I've always found that working through ideas in written form really changes the thinking. Scott D. Anthony More Quotes by Scott D. Anthony More Quotes From Scott D. Anthony You still want to be thoughtful about what you do, no doubt, but you have to learn through trial-and-error experimentation as well. Scott D. Anthony thoughtfulerrorsdoubt When you are motivating people to do amazing things, you have to win over both their rational side and their emotive side. Scott D. Anthony winningsidespeople I've never seen impeccable logic be sufficient to win both the heart and the mind. Scott D. Anthony mindwinningheart It's one of the underappreciated skills required by an innovator - they have to be able to convince lots of people to do things that might not be fully rational (invest in the company, join something that is likely to fail, try a product they've never seen before), and if you can't tell a good story it is just very hard to make that happen. Scott D. Anthony skillstryingpeople Now, I worry a bit about the TEDification of the world where style trumps substance, so hopefully you have a good blend of both! Scott D. Anthony stylesubstanceworry You have to make the decision about whether you want to avoid or you want to overcome the resistance. Scott D. Anthony decisionovercomingwant Avoiding along some dimensions is easy. Create organization space and bring in some new talent so the innate cultural resistance is less material. Unfortunately, it's rarely that easy. Scott D. Anthony resistancespaceorganization It would be fun too to put some of the great philosophers and political scientists of the past couple centuries into a time machine, have them look at the world today, and see what they think. Imagine Schumpeter, Malthus, Hobbes, Nietzsche, Marx, and more! That would be good fun. Scott D. Anthony couplefunpast If you are a large company and you want to do something unique, you almost by definition have to tap onto the core business in some way. Otherwise you are going into a naked fight against startups, and that's just a tough place to be. Scott D. Anthony nakedfightingunique Some people who were central to former success aren't the right people for your future success. Scott D. Anthony future-successyour-futurepeople What looks like resistance in many cases is rational responses to incentives and ingrained resource-allocation processes. Scott D. Anthony incentivesresistancelooks If you are trying to improve the performance of existing operations in known markets, it is an analytical problem where it's just a question of aligning your execution engine in the right way. If it is about creating something new and different, you can't derive the right answer analytically. Scott D. Anthony creatingdifferenttrying Of course if you are launching a new business you can thinking about revenues, profits, and so on, but metrics such as customer satisfaction or employee retention might be meaningful if you are focusing more internally. Scott D. Anthony metricsmeaningfulthinking Of course, it is worth it to take the time to think carefully through your assumptions, and ensure you at least have hypotheses around how you will create value. But use the analysis as a way to focus attention on the most critical assumptions, rather than spend a ton of time massaging the numbers. Scott D. Anthony focusnumbersthinking A spreadsheet for an innovative idea reports the mathematical relationship between made up numbers. You can't cash a spreadsheet. Scott D. Anthony cashnumbersideas One of the biggest mistakes large companies make is creating innovation teams that mirror all the functions of the core business. Those teams make no progress because they spent forever updating each other on what they are doing versus really crushing the most critical problems they need to address. Scott D. Anthony crushteammistake We fool ourselves into thinking that the spreadsheets that capture our financial projections are something different than what they are. Scott D. Anthony fooldifferentthinking Good innovators are careful observers, network extensively, run experiments, ask lots of questions, and find ways to bring diverse ideas together. Overarching all of this is an intrinsic interest in working through puzzles. Scott D. Anthony togetherrunningideas Why do people do crossword puzzles? There's no reward for completing one, but some people just like the challenge. Scott D. Anthony rewardschallengespeople Successful strategies adhere to a basic pattern. Scott D. Anthony strategypatternssuccessful
