Grabbing Lightning

Established companies are clamoring for breakthrough innovation, but are often hamstrung by the highly reliable, repeatable processes of their management systems. Based on years of research, Grabbing Lightning shows how twelve companies have tried to develop a capability for sustainable breakthrough innovation and outlines best practices for your organization.

The authors show how the management system for innovation is different from the traditional one in that it allows?and even encourages?mistakes and failures in order to promote learning. Grabbing Lightning outlines the three building blocks of breakthrough innovation (BI) and shows what it takes to become an organization that values the BI management system.

Preface ix

Introduction xv

1 Management Systems for Innovation 1

2 Assessing Your Organization’s Capacity for Breakthrough Innovation 23

3 The Discovery Competency 51

4 Incubation: The Long and Winding Road 81

5 Acceleration: Gathering Steam and Building Critical Mass 117

6 The DNA Innovation System 151

7 Incorporating the DNA: The Role of the Orchestrator 185

8 Getting Started: Initiating and Maturing an Innovation Management System 215

9 The Innovation Function 259

Appendix A: Companies Participating in the Breakthrough Innovation Research Study 275

Appendix B: Assessing Your Firm’s Breakthrough Innovation Competency 279

Notes 305

Acknowledgments 315

About the Authors 319

Index 323

Voted "Best Book of 2008" in Innovation, Strategy + Business

The Authors

Gina C. O'Connor is associate professor of marketing at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's (RPI) Lally School of Management and Technology. She currently serves as the director of the executive M.B.A. program and is also the academic director of the Radical Innovation Research Program.

Richard Leifer is an emeritus professor at the Lally School of Management and Technology at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Albert S. Paulson is Gilbreth Chaired Professor in the Technologies of Management at RPI andchief investment officer at Purshe Kaplan Sterling Investments.

Lois S. Peters is associate professor, past-director of the Ph.D. program, and current director of the Center for Science and Technology Policy at Lally School of Management and Technology at RPI.

GRABBING LIGHTNING

TO STAY COMPETITIVE in today's global marketplace, companies need to learn how to harness and sustain innovation rather than relying on the unexpected.

Established companies are clamoring for breakthrough innovation, but are often hamstrung by the highly reliable, repeatable processes of their management systems. Based on years of research, Grabbing Lightning shows how twelve companies have tried to develop a capability for sustainable breakthrough innovation and outlines best practices for your organization.

The authors show how the management system for innovation is different from the traditional one in that it allows—and even encourages—mistakes and failures in order to promote learning. Grabbing Lightning outlines the three building blocks of breakthrough innovation and shows what it takes to become an organization that values the breakthrough innovation management system. In Grabbing Lightning, the authors:

• Explore the discovery competency and show how it differs from R&D
• Examine the incubation competency and reveal how incubation can greatly enhance an organization's options for new business creation
• Focus on the acceleration competency and address the activities it involves and approaches companies are taking toward it

The book also explores the challenges organizations can expect to face once a breakthrough innovation capability is initiated and offers advice for establishing innovation as a sustainable business function in organizations. Grabbing Lightning is a hands-on resource for all established organizations who want to make breakthrough innovation the norm rather than the exception.