Apple is poised to become the most valuable company

S&P 500 Largest Companies

Symbol	Company Name	Close on 5/26	% Chg. YTD	Mkt. Cap Value B$
XOM	Exxon Mobil	59.31	-13	278.6
AAPL	Apple	244.109	15.8	222.1
MSFT	Microsoft	25.01	-17.9	219.2
WMT	Wal-Mart Stores	50.02	-6.4	187.6
PG	Procter & Gamble	60.44	-0.3	174.1
GE	General Electric	16.01	5.8	170.9
JNJ	Johnson and Johnson	59.66	-7.4	164.5
IBM	IBM	123.23	-5.9	158
BAC	Bank of America	15.47	2.7	155.2
JPM	JPMorgan Chase	38.78	-6.9	154.3
GOOG	Google	475.47	-23.3	151.4
WFC	Wells Fargo	28.04	3.9	146
CVX	Chevron	71.55	-7.1	143.7
T	AT&T	24.13	-13.9	142.6
CSCO	Cisco Systems	22.89	-4.4	131.1

source: CNBC

Bottomline:
Apple surpassed Microsoft as the most valuable technology company. Apple is on a high growth drive. Apple's forward P/E is only 16.58, whereas the current P/E is 21.78. Analysts are estimating Apple's stock to rise to $303.11, with a high end estimate of $350. If Apple stock indeed breaks $350, Apple's marketcap will expand to $318.5B, higher than Exxon Mobile's marketcap of $284B, making it the most valuable company in USA (source: Yahoo Finance). With successful new innovations such as the iPad that will generate at least $5 billion in new business this year, and the impending launch of the new iPhone which will bring in more sales, Apple will accelerate the torrid growth throughout 2010. The stars are aligning for a perfect marketcap storm that Apple is going to cause, as analysts will ponder on whether to raise Apple's stock target price further to $400 come December. It's a matter of when, not a matter of if, that Apple will surpass Exxon Mobile. Bravo Apple!!

Apple Innovation Strategy - Apple Innovation eBook

How does Apple, the #1 innovative company in the world, innovate and create game-changing innovations such as the iPod, iTunes, iPhone, iPad and more? What is Apple's secret recipe for innovation success?

What is Apple's Innovation Strategy? Download these Apple Innovation eBook insights and learn to be like Apple... like Steve Jobs, the innovator and CEO of Apple.

"There's an old Wayne Gretzky quote
that I love. 'I skate to where the puck
is going to be, not where it has been.'
And we've always tried to do that at
Apple. Since the very very beginning.
And we always will." -Steve Jobs

Apple innovates through:
• Creativity and Innovation
• Innovation in Products
• Innovation in Business Model
• Innovation in Customer Experience
• Innovation and Leadership
• Steve Jobs

This Apple Innovation Strategy ebook provides insights, strategy, best practices, facts and much more...

Apple has built an Innovation Factory – one that harnesses creativity in its people, stimulating new ideas, and launching successful, profitable new innovations... Apple leverages its diverse culture, innovation processes, partners and networks to seize the new opportunities in the marketplace and grow its business...exponentially…

How did Apple do it?
• Increase revenue more than 400% in 8 years…
• Increase net profit more than 650% in 8 years…
• Increase market cap more than twenty times to over $170 billion and
counting…

The Apple Innovation eBook has been revised in 2011, and includes new insights, iPad innovation, Steve Jobs interview and more!

Download Apple's Innovation Strategy and learn to innovate, like Apple, today!!

If you are having download issues, send us an email at: info at innovationmain dot com

About the author:
Sanjay Dalal is an innovator and entrepreneur with over fifteen years of leadership experience in Silicon Valley and High Tech companies. Dalal authored and launched the Innovation Faculty eBook and Definitive Guide on Creativity and Innovation in business in 2008, used by over 650 leading organizations and professionals all over the world including HP, Hallmark, Cleveland Clinic, Pepsi, EDS, TATA, J&J and major universities. Dalal published over 200 articles in the last two years on the real-time state of innovation in business at this blog on Creativity and Innovation Driving Business, and introduced the Innovation Index in December 2006 that correlates business, innovation and stock performance. Dalal filed joint U.S. Patent on "Hands-On Labs" for delivering live, hands-on training over Web Meetings by simulating a training lab environment. Dalal has launched innovative products such as WebEx Training Center and WebEx Sales Center to market, and grown product line revenue to tens of million dollars in annual revenue. Dalal holds executive certification on Leading Management Teams from Cornell University, and is an engineering scholar graduate in Computer Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin. Dalal attended Arizona State University for graduate education in Computer Science.

