Irrational ExuberanceV2.0 – A Webinar to learn how to be Irrational!! Part II

Unfortunately, there is a Part II, but I did warn you it was coming, and I didn't have to wait long for it: 

A Webinar to learn how to be Irrational!!

It's always nice I suppose to see opportunities for education, but it's not always nice to see what the curriculum is.

 

"Drug Makers Go Mobile"

 

This is nothing more than a "fresh" proclamation of something that is not less than 5 years old already. 

 

Is this “buzz worthy” news when it's 4-5 years old.  I was building mobile apps for PharmaCo's back in 2008, and they were better and more relevant than what we are meant to be "learning" about today.  My point is simply that this kind of news is not a good source for anyone looking for industry innovation.  It’s ancient history. 

I think the only thing interesting about this Webinar is that it clearly demonstrates that by sticking to the fundamentals, but focusing on unique sourcing, the underpinnings of innovative ideas do not get stale.  And this must be true because what is being trumpeted as "new" today, was "new" 5 years ago also.  Call me cynical, but it's my belief that the same thing can only be new once.  And as the one who coined the phrase "Contextual Innovation", there are opportunities for things to be "contextually new" more than once, but that is not the point of this Webinar.

 

There is an old saying that goes something like "all that's old is new again", and assuming ubiquitous long-term memory loss this may be a true statement.

There is a concept of "history repeating itself", but rarely does that mean literally, as is the case here.

 

Throughout corporate America we hear Management talking about "leap frog technology",but has anyone really seen any leaping frogs?  Of course not. Why? Risk Aversion.  To deviate from the status quo and be first requires a leap.  And leaps do not need to be treacherous, but they do need to be understood and practised.  We don't see gymnastic aerialists attempting new maneuvers for the first time in competition. Of course not.  That's why we have doors that close....so we can do things behind them before they are put on public display.

 

It’s such an easy concept to understand, and yet it runs completely against the grain in most corporate cultures: 

“True innovation does not, and cannot be found by looking at ourselves in a mirror, or looking inwards at our competitors or even our industry as a whole.  If that is the approach we take, we simply end up with mildly differentiated iterations of the same set of inbred ideas.  The only way to inject *real* innovation into a company or industry, is to look outwards to other, unrelated industries.”.ie “Contextual Innovation”

 This is a hard concept for most people to accept because it means that “in a crowd of people, we are the one person looking the opposite direction”.  But it’s a Mgmt decision to decide if they want to create, or simply recreate.

Finally, it would be incorrect to assume that what I am saying here is suggesting that we try to build “wild and crazy” new things. 

It’s a fundamental truth that even the best raw innovation will be derived from a collection of “pre-existing parts”, but, the most important point here is:  where are we sourcing the “pre-existing parts”.

Look at it this way: If the answers we seek to meet our business challenges and objectives existed within the boundaries of our industry, they all would have been found already.