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What Really Drives Innovation, Anyway?
I recently had a team that was under-performing by any standards. They were all nice people: smart, capable, positive attitudes, competent in their work. But they just weren't producing that much.
So management told them: produce or die. Basically either finish up your work in the next sprint or we'll just throw away the entire project and start over with a different team.
It was amazing. People started working harder, using and creating effective information radiators. The team's stand-ups became laser-focused on the work. Everybody was looking for obstacles and getting them out of the way before they could affect progress. The team innovated several new ways of getting things done faster. They had a six-fold increase in productivity.
So what drives innovation, anyway? What makes one team create the next Google and the next team struggle to create a simple report?
I say innovation is when attitude and capability meet crisis.
Let's take them one at a time.
Capability is the one everybody focuses on. Why of course we'll never be the next
But there's a dirty little secret about capability: capability is not static.
If you don't know something, how about just go figure it out? I've found that 90% of the capability you need for a project is within easy reach. The other 10%? It's likely within easy reach of somebody else on your team. So don't make excuses why you can't do things, and don't think that just psyching yourself up is all that's required. Make a list of books that explain how to do what you want to do. Go read all of them. Then make a second list of the capabilities those books told you that you're going to need. If you're not reading books that explain what capabilities you need, you're reading the wrong books. Usually by the second iteration of this exercise, a month or two in, you've either grown capability or know how to find/rent it. This part is just a job: go do it.
Attitude is the one thing I think most people underestimate. When I'm interviewing programmers, I go for attitude first, capability second. After all, a positive, motivated, happy person can always go learn something, but even a smart capable person with a bad attitude is not somebody you want on your team. Somebody said once that 90% of life is just showing up, and it's true.
I recently needed a housekeeper for one of my corporate apartments. So I posted an ad on Craigslist. $15 an hour, easy work, you need a resume and a good reputation as a hard, independent worker. Great money for a part-time job.
I got three applicants.
Three.
And only one sent in a resume. She was optimistic, happy, and appeared to be hard-working.
So now she's working on her Master's Degree and has a flexible, part-time job to bring in spending money. Meanwhile, in the same area there are ten thousand unemployed people are sitting around complaining about how there's no jobs out there.
Crisis is the one we're probably most uncomfortable with, but it probably has the greatest catalyzing effect of the three attributes. When Cortez came to the Americas, he burned his boats. His men were going to have to make it work one way or another.
It is critical for teams to have stress in order to innovate. This stress can be internal: wanting to be the smartest/best/richest/most-admired guys in the game. Or it can be external: sell or die. But there must be stress.
Ever wonder how so many people hit it rich with their first startup and then can't make any of the others fly at all? It's because there's no stress: they've already made their money, got their fame, or whatever. If the business doesn't work they just go back to playing golf. I was pitching for a partner a couple of years ago in the virtual commodities space (which I still think is going to be huge) My potential partner had already had a successful startup a decade ago and was looking to do something new. But at the end of the day, there just wasn't that drive there. She couldn't make the choice because there was just no pressure.
Many times we confuse emotional attachment to an idea with the stress needed to execute. Being emotionally attached to an idea can carry you through some tough times, but it's the tough times you needed and not the attachment!
Another friend of mine (and YC interviewee) wanted to do a startup in the medical information field, but there simply wasn't a market for what he wanted to do. After dickering around for a while he realized that he had to do something. Bill collectors were calling and life was closing in around him. Now he's making much more money than I ever have with a completely off-the-wall business idea. It was innovate or die. At the same time, another friend is living in a country with highly subsidized social care. He's comfortable if his startup plans don't work out because there is an elaborate safety net for him. So far, it's been years and years and he just hasn't seen any of his ideas really take off.
And then there's me. I make enough money consulting that when I'm not consulting I live off of savings. When I'm working, I find it very difficult to emotionally commit to a startup: I'm simply too busy and there's not a lot of monetary stress. When I'm not working I get very stressed and I do a lot of creative, innovative things. My problem is maintaining that stress while also succeeding. Some of the great business leaders of the past had horrible fears of poverty to help carry them through. Some folks get wrapped up in office politics, eventually viewing their company as their family. Whatever it takes, you've got to have stress.
Stress is the critical thing that as soft westerners we have difficulty producing and accepting as being a good thing. This inclination to keep reducing external stress means that successful innovators are going to have to have a higher level of internal stress and crisis than people from places where real external existential stress exists. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or bad thing, but it is interesting.
There are exceptions, of course, but if you want a team to innovate, find one with a good attitude and capability, then stress the hell out of them.
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