Innovation eBook is brought to you by Creativity And Innovation Driving Business based in Irvine, CA.

Address:
111 Academy Way, Suite 100, Irvine, CA 92617
Main Phone #:
1-949-288-6880 (call-in only)

Disclosure: Long Apple.

Apple Innovation Strategy - Innovation eBook, Innovation Process

How did Apple do it?
• Increase revenue more than 400% in 8 years…
• Increase net profit more than 650% in 8 years…
• Increase market cap more than twenty times to over $170 billion and counting…

Download Apple's Innovation Strategy and learn to innovate, like Apple, today!! The Apple Innovation eBook has been revised in 2011, and includes new insights, iPad innovation, Steve Jobs interview and more!

If you are having download issues, send us an email at: info at innovationmain dot com

About the author:
Sanjay Dalal is an innovator and entrepreneur with over fifteen years of leadership experience in Silicon Valley and High Tech companies. Dalal authored and launched the Innovation Faculty eBook and Definitive Guide on Creativity and Innovation in business in 2008, used by over 650 leading organizations and professionals all over the world including HP, Hallmark, Cleveland Clinic, Pepsi, EDS, J&J, TATA and major universities. Dalal published over 200 articles in the last two years on the real-time state of innovation in business at this blog on Creativity and Innovation Driving Business, and introduced the Innovation Index in December 2006 that correlates business, innovation and stock performance. Dalal filed joint U.S. Patent on "Hands-On Labs" for delivering live, hands-on training over Web Meetings by simulating a training lab environment. Dalal has launched innovative products such as WebEx Training Center and WebEx Sales Center to market, and grown product line revenue to tens of million dollars in annual revenue. Dalal holds executive certification on Leading Management Teams from Cornell University, and is an engineering scholar graduate in Computer Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin. Dalal attended Arizona State University for graduate education in Computer Science.

Innovation eBook is brought to you by Creativity And Innovation Driving Business based in Irvine, CA.

Address:
111 Academy Way, Suite 100, Irvine, CA 92617
Main Phone #:
1-949-288-6880 (call-in only)

Creative Participation Opportunities Abound in Chicago right now..

Next week I'll report in more detail about the big national news on the creativity front--that CEOs have identified creativity as the most important leadership competency for the future (More here).

But it's a full moon tonight, and I want to urge you to kick up some early summer creative dust of your own. I'll be kicking the creative cat (apologies to my cat, Jupiter) myself, so if you're in Chicago, come join me for one of the following:

Tonight/Thursday, May 27, Full Moon Jam after sundown
It’s another world at the Full Moon Jam, where hundreds will be gathering tonight after sunset on the lakefront just between Lawrence and Foster. There will be fire spinners and drummers and who knows what else in Chicago’s closest outdoor approximation to Burning Man. It’s a family/community event, no alcohol, ends around 10:15pm. More info here.

Sunday, May 30, Adam/Creativity Jam Performance, 1pm

I’m performing a 45-minute set/Creativity Jam as part of the Mitziut Art Show on Sunday, May 30th , from 1:15p to 2pm. It will be mix of original and popular songs, with opportunities for you to sing and play along (song lyrics, instruments and shakers available, with dancing encouraged). It’s the kickoff set to a free, full day of music and art at the North Lakeside Cultural Center, 6219 N. Sheridan Road. Parking can be tricky so come early just in case or ride your bike—should be beautiful out.

Tuesday, June 1, Creative Energy Boost Networking, 6pm
I’ll be co-facilitating (with energy expert and facilitator extraordinaire Natalie Goldfein) a “Creative Energy Boost” networking session for entrepreneurs and independent consultant types, brought to you by the Big Ooga. Natalie and I will facilitate a creative and interactive experience—you’ll leave with more energy, surprising ideas for what’s next in your business, and many new connections with colleagues. It’s at the 4Points Sheraton, 630 N. Rush (Rush & Ontario), from 6-8 pm. To learn more and purchase tickets (just $15): Click here. If you want to come for free, just say you are a guest of mine and RSVP to Lennie Rose: Lennie@BigOoga.com or 708-524-4562.

