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Jamie Gregor
The Innovators DNA explores how average people who are not Steve Jobs or Michael
Dell can become disruptive innovators. Right away, the authors establish that while many
believe that creativity and innovativeness are innate abilities, the truth is that genetics only play a
small role in the innovators ability to think differently. An average of 33% ofinnovation skills
are genetic, leaving 67% of these skills open to being cultivated through learning. The authors
state, Ones ability to generate innovative ideas is not merely a function of the mind, but also a
function of behaviors If we change our behaviors, we can improve our creative impact. (3)
Thus, the DNA of disruptive innovators is first established on the principle that all
professionals with the will and means to engage in specific behavioral skills can increase in
creativity and thrive in innovativeness. Before engaging in these skills though, a pre-existing
condition must be met. The willing individual must find the courage to innovate. In fact,
successful innovators who have the courage to innovate are led to practice the five discovery
skills through their active desire to change the status quo and their tendency to take smart risks to
make change happen. Innovators respond to the phrase If its not broke, dont fix it by finding
something broken. In addition, as they take risks to enable change, they see mistakes as a cost of
doing business and something to grow from.
After finding the courage to innovate, the creative process becomes an active endeavor.
Innovators, and those striving to become innovators, must practice the five discovery skills that
are focused on behavioral actions that generate sparks in creativity. These five discovery skills
are associating, questioning, observing, experimenting, and networking. All of these skills
emphasize learning and experiencing new things and looking at situations in new ways. It is
emphasized that when different disciplines and cultures intersect, a Medici Effect, as in the
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Renaissance, occurs to allow creativity to flourish. It is in these intersections of new ideas and
new ways of thinking that innovators learn to associate, question, observe, network, and
experiment. These intersections are sought out by those seeking to innovate.
Before examining each skill, it is important to recognize that each is equally important and
that innovators do not normally excel in every one, but still must practice each. Innovators score
very high on two or more and then combine each of the skills in a unique way to make valuable
insights. It is also important to recognize that no one skill can stand alone. For example, those
who ask questions naively without the other skills are referred to as armchair quarterbacks. They
hope that one of the questions will result in something big, but it will not unless they learn to
utilize the other skills as well.
Each skill will be examined further in the second portion of this analysis, but a brief
overview is now in place to demonstrate how the elements of the innovators DNA interact to
ultimately create innovative business ideas. Through questioning, inspiring innovators ask
different questions to examine what is and what could be. Common questions begin with why or
why not, what if, or what caused or is. By framing problems as questions, solutions can be
discovered and sometimes, through questioning the status quo, problems themselves are
discovered. Likewise, through observing carefully, innovators see problems and solutions that no
one else has noticed yet. They may even discover ways of using a product or idea differently. In
developing networking skills, innovators are able to draw new ideas and inspiration from others
and bridge gaps between disciplines to discover ideas commonplace to some but unknown to
their field.
In the final behavioral skill, innovators practice experimenting through new experiences,
taking apart existing entities, or testing new ideas. This skill becomes a lot easier and more
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effective when the innovator is more in tune with the other three behavior skills. In addition,
many businesses with disruptive innovators will be constantly experimenting and evolving over
time. But this evolution requires one more skill in order to pull all four behavioral skills together,
and that is where the final discovery skill comes into play.
As discussed earlier, innovators must have the courage to create change and then must
practice observing, questioning, networking, and experimenting. The final discovery skill that
synthesizes the ideas gathered from these activities is associating. By associating ideas together,
innovators make connections between questions asked, things observed, experiments run, and
networks formed, combined with prior knowledge, in order to truly discover great business
innovations. By learning to gather all of the information from these skills and combining it in
unique ways, an innovator is truly born and achieves success.
In conclusion, it is evident that while 1/3 of an innovators creativity really is genetic, the
other 2/3 can be easily formulated by examining and acting on the principles of the innovators
DNA. The innovators DNA is truly a process, which starts with having the courage to enact
change by desiring to create a change and taking risks in those pursuits. After finding the
courage to innovate, those seeking to be innovators must follow the behavioral skills of
questioning, observing, networking, and experimenting. Throughout this process, which truly
never ends, the fifth discovery skill, associative thinking, is used to combine knowledge and
experiences to create an innovative business idea.
