Improving, adding on or adjusting a current technology is often the focus of innovation - think Apple is nearly on its ninth version of the iPhone. However, there are other ways to innovate, like trying something completely new. How are you thinking about breaking through with new developments?
Innovators and entrepreneurs share a common trait: they are interested in change. Innovators want to create new products and services that respond to change or create change. Entrepreneurs are innovators who want to implement great ideas that often change business models or even industries. What innovation really means then is putting great ideas into action, and the very act of innovation is an act of change.
But there's often too much focus on simply changing things up, and not enough on what change is valuable when innovators and entrepreneurs start to develop new ideas. In fact, while we are often trying to predict what's likely to change, and figuring out how to create products that will meet new demands, we often neglect the flip side of this analysis: what isn't going to change. This is important because it's often easier to predict what won't change, and to act on that insight, than it is to predict what might change, and act on those beliefs.
Great minds steal
I'm stealing this idea from Jeff Bezos, a one-time entrepreneur and innovator who will soon be one of the wealthiest men on the planet. Bezos is quoted as saying he's more interested in what won't change than in what will or might change.
Now, for a true entrepreneur or innovator, we may be led to scoff at such a remark. It may seem that the only way to compete is to upset the natural order, get ahead of significant evolving changes that the other competitors don't anticipate. But change and its impact are unpredictable. You may anticipate significant change that never happens, or does happen but the impact is less than you expected.
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