A letter to Innovation Santa
Ten essentials for an innovator’s Christmas list… Christmas, as my 6 year old never tires of reminding me, is coming. Never mind that...
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John Bessant
- Oct 20
- 2 min
Playing the innovation game
Birds do it. Bees do it. Even educated fleas do it….. Well, I’m not sure about the last one but someone somewhere has probably done...
John Bessant
- Oct 3
- 1 min
ice cream dreams
The surprising innovation stories behind that sunny afternoon delight.... Season of mists, mellow fruitfulness — and those rare but...
John Bessant
- Sep 14
- 2 min
Don't kick the copier...
Image: @thidarat.suteeratat on Freepik Have you ever felt the urge to kick the photocopier? Or worse? That time when you desperately...
John Bessant
- Aug 10
- 2 min
Open innovation - the musical...!
Another innovation song....this time about open innovation. Written as part of the celebrations for Henry Chesbrough's retirement, you...
John Bessant
- Jul 28
- 1 min
Two timing innovation
Image: @samodelkin20 on Freepik Multiple independent invention is surprisingly common — there have been many research studies...
John Bessant
- Jul 11
- 1 min
Scaling innovation
Innovation fails — sometimes spectacularly so. It’s hard enough when that failure comes early on during the start-up phase — that...
John Bessant
- Jun 20
- 2 min
Digital is different...
How innovation management is changing and why we still need strategy Image: Freepik ‘Now the chips are down…..’ ‘The robots are coming….’...
John Bessant
- May 17
- 1 min
Why nodding is bad for your brain...
Image: @macrovector on Freepik One of the huge cast of characters created by the wonderful humorous writer P. G. Wodehouse was Wilmot...
John Bessant
- Apr 22
- 2 min
Managing knowledge spaghetti
Image: @chaded on Freepik Innovation is all about knowledge spaghetti. Just like a plate of pasta innovation involves many different...
John Bessant
- Apr 6
- 1 min
Releasing the power of users
Why healthcare innovation is increasingly going to depend on the insights of patients... These days there are very few certainties but...
John Bessant
- Mar 17
- 1 min
The suggestion box strikes back
The suggestion box sounds like a very old approach to the challenge of high involvement innovation - how to engage the majority of...
John Bessant
- Feb 28
- 1 min
Dancing at the Innovation ball
Image: Vectorpouch on Freepik Innovation is all about uncertainty - no-one knows quite what's around the corner. So there's a limit to...
John Bessant
- Feb 3
- 1 min
Making innovation count
The great management writer W. Edwards Deming had a powerful introduction to his talks on quality management. Pulling out a dollar bill...
John Bessant
- Jan 20
- 1 min
Not invented here?
Why letting go is sometimes the hardest part of innovation History is full of examples of innovations which, despite their promise, have...
John Bessant
- Jan 9
- 1 min
Everyday entrepreneurs
Here’s a challenge. Close your eyes and try to visualise an entrepreneur. There’s a good chance that what you’ve come up with will be...
John Bessant
- Dec 20, 2021
- 1 min
Learning to create the digital future
What kinds of skills are going to be needed in organizations as they move towards an increasingly ‘phygital’ (= hybrid physical and...
John Bessant
- Dec 10, 2021
- 1 min
Delivering digital transformation
The challenge of digital innovation is everywhere. It’s hard to escape the talk of ‘revolutionary impact’ or ‘digital disruption’ or the...
John Bessant
- Nov 24, 2021
- 1 min
Successful alchemy
This is the story of the development of porcelain, a series of innovations which enabled the creation of beautiful artefacts and a global...
John Bessant
- Nov 19, 2021
- 1 min
Shaping the future of learning about innovation
The development of skills and capabilities to work with innovation is becoming essential — they are no longer the province of...