As highlighted above, the five skills of disruptive innovators are associating, questioning,
observing, networking, and experimenting. Each of these skills plays a unique role in the makeup
of an innovators DNA and all must be simultaneously practiced and engaged in interplay for an
innovator to be truly effective.
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First, associating is the ability to connect ideas across areas of knowledge, industries, or
geographies. For example, Salesforce.com was developed as the concept of enterprise software
meets Amazon and has even now led to products that incorporate the idea of enterprise software
meets Facebook (43). In addition, Walt Disney championed being a creative catalyst in an
organization by putting ideas together, or cross-pollinating ideas. Innovators are encouraged to
gather as much knowledge and experience as possible, utilizing the other five skills and even
attending ideas conferences like TED, since the more diverse knowledge the brain has, the more
connections it can make. By having deep expertise in one area and broad knowledge of other
areas, T-shaped individuals have the assets needed to associate. Associations can be formed by
creating odd combinations, even if just to start ideas forming, and learning to see both the big
picture and dive into the details at the same time. Innovators are encouraged to use Lego
thinking, where more blocks mean a bigger and better structure, especially if the blocks are from
different sets.
In questioning, innovators propose questions to understand what is and what might be.
Einstein said, The formulation of a problem is often more important than its solution (68). By
constantly questioning what things are, what caused them, why they are the way they are, and
how things could be different, innovators might just stumble on a breakthrough idea. Innovators
are also encouraged to ask what if questions that both eliminate and impose constraints to see
how things could be different and if different might in fact be better. By posing challenges as
questions, innovators are able to examine them in a new way and find answers. With the right
questions, the answers may just reveal themselves.
Observing is also a way in which answers reveal themselves. By carefully watching the
world for things that do and dont work, innovators equip themselves to discover new ideas. The
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concept of vuja de expresses how skilled observers can see something over and over until one
day a new idea is revealed to them because of their vigilance. Ratan Tata had this experience
when he saw that Indian families were in need of affordable cars. He then had to further his
observation to decide how the cars would be purchased and what related services would be
needed, like financing and drivers lessons. Innovators must continually observe to examine what
products customers need to complete jobs, what surprises they experience in using the product,
and what kinds of workarounds they may use. As the authors point out, All of us are watchers
but few are observers. Everyone is looking, not many are seeing (108-109). The innovators
of the world must keep an eye on customers and also on the world around them through travel,
museums and zoos, and experiences with nature. Lastly, innovators must not limit their
observations to sight, but also to senses like smell, taste and touchsuch as when Howard
Schultz visited Italy and his senses were bombarded in an Italian espresso bar, inspiring him to
open the first Starbucks.
Similar to observing, networking requires innovators to step out of their comfort zones.
Thinking outside the box requires playing with people in different boxes. These people may be
of different ages, cultural backgrounds or fields, among other factors. In contrast to conventional
networking, networking for innovators is a way to learn new and surprising things, gain new
perspectives, and test ideas. Innovators may bridge the gap into a different area of knowledge
and then import ideas from that field into their own. In some cases, by establishing different
connections with unique individuals, innovators may experience serendipity and stumble on a
new idea to answer the questions theyve been asking or the problems theyve been observing. In
order to cultivate this networking skill, innovators are advised to attend networking events
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regularly, tap experts outside their fields, and build a circle of creative confidants, possibly even
within their field, to discuss the ideas they come in contact with or change they see need for.
Finally, through experimenting innovators try new ideas to see what might work in the
future. Innovators may experiment through immersing themselves in new experiences, taking
apart products, processes, and ideas, and testing ideas. Some experiments are deliberate, like
when Michael Dell took apart a computer at age 16 to see how it could be improved and when
the founders of Rent the Runway tried to discover the best model for their business. Other
experiments happen by accident, like when IKEA had to disassemble furniture after a photo
shoot and discovered they could make their products cheaper by shipping them in flat boxes and
requiring consumer assembly. And some experiments are a combination of both, especially
companies that evolve over time like Amazon.
