Kawasaki on the art of innovation
A lot of good takeaways from Guy Kawasaki's general session, and one big conflict for me. It's the conflict I want to explore.
Kawasaki gave 10 steps to the art of innovation. Step 3 was "Jump to the Next Curve." Kawasaki is an innovator, a venture capitalist; you could describe him as a thought leader, an early adopter, a critical thinker. It should be no surprise that he favors making big jumps in improvement rather than small, incremental steps. That's what he mean by jumping to the next curve. It's not about making the incremental improvement of a bigger name keynote speaker; jumping to the next curve is rethinking how and what a general session at an annual meeting is.
So the contrast is his eighth point: "Churn, baby churn." Once you've jumped the curve, put out the beta, learn, improve, put out the next version, learn, improve, etc. I don't know if Kawasaki would bristle at this or not, but to me this is the definition of incremental improvement. I think Kawasaki meant to also churn from curb to curb, but clearly at least on of the examples he talked about was to be quick to release and then improve the product the next time.
In general, I think associations spend tons of time on incremental improvement and not near enough time jumping to the next curve. But I think there has to be a place for both. The art, and something I'd like to ask Kawasaki, is how do you know when to keep churning on a product and when to jump to the next curve?
I think one common answer might be to wring all the value you can out of a product and then move on. Getting out a little quicker might mean having the philosophy of getting out when the product is on top, when it reaches its goals and is doing well. But I think my optimal answer is both more aggressive and more conservative. I think you jump to the next curve while the product is still gaining momentum. Obviously that sounds aggressive. The conservative part comes in because if you don't get it and you're waiting to be on top or to wring the value out of it, the risk of clinging to something too long is too great, and the upswing of the next curve would actually be more important and lucrative to your organization than the value of getting to the top (or wringing the last bit of value from something).
| | Permalink |
Comments
Scott, I think Guy is speaking about "The Innovator's Dilemma" which talks about "Disruptive Technology". The concept of a disruptive technology is the same as jumping to the next curve. Jumping to the next curve is not "a big jump in improvement" as you said. It's a change in the thought process. It may not fit the masses at first, it's usually a simpler solution and it's usually a niche that appreciates jumping to the next curve. But, this does not contradict incremental improvements at all... Once you're on the next curve with a different product/service, now you can start with small incremental frequent improvements.
Again, I don't think there's a contradiction at all.
Read "The Innovator' Dilemma" for a much better explanation than what I just gave.
Posted by: Dave Will | March 7, 2010 6:25 PM
Scott, it's great to read such a thought provoking recap in near real time. I'm not at the conference this year, so thank you!
Your main points make a ton of sense. Adding to the stop doing list is sometimes harder than attempting new things. As a general rule, if a product or service is trending down an association needs to ask hard questions about the sustainability of that revenue source 12 - 36 months down the road. Pulling the plug too late or not jumping to the next curve can be real costly in this time of rapid change.
I love this quote from Rupert Murdoch - "The world is changing very fast. Big will not beat small anymore. It will be the fast beating the slow."
Enjoy the rest of the conference!
Posted by: Dave Lutz | March 7, 2010 7:56 PM