Wednesday, June 2, Gypsy Jam, 6:30p
Chicago non-profit Arts At Large is sponsoring this Jam dedicated to providing artists of all mediums an artistic playground--a place to come together, share ideas, inspire, support, (perchance collaborate), and yes, perform in a jam session. To sign up for a performance, contact Cindy Firing at fishopera@rcn.com/212.304.8871 asap. You can also just come to watch. More info here. Wednesday, June 2, 6:30-9:30pm, Arts at Large Office, 318 N. Lake Shore Drive. Note: Dial #100 at the front door to be buzzed in.

All of these events are participatory, guaranteed to get your creative juices moving.

Chicagoans, if you're not quite ready to participate in a jam but want to explore your musical side, I give great one-on-one starter lessons that provide an overview of music basics and get you playing songs on either keyboards or guitar in just weeks, on your schedule. Try it out and see what happens. Read more about my music coaching and six-week starter package. For those of you outside of Chicago, here's urging you to seek out--or create--creative participation opportunities of your own.

Say hi to Jupiter, the grand troublemaker.

The New Polymath : The New Way To The New Future

Fellow Enterprise Irregular and a great friend Vinnie Mirchandani is coming out with a new book :The New Polymath - Profiles in Compound-Technology Innovations, due for release last week of June 2010. He shared an early review copy with me for my reading – what a pleasurable and stimulating read it turned out to be. I was impressed with the theme of the book , the very powerful examples therein ( who won’t be impressed to look at the striking success of the likes of Apple, Google, General Electric and scores of others in other industries in a new light) and the recommended practices therein.
The present era of mankind is seeing lot of excitement and promise all around. Around the world, everyday in our lives bring lot of changes – fast , unpredictable and may times we have to struggle hard to understand what the change stands for. Globalization, Technology has transformed the playing fields across continents, industries and sectors. Very powerful forces of change have shaken the beliefs in many aspects of governance and social thinking. Fortune 500 companies list is changing faster than the fast pace that we have seen in the past. Powerful brands have suffered huge damages and many industries have gotten transformed substantially so much so that many successful leaders today claim their business need to adapt and transform faster than ever. Leading edge corporations run faster in this direction to ensure that their rate of change inside is ahead of the change seen in their external environments. Looking at these developments, its clear that the time to re-imagine the future is now, and it is best done by a fresh school of thought that governs our thinking frameworks to enable a fundamental rethink and envision what is desirable and sustainable.

Now about the book: What does the term Polymath mean? Vinnie explains, “Polymath,” as in Greek for someone who excels in many disciplines, like Leonardo da Vinci, who was an artist, sculptor, architect, and so much more,
Isaac Newton, the English physicist, astronomer, and philosopher, and Hypatia of Alexandria, who was a mathematician, astronomer, philosopher, and teacher
Ben Franklin - author, journalist, scientist, inventor, political philosopher and statesman. In this book, Vinnie focuses on Polymath enterprises, who are setting out a strikingly successful path in business.

Vinnie, the quintessential polymath as defined in the book, starts by observing that for the most part today, most of us seem to specialize and highlights the fact that we are monomaths in a world of exploding knowledge and passionately argues for more and more polymaths to be nurtured both at the institutional and at personal levels. (Being a monomath is a direct teaching of many management thinkers of recent era – for example, as recently as in the last two decades, Jim Collins adopted Peter Drucker’s thinking and brought out in his book “Good to Great” that leaders need to think and act like hedgehogs , not foxes. Hedgehogs are more like monomaths and foxes are more like polymaths ). With monomaths around, Vinnie argues that many ecosystems are going through a phase aka the dark ages, where there was plenty of living, but there was little forward movement in terms of progress. It was defined by its relative “nothingness”. Drawing a parallel to the current time, he points out, in the information technology, there is lack of nutrition—so much of the spending is wasted. In sustainability, there is lack of agreement—there are so many rancors in spite of so many global concerns. In health care, it is about lack of availability—so much of the world does not have access to all the advances in technology—or even basic health care. The core of these problems Vinnie argues amongst others centers on monomath thinking and execution.

