away but to be mindful of the design process such that the resources are well-spent.
On the flip-side, the weakest moments were the apparent bashing of ideas that did not pan out. It was difficult for me to discern if Franklin was applying the critical analysis techniques he set up in the earlier chapters or if he was simply calling out ideas that failed spectacularly for entertainment purposes. Franklin also locks his book into a specific time period by calling out "doomed technologies" [emphasis mine] such as 3G or Anoto's wireless pens (Livescribe seems to be using the technology quite successfully). Lastly, the organization could probably have been improved upon - fewer boxes and fewer questions in the Appendix.
I think if I had applied the hype checklist to this book before reading it, my expectations probably would have been more realistic. Maybe I should have asked, "Why is this book so difficult to find, really?" True, the authors' thoughts seem to be a little disorganized, that he has seen maybe a few hundred too many bad ideas, and like he's trying to meet a word quota. But I did appreciate the references to studies in product development and his international perspective. "Group think" and ego involvement are real issues to be cognizant of during product development (citing personal experience here). Some of his case studies - like metric vs standard units - were also quite illustrative. So... without the hype, would I have read it? Yes. Without the hype, would I recommend it to others interested in design and innovation? Again, yes.
Why Innovation Fails' strongest moments were the definition of innovation (pgs 38-40), characteristics of adopters (pgs 43-44), the checklist for critiquing hype (pgs 81-82), the dangers of "bad thinking" (chap 6), emphasis on and techniques for market research (chap 7), the correlation between the source of ideas and probability of success (pg 208), description of the Stage-Gate(TM) process (pg 209), and the gentle reminder that failure is an option (chap 13). As mentioned in my status updates while reading the book, I felt reminded a number of times of the importance of the Universal Design Principles - to keep the end user as the focus throughout the design process. Likewise, one must also be mindful of the the resources used develop the innovation - that is, not to throw them away but to be mindful of the design process such that the resources are well-spent.
On the flip-side, the weakest moments were the apparent bashing of ideas that did not pan out. It was difficult for me to discern if Franklin was applying the critical analysis techniques he set up in the earlier chapters or if he was simply calling out ideas that failed spectacularly for entertainment purposes. Franklin also locks his book into a specific time period by calling out "doomed technologies" [emphasis mine] such as 3G or Anoto's wireless pens (Livescribe seems to be using the technology quite successfully). Lastly, the organization could probably have been improved upon - fewer boxes and fewer questions in the Appendix.
I think if I had applied the hype checklist to this book before reading it, my expectations probably would have been more realistic. Maybe I should have asked, "Why is this book so difficult to find, really?" True, the authors' thoughts seem to be a little disorganized, that he has seen maybe a few hundred too many bad ideas, and like he's trying to meet a word quota. But I did appreciate the references to studies in product development and his international perspective. "Group think" and ego involvement are real issues to be cognizant of during product development (citing personal experience here). Some of his case studies - like metric vs standard units - were also quite illustrative. So... without the hype, would I have read it? Yes. Without the hype, would I recommend it to others interested in design and innovation? Again, yes.
Displaying 1 of 1 review