Explain How You Can Adapt the DNA and Skill Set in a Way to Help Your Sales Career:
At first I was a bit unsure how this book would relate directly to professional selling, but
after the first couple of pages, it became evident. Not only are the exercises in improving the five
discovery skills useful for all professionals, but it is essential that professionals in the business
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world are innovative. Whether I end up in sales, marketing, or management, I must stay
innovative to be able to continually offer a unique value proposition to the market. In addition,
when selling myself to future employers, being able to observe and question what they are
looking for in a candidate will be a major indicator of my success. Likewise, ideally I will be
working in a leadership role and, according to a recent IBM poll, creativity is the number-one
leadership competency of the future (1). Each of the discovery skills applies in a unique way to
my future sales career.
In terms of associating, I must be able to draw conclusions between what the consumer
wants and what my organization can offer, sometimes offering up odd solutions if it will work
best for their needs. When struggling with finding creative solutions to problems with customers
or coworkers, the authors suggest flipping to the 27th
page in a catalog or utilizing Wikipedias
random page option, both of which can help with examining sales issues in new ways. In
addition, it is inevitable that I will face competitors and an association technique proposed is to
think like the competitor or an admired company you, which is completely applicable to sales
situations. I also love the idea of creating a curiosity box in order to help with ideas for future
products or promotion and believe that is a strategy I will implement even before graduation.
Finally, this advice will definitely prove valuable in my sales career: give space for ideas to
simmer (like the shower) and, if all else fails, go to sleep.
The questioning discovery skill is equally appropriate for my future sales career. The
book itself states that, asking clients lots of questions is key to generating powerful solutions to
problems (66). By becoming skilled at phrasing questions, especially in unique ways, I can
discover what the customers needs and wants are and may even help them discover ones they
never knew existed. Likewise, I can question myself by asking who my target customers are and
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what they want. Finally, three particular tactics discussed to cultivate the questioning skill seem
very helpful to me. The first is Question Storming, rather than brainstorming, which may help in
discovering new sides to a problem or even new solutions. The same end result can be achieved
through question thinking, in which I could turn my top three challenges into questions. Finally, I
can check my Q/A ratio to make sure that I am focusing more on what my client is saying than
what I have to say and showing them I am there to help by asking productive questions.
Next, observing can be very helpful in my future career by allowing myself to become
more aware of the jobs that companies need done and using my unique value proposition to
capitalize on them. In addition, I must look at specific ways in which they use my product or
service, paying special attention to their surprises and workarounds. Observations on these two
concepts could then be used to better serve the customer or even take advantage of on another
need they have in order to generate more business. It is also important to note that these
observations should be regular and that I can apply the innovators technique of scheduling
regular visits to not only check in on customers, but observe them using my product. While
observing, the authors even provide ten questions I could ask myself, focusing on topics from the
purchase situation to delivery and payment to customer service issues.
In terms of networking, there is a lot I can take from this skill for my future career. Ive
always been uncomfortable with the way some people describe networking as a way to
basically play nice so you can get what you want from someone. However, the textbook and this
skill in the innovators DNA have shown me that networking works best as a mutually beneficial
relationship. The way that innovators use networking to exchange ideas and learn new ideas
should be the primary focus of every networking relationship, with resources and job
opportunities as a byproduct from a fruitful relationship. Furthermore, the authors highlight
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tactics to network that are beneficial as well, including a mealtime networking plan, attending
conferences, starting a creative community, inviting an outsider, or cross-training. All of these
are very insightful ideas to improve my sales career through networking.
Finally, experimenting will be applicable in my sales career in many ways as well. Like
innovators, it will be essential for me to try out new experiences to grow as an individual and
professional. Working in new places and in multiple industries, as well as learning new skills,
will continually help me to advance in my field and make me more relatable to a larger number
of clients. Next, while I may not necessarily be taking apart products, I can still deconstruct an
idea to examine why things operate a certain way. Through this, I may conduct an experiment or
pilot study to find a better way. Lastly, developing new skills, crossing physical and intellectual
borders, and going trend spotting, all activities recommended for innovators, will be essential for
me to grow in my professional career.
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