At the same , Vinnie brings out the modern day success stories of polymath enterprises and individuals and argues that in them he sees the potential to capitalize on the promise that future holds for business and mankind. He succinctly points out to the fact that well-designed enterprises are taking individual monomaths, leveraging a wide array of technologies and becoming the new polymaths. The good news is that as in the European Renaissance, there are plenty of polymaths that are around. Though a lot of attention these days seems to go to innovation in mobile and social technologies, plenty of complex, hairy “industrial innovation” is also going on. This is encouraging because we face a daunting series of challenges at the global, enterprise, and individual level. We need polymaths to help deal with a range of challenges – big and small, of various size and structures.

Let's looks at the new business that are shaping many emerging industries - The successful enterprises spanning established corporations to upcoming start-ups—are creating incredible value by succeeding in a new way: by bringing together various streams of technology (biotech, cleantech, healthtech, infotech,Nanotech etc) to create new form of processes, products and services to create value . These are the poster child of Vinnie’s definition of the New Polymaths.

What I see in the book are a rich set of examples and metaphors that talk the story of entrepreneurs, business leaders, and multinational companies innovatively leveraging technology to tackle big problems, “grand challenges,” related to health, hunger, and natural disasters—and, of course, information technology. In their own ways, these big and small enterprises in their spheres of influence are reshaping the world . Vinnie highlights that examples represent a range from a triangle to an eight sided octagon to a ten sided decagon to a twenty sided icosagon to a 50 sided pentacontagon! The “more-sided” polymaths are trying to solve the really big, hairy problems. The “fewer-sided” ones are a bit less ambitious, but they are helping us run our enterprises and lives much better. The book rightfully brings out the range, recognizing that we need a variety of such forms of organizations.

The easy to read book is structured into three parts :

Part I sets the stage for the challenges of today and opportunities for polymaths of today and profiles GE, a new polymath.

Part II is organized around an acronym—R-E-N-A-I-S-S-A-N-C-E—each letter of which discusses a building block for the new polymath to leverage.

Part III is focused on how helping you groom your own new polymath. It profiles the BP CTO group, its tools and processes, and its vast ecosystem of innovation ideas, besides bringing together common threads from the seven other polymath profiles and the 11 building blocks

Leaders who disrupt to succeed in business need a framework to navigate their way and Vinnie provides that through his key building blocks of the R-E-N-A-I-S-S-A-N-C-E framework (each letter is a chapter that discusses a building block for the New Polymath), we learn about 11 key ideas: Residence; Exotics; Networks
(Bluetooth to broadband); Arsonists; Interfaces; Sustainability; Singularity;
Analytics; Networks (social); Cloud Computing; and Ethics. He further brings in the ethics dimension and urges integrating this into the warp and weft of innovation that the Polymaths unleash. This is a nice read explaining the need for these changes and how to effectively leverage them for success.

Do all these things thing look theoretical? - No way!. Look at the rich examples that Vinnie is parading: Apple, Google, Salesforce.com et al... Marc Benioff in the preface to the book captures this very well.–“Being a Polymath isn’t that difficult—and it always yields multidimensional rewards”. One of my favorite in this book is the chapter on steps to becoming a polymath – and the book lays out the key steps to becoming a Polymath enterprise.

Vinnie’s closing comments captures the essence that if we add up all the personal interests and skills that do not show up in job descriptions, there are plenty of other modern-day, mainstream polymaths and urges business to craft the right blend of monomaths that can lead to running successful polymath enterprises. And that we need these polymaths to solve the world’s wicked problems that Aristotle and al-Tusi and Jefferson never even imagined. In Vinnie’s dream, in such a world, Michelangelo would propose a toast to the uomo universale, the Italian term for polymath, and invoke his contemporary, Leon Battista Alberti: “A man can do all things if he but wills them.”

