How Innovation Works

How does innovation work? First Matt Ridley gives us a number of examples from throughout history. Then he analyzes what those examples tell us. Here is a clue – innovation and invention are very different things. Inventors, leaders, would be innovators, and yes the rest of us, would do well to understand how innovation really works – what helps it and what hinders it.
Good book. Read it.
(I read a library copy, and then immediately bought a copy to keep.)

The book does just what its title suggests: explaining how innovation happens. I enjoyed the first 50-60% of the book, not so much the rest of it; it felt to me that it could have been more concise.

The book started slow, going through many previous innovations and making some light commentary about them. About halfway through the book became intensely practical. I was stopping every few minutes to make notes.

Key takeaways:

- Innovation is simply evolution of ideas.
- You should strive for evolution, not revolution. Big, drastic changes rarely work. Even changes that look big and drastic are usually a cumulation of slow, steady progress unveiled.
- Innovation seems obvious in hindsight, but is impossible to predict in the moment.
- Invention vs innovation. Innovation is not making something new, but putting things together in a new way.
- “Failure is only the opportunity to begin again, more intelligently.” Henry Ford
- Bankruptcy laws can stimulate or stifle innovation. States with the homestead exception, allowing you to keep your home through bankruptcy, have considerably more business innovation. As someone that has worked in credit, I have often been frustrated by bankruptcy laws. It is a good reminder that–in certain arenas–bankruptcy can benefit society.
- A recurring theme in this book is that innovation REQUIRES collaboration. Holding too tightly to patents can hinder, rather than help. Come up with your best idea, and share it widely. Someone else will take your foundation and build on it. Then you can benefit from their advances.
- The Monkey Principal: Tackle the hardest part first. If your plan involves a monkey reciting Shakespeare while standing on a pedestal, focus on teaching the monkey to speak. Don't start with building the pedestal.
- Being wrong may hurt, but being slow will kill you. You're better off to try a few things and fail, then you are to be left in the dust.
- Amazon has a reverse veto system. An idea must be forwarded to higher ups even if all buy one of the managers thinks the idea is rubbish.

Major recurring ideas through the book: Innovate often. Share your ideas freely. Too much regulation or red tape stifles innovation. Innovation is good for society as a whole. As your organization gets bigger, it's harder to innovate–there must be a plan for how you will continue to move forward.