2 Good Pieces on Innovation

Booz Allen Hamilton's Strategy & Business Magazine had a good recent article that discussed an alternative perspective on Christensen's idea of Disruptive Innovation. One of the fundamentals of a Disruptive Innovation is the idea that it's typically "worse" in some ways than existing products. In his recent article, Carr argues that there can also be Top-Down Disruptive Innovations which outperform existing products:

But in its single-minded focus on bottom-up disruptions, the model is also potentially dangerous. It may lead managers to overlook a very different sort of disruption — one that emerges not at the bottom of the market but at the top.

Another good report I recently came across comes from BCG. This report covers many of the innovation issues that I've touched on in the past- including some good thoughts around the required culture and organizational elements of innovation. There is also some interesting survey data regarding innovation spending and companies admired for innovation.