Defensive innovation: stop de-innovating

Explore how to combat de-innovation and unleash the constant potential for creativity in your projects to drive meaningful change and growth.

It’s commonly thought that innovation depends on some sort of creative bursting forth. There certainly seems to be this sort of generative innovation where something new is deliberately made.

I wonder whether this kind of innovation is really so special and unique. I’m suspicious of explanations where “something magical happens”. So, I wonder if “creation” isn’t all around us all the time.

If it is, then why do we focus on this special, magical kind of innovation? If innovation is all around us, why don’t we see it more often?

I think this is because we see a lot of de-innovation. By that, I mean that the average project/effort spins off all kinds of new ideas. Mostly, these ideas are suppressed, diverted, or cancelled.

This means that “doing innovation” should focus at least as much on preventing de-innovation as on encouraging innovation.

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