When In Search Of Excellence got published in 1981, it was a time when every good business idea seemed to be born in Japan, and most did not appear transferable to the United States. That’s the time, Tom Peters & Robert Waterman, the authors of the book examined several successful American companies and detailed readily transferable attributes shared by most of them. It helped American executives look into the mirror and see that some of the things they were doing were not bad at all, that others were excellent, and that they could borrow excellent ideas from each other. That, in turn, paved the way for many wannabes to create successful business. With the examples showcased in The New Polymath, Vinnie is again demonstrating the extraordinary ways in which the New Polymaths of the American business are winning in the international arena – he tops it by laying a robust framework for others to get there. When we extend these concepts to new strata - the likes of the emerging world, the non profit institutions etc. the results shall turn out to be much more significant. A very important reference book for business, entrepreneurs, management students and all professionals who dream and are working to create a better world.

The Creative Energy Crisis

"We're in a new kind of energy crisis—and this one's personal" ~from the Energy Project website

How energized are you when you're reading this? Do you feel in balance, on top of your life, tasks and goals--or stressed, overwhelmed and guilty for not doing more? We need energy to be creative, and too many of us are pretty maxed out.

The Way We're Working is not Working, the new book from Tony Schwartz, human performance expert and founder of the Energy Project, explores this compelling and too-often-ignored topic of personal energy. "The relentless urgency that characterizes most corporate cultures," he writes--and, I would add, organizations of all stripes and many personal lives of Americans as well--"undermines creativity...and, ultimately, performance." Schwartz has focused on how mismanaging our energy has impacted engagement in organizations (see his previous best-seller The Power of Full Engagement). His new book cites a meager 20% global workforce level of full engagement (those who consider themselves "fully engaged" at work, according to Towers Perrin) even before the recession fully hit. 57% of people work on evenings and weekends. 37% take 20 minutes or less for lunch. It's hard to be fully engaged when you're running on fumes. Creative? Forget about it.

In my role as a consultant I get to take a peek into the work lives of many different people in various industries and organizations--and it's not pretty. Almost everyone is stretched and overwhelmed, and the people who thrive tend to be those who have learned how to ignore personal needs and jump from one urgent demand to another. (Pardon me as I take a moment to vent. Perhaps I experience this more than others because of my outsider role, but it's shocking how many "successful" people cancel meetings at the last minute, don't return phone calls and don't keep their word. These integrity gaps have only widened in the past few years.)

Schwartz offers a better, and ultimately more productive, way of excelling in our ratrace world. It's by understanding and respecting the way personal energy works (see 10-minute video below for a good synopsis). Yes, high performers work hard, but they also recover their energy more than others. Humans are not unstoppable computers. We function in waves and pulses, like the heart beat, and sleep, breaks and renewal are essential for our productivity. "As addicted as we can become to the speed and intensity of our lives," Schwartz writes, "we're more creative an productive when we move intentionally between effort and renewal, action and reflection." Organizations, Schwartz explains, need to meet core energy needs of employees so that they are "freed, fueled and inspired" to bring the best of themselves to work. Those energy needs are sustainability (physical), security (emotional), self-expression (mental) and significance (spiritual). You can take the energy audit on the Energy Project website to see how well you are meeting your own energy needs.

I saw Tony at this week's international American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) conference here in Chicago, where we all ran like panting dogs from one breakout session to another, from one Expo booth to another, trying to network and learn and push ourselves to swallow everything we can (sorry, energy...though all conferences are like this, right?). I originally met him in San Francisco in the 1990s when his book, What Really Matters: Searching for Wisdom in America, made a particular impact on me. That book described his own five-year journey across America seeking out mystics, philosophers, physicians and psychologists--an amazing feat--to understand what makes humans thrive. While his focus is a bit more on the corporate world these days, it's great to see that he continues his commitment to helping us all live a little better. And I have no doubt that our understanding of "energy"--long a buzzword in California ("You have good energy")--will become more more crucial in helping us navigate our world in the decades to come.

Apple iPad ignites the Ebook readers market

Apple iPad - Red Hot Innovation for eBook Reader market

"Yankee Group forecasts that the already hot United States ebook reader market is about to catch fire, sparking from $1.3 billion in revenue in 2010 to $2.5 billion by 2013.

