The Innovator's Way: Essential Practices for Successful Innovation

by Peter J. Denning, Robert Dunham

Two experts show that innovation is a skill that can be learned and describe eight essential practices for achieving success. Innovation is the ruling buzzword in business today. Technology companies invest billions in developing new gadgets; business leaders see innovation as the key to a competitive edge; policymakers craft regulations to foster a climate of innovation. And yet businesses report a success rate of only four percent for innovation initiatives. Can we significantly increase our odds of success? In The Innovator's Way , innovation experts Peter Denning and Robert Dunham reply with an emphatic yes. Innovation, they write, is not simply an invention, a policy, or a process to be managed. It is a personal skill that can be learned, developed through practice, and extended into organizations. Denning and Dunham identify and describe eight personal practices that all successful innovators sensing, envisioning, offering, adopting, sustaining, executing, leading, and embodying. Together, these practices can boost a fledgling innovator to success. Weakness in any of these practices, they show, blocks innovation. Denning and Dunham chart the path to innovation mastery, from individual practices to teams and social networks.

Genres: Business, Leadership

460 pages, Paperback

First published August 13, 2010

About the author

Peter J. Denning is Distinguished Professor of Computer Science at the Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California. He is the coauthor of The Innovator's Way: Essential Practices for Successful Innovation and Great Principles of Computing, both published by the MIT Press.

Reviews

[Antonia · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book you do not ‘finish’ it will become one of my reference books there’s just so much good stuff in it and applies beyond innovation.
Yes, it’s not another innovation book full of anecdotes, there’s lots of practical things to keep you going for a long while.

[Samuel Lubell]

A business book that I read for the Futurist book club. I found it somewhat dull.

[Nico Macdonald]

Recommend by Nathan Shedroff.

[Christina · Rating 5 out of 5]

The eight principles are very straightforward and are great practices for innovator's and others alike.