Book Summary Preview : The Myths of Innovation

The Big Idea

In this book, author Scott Berkun takes a close look at innovation history, including the software and Internet ages, to reveal how ideas truly become successful innovations – truths that can be applied to the challenges of today.

The book uses innovation myths to understand how innovations take place. Each chapter identifies and discusses one innovation myth, explains why it is popular, and, lastly, uses the history of innovations, both recent and ancient, to teach the truth behind the myths.

WHY YOU NEED THIS BOOK

Using dozens of examples from the history of technology, business and the arts, this book will teach you to learn how to convert your knowledge into ideas that can change the world.

The book intends to clarify how innovation happens by taking on business, scientific and technological innovation all at once, to enable you to gain a better understanding of the world around you and to be able to avoid mistakes should you attempt to innovate as well.

THE MYTH OF EPIPHANY

Where do ideas come from? This question is on the mind of anyone who visits a research lab or an inventor’s studio or an artist’s workshop. It’s the secret we hope to see – the magic that takes place where new things are born, where world-changing ideas come from – they have always proven elusive.

For centuries before hotbeds of innovation such as Google, IDEO and MIT came into existence, humanity struggled to explain any kind of creation. For the most part, popular answers have been unconvincing – enabling fantasy-laden myths to grow strong.

Two of the grandest idea-creation myths:

1. The story of Isaac Newton and the discovery of gravity, in which Newton was sitting under a tree when an apple fell on his head and the idea of gravity was supposedly born.
2. The tale of Archimedes’ Eureka – he was asked by his king to detect whether a gift was made of false gold, and supposedly did so by accident upon observing the displacement of water as he stepped into his bath.

These myths are stories of an epiphany or a “sudden manifestation of the essence or meaning of something”. The word has religious origins – its first use meant that all insight came from divine power – and although today its religious connotations have been mostly forgotten, what remains is that we don’t know where the idea came from and aren’t willing to take the credit for it.

To disprove these and other such myths, we have to remember that ideas never stand alone. Any and every seemingly grand idea can be subdivided into an infinite series of smaller, previously known ideas. Similar patterns exist in the work of innovation itself; for most there is no singular magic moment. Instead, there are many smaller insights accumulated over time.

The best way to think of epiphany is to imagine working on a jigsaw puzzle. Epiphany is the moment when the last piece of work fits into place. However, that last piece really is no more magical than any of the others – and, moreover, has no magic without its connection to the other pieces.

One final point – to look at this from another angle, no grand innovation in history has ever escaped the long hours required to take an insight and shape it into a form that the world can use. The big idea has to be broken down into its constituent parts that can be built or even attempted before said idea can be realized.

WE UNDERSTAND THE HISTORY OF INNOVATION

Ordinary things, people and events are transformed into legends by the forces of time. The Rosetta Stone, the key to sorting out the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic language, and Johannes Gutenberg, the celebrated inventor of the printing press, were not appreciated for what they mean to us in their times.

• Their influence and impact owes as much to circumstance, world politics and chance as to their inherent value or skill. In their time they were perceived in a radically different way than we see them now.
• There is a lesson here for us: when the legends we know so well today were becoming legendary, they were rarely if ever seen as legends.

Some points:

• The stories told in many schools present innovators like Gutenberg as obvious, logical and necessary contributors, which beg the assumption that if we were alive when they were, we would have seen them the same way as we do now. This obviously is far from the truth.
• In addition, any legend of innovation will find natural omissions by history. History can’t give attention to what’s been lost, hidden or deliberately buried! It’s mostly a telling of success – and not the partial failures that enable success. Many of the heroes we idolize were far from perfect; popular history neglects to mention their failings.
• The innovations in the past were far from inevitable. There are no guarantees that grant that these innovations really would have come into existence no matter what – or, moreover, that the situations that persist today are the inevitable consequences of history!
• We also tend to forget that when an innovation was in progress, there are always competitors.The process by which an innovation gains superiority over the competition is an open, competitive, experiment-rich playing field.
• The winners of this process are the ones that become feted, while the losers are usually forgotten. At best, timelines only show one path of the full tree of innovation history.

THERE IS A METHOD FOR INNOVATION

A methodology is defined as a systematic way of accomplishing something. There is a belief that a playbook exists for innovation – a distinct and definite process similar to that followed in, say, chemistry experiments – and, if followed faithfully, will remove risk from the process of finding new ideas.

However, there is no way to avoid all risks when doing new things! It takes resources to start a company, develop an idea or even change someone’s mind – and those investments never have any guaranteed returns. There can be no perfect beginning to innovation; plus once you start you have to evaluate and decide to shift directions or start over with the insight, perspective and experience you’ve gained.

In addition, luck is a big part of business life and perhaps the biggest part of entrepreneurial life as well.

That said, though, some patterns to the source of innovation do exist:

1. Hard work in a specific direction. The majority of innovations come from dedicated people working hard to solve a problem.
2. Hard work with direction change. Many an innovation starts as mentioned previously, but an unexpected opportunity arises and is pursued midway through.
3. Curiosity. Many innovations begin with bright minds pursuing interests.
4. Wealth and money. Some innovations are driven by the pursuit of cash.
5. Necessity. Individuals have innovated to seek something they couldn’t find.
6. Combination. Most innovations involve more than one of these factors.

 

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