What’s the key finding of the research and why?
Yankee Group forecasts sales of eReader devices to rise from 6 million units in 2010 to a little over 19 million units sold in 2013.

Revenue from the sale of these devices will similarly catch fire, sparking from $1.3 billion in revenue in 2010 to $2.5 billion by 2013.

Additionally, by 2013 the U.S. ebook reader sales will reach 19.2 million, a CAGR of 34 percent, with 6 million ebook readers sold in 2010 alone.

The U.S. installed base of ebook readers will hit over 36 million, up from an installed base of 9 million by 2011.

Half of all consumers who indicate interest in buying an ebook reader will have bought one already, so device makers should act quickly.

"Our forecast is built around a model that factors in the effects of price elasticity, network effects and adoption risk and is loosely based on product diffusion models developed by Everett Rogers and Frank Bass." - Dmitriy Molchanov, an analyst at Yankee Group, regarding the research firm’s new study, “Yankee Group’s US EBook Reader Forecast: Kindling a Fire”

Apple (AAPL) launched the iPad on April 3, 2010... at unbelievable pricing:

"With iPad, you get all our latest innovations. And all our most advanced technologies. In one of the most revolutionary products we’ve ever created. All at a price that’s well within reach." Apple

iPad Wi-Fi 16 GB starts at $499

iPad Wi-Fi + 3G 16GB starts at $629

Pre-orders were brisk for Apple's new iPad

Neither recession nor gadget overload shall slow the mania surrounding the introduction of Apple's iPad mobile computer.

On Friday, the first day that buyers could pre-order the device (it arrives in stores next month), Apple racked up an estimated 91,000 sales in just the first six hours of availability, putting temporarily to rest the Internet's persistent "iPad fail" meme. Analysts predict the first-year sales could reach 5 million.

Engadget.com asked its tech-savvy readers whether they planned to buy an iPad, which starts at $499. The result: Nearly 19 percent of 60,000 respondents said yes; 65 percent were negative; and 16 percent clicked "What's an iPad?"

Apple Sells One Million iPads

CUPERTINO, California—May 3, 2010—Apple® today announced that it sold its one millionth iPad™ on Friday, just 28 days after its introduction on April 3. iPad users have already downloaded over 12 million apps from the App Store and over 1.5 million ebooks from the new iBookstore.

“One million iPads in 28 days—that’s less than half of the 74 days it took to achieve this milestone with iPhone,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “Demand continues to exceed supply and we’re working hard to get this magical product into the hands of even more customers.”

New Survey Shows Huge Wave of Apple iPad Demand Striking Amazon

A ChangeWave survey of 3,171 consumers – conducted in the aftermath of that Apple announcement (Feb 1-10) – shows a huge wave of pre-launch demand for the iPad and offers key evidence that the Apple tablet will have a major impact on the e-Reader, laptop and home entertainment markets.

Moreover, the survey shows Amazon (AMZN) and its e-Reader competitors are poised to take a big hit early on from the iPad's entry into their market.

The survey shows the Apple iPad is now poised to capture an astonishing 40% of the e-Reader market going forward in the first 90 days after its launch.

Bottomline:

According to Yankee Group, there will be at least 6 million eBook readers sold in 2010 (this survey was done before the Apple iPad announcement & launch). However, this is assuming the eBook reader market grows according to the baseline forecasts by Yankee. In all likelihood, the eBook readers market will grow much faster, rather ignite exponentially, with the introduction of iPad.

If Apple takes 40% of the U.S. market share, Apple will sell at least 2.4 million iPads in 2010 - new business worth at least $1.2 billion in the first year of launch - WOW! Apple has already sold 1 million new iPads. Apple creates a new category of devices that combine eBook readers, multi-media players, web browsers, music players, productivity apps, e-mail, business & entertainment apps & more. Apple is poised to sell at least 4 million iPads in 2010 (Apple will begin selling iPads in 9 countries in May), thereby creating yet another successful, disruptive aka "killer innovation"! Only Apple knows best how to create new businesses that grow from 0 to $1 billion plus in less than one year... this is simply AMAZING!

