I once heard Alan Kay, a die hard inventor/ researcher, share a comment  that gets to the heart of one of the great challenges that mature organizations have when they are in pursuit of developing a continuously renewable innovation culture.  Alan and his very exploratory research team were being asked to direct a portion of their time and talents toward an immediate production effort that was under pressure to deliver specific results with a tight budget and schedule. Alan confidently explained to us why he would not ask his creative team to try and do both. He said,  ” You can’t produce while you are trying to invent and you can’t invent while you are trying to produce.” Although at that moment he was referring specifically to the different mindsets of individuals on his team- I think that the statement reflects essential challenges for the collective mindset and behavior of organizations.

As human beings we are in tune with the idea of putting out great effort and taking risks to establish a better state  for things we care about. The start-up enterprise is based on this ideal. We understand the heuristic of trial and error as an acceptable state of uncertainty, but with an expectation that eventually the struggle leads to a different state or a specific goal. Read more…