How leaders can recast innovation's toughest trade-offs--efficiency
vs. flexibility, consistency vs. change, product vs purpose--as
productive tensions.
Why is leading innovation in today's dynamic business environment so
distressingly hit-or-miss? More than 90 percent of high-potential
ventures don't reach their projected targets. Surveys show that 80
percent of executives consider innovation crucial to their growth
strategy, but only 6 percent are satisfied with their innovation
performance. Should leaders aim for Steve Jobs-level genius, shower
their projects with resources, or lean in to luck and embrace
uncertainty? None of the above, say Christopher Bingham and Rory
McDonald.
Drawing on cutting-edge research and probing interviews with hundreds of
leaders across three continents, in Productive Tensions Bingham and
McDonald find that the most effective leaders and successful innovators
embrace the tensions that arise from competing aims: efficiency or
flexibility? consistency or change? product or purpose? Bingham and
McDonald spotlight eight critical tensions that every innovator must
master, and they spell out, with dozens of detailed examples of both
success and failure, how to navigate them. How do you excite customers
about a product they've never imagined? When is it wise to accept what
the data is telling you, and when should you ignore the data and plow
forward anyway? How can you maintain stakeholders' trust and support
during radical unforeseen course corrections? Bingham and McDonald guide
readers through innovation's thorniest tensions, using examples drawn
from the experience of organizations as varied as P&G, Instagram, the US
military, Honda, In-N-Out Burger, Slack, Under Armour, and the
snowboarding company Burton.