What does this mean for Amazon & Kindle? Would iPad relegate Kindle to second place, and deliver a knock-out punch? If history is a guide (and considering what Apple did with iPod and then with iPhone), Amazon has got to be worried... What will be Amazon's answer to the iPad? Kindle 3 better be good!

Apple's Innovation Strategy

How does Apple, the #1 innovative company in the world, innovate and create game-changing innovations such as the iPod, iTunes, iPhone, iPad and more? What is Apple's secret recipe for innovation success? What is Apple's innovation process?

― "There's an old Wayne Gretzky quote that I love. 'I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.' And we've always tried to do that at Apple. Since the very very beginning. And we always will." —Steve Jobs

Download Apple's Innovation Strategy, and learn how Apple became the #1 innovator through:
• Creativity and Innovation
• Innovation in Products
• Innovation in Business Model
• Innovation in Customer Experience
• Innovation and Leadership
• Steve Jobs

Apple's Innovation Strategy & Process - Download Now

"Conformity Reigns but Exceptions Rule"

"Difference is a commitment to the unprecedented…a commitment to letting go.” Youngme Moon

I love Harvard professor Youngme Moon's sub-subtitle of her new book, Different: Escaping the Competitive Herd: "Succeeding in a World where Conformity Reigns but Exceptions Rule." In her book, she makes the case that true innovation--and success--comes when a business offers something meaningfully different.

As much as we Americans often claim the mantle of individuality and freedom to be different, most of us rarely are. From what we wear to what we talk about, from the party at the bar to the big wedding we attend, conformity reigns and rains and, as my poor friends here in Chicago have heard too much from me lately, I'm feeling all wet.

Moon makes the case that almost every success story of the past couple decades has been the exception to the rule, the outlier that has rejected orthodoxy, the difference-maker that did not simply compete in the same game as others. "Differentiation is not a tactic," she says. "It's not a flashy advertising campaign; it's not a sparkling new feature set. It's not a laminated frequent-buyer card or a money-back guarantee. Differentiation is a way of thinking. It's a mindset. It's a commitment. A commitment to be different, not in a superficial, I'm-going-to-offer-a-couple-of-features-my-competitor-doesn't-offer kind of way, but in a way that is fundamental and near impossible to replicate.”

Now I happen to be allergic to too much conformity, but I realize that it's often easier, and even satisfying, to conform. But creativity--which we need more than ever in our organizations and for our own personal success--requires deviance, a willingness to be different. A willingness and a mindset and a drive to be the one who doesn't do it that way, who draws outside the lines or creates meaningful new lines, who risks the stares and comments (and there will be many) from the conforming majority.

Moon's wonderful Anti-Creativity Checklist video (above) shares her top 14 ways to keep your place in the conforming majority and ensure that you won't be a difference-maker in your organization.

Charlene Li’s Book : Open Leadership

Charlene Li and Forrester’s Josh Bernoff earlier gave the pioneering book, “Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies”, which provided business a leg up to understand social technologies and consumer behaviors. (For the record : Charlene was amongst the well known Forrester Star who quit to start her own venture Altimeter Group with other partners) Among other things the book laid out the now widely used, the four-step process for developing a social media strategy. A lot has changed since then – the most noticeable one includes, blogging meeting its match as a popular social technology with the exploding popularity of social tools like Facebook ,Twitter, Ning etc. I was delighted to when I got the chance to review Charlene Li’s to be released book – “Open Leadership – How Social Technology Can Transform The Way You Lead” (Release planned May 24, 2010) .

To begin, let’s look at the business world and leadership challenges therein as it exists today: As is now widely recognized, the contours of leadership inside business are changing. Business in this era are discovering that the command -and-control leadership methods of the last century are a misnomer in this age where changes happen too fast, ten year old organizations scale up to support multiples of tens of billion dollars in market cap, business can go global at such a terrific pace that virtually every business that operate in the free market edifice becomes global in nature. Advances in social media impose a huge influence in the way stakeholders come together in running the business. In these circumstances, to attract and retain employees and all other stakeholders to get them to contribute their best to make business grow is a challenge being grappled by all organizations. Working styles and enriching work environments becomes a clarion need and the traditional models of centralized leadership is slowly (some would say that is too swiftly) giving way to more social(open) leadership. In its classical