Bob Williams

Urgency is a two-face

May 21st, 2011 | Leave a comment | Tags: , , , ,

What’s the goal of your organization? Do this. Ask executives in your business what the goal of the business is. Is it to make market leading products and services? Is it to make and serve customers? Or is it really to make money?

Eliyahu M. Goldratt writes in his book “The Goal” that the goal of the organization “is to increase net profit, while simultaneously increasing both ROI and cash flow, and that’s the equivalent of saying the goal is to make money.”

The business may be about making a particular product or service. But the root goal is to supply money to its stakeholders and employees.

Is there an …Continue reading >>

Bob Williams

Innovation process?

June 16th, 2010 | Leave a comment | Tags: , , ,

Earlier this week I had lunch with @Cjack_HC, @ElliotLeson, @Westdene64, and a few others. I joined the lunch late as the group was in the middle of a brainstorming session on creating names for business card designs.  Sounds easy, but I found the task pretty challenging.  It made me think of the age old question “Is creative accidental or thoughtful?

I'll be happy to give you innovative thinking. What are the guidelines?

Today, during drive time commute with the carpool gang, a similar question was asked. “Can you have a process around innovation?” At first thought the two words seem to contradict each other.

Merriam-Webster defines process as “ a …Continue reading >>

Bob Williams

Thoughts on serendipity and managed processes

November 15th, 2008 | Leave a comment | Tags: , ,

Question: Should we rely on serendipity or a managed process for incremental innovation?

I’ve been asked to answer this question as part of an assignment.  I thought it would be good to record the answer here. It’s not because I think my answer is anything great or has uncovered some train of thought that no one else has wrestled to understand.  In fact, I see blogs, podcasts, and the like on creative thought versus process all the time.  But this is my sounding board and place for me to record thoughts.  I’d welcome yours.

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Man, by nature, wants life to be very rhythmic and loves to have patterns of …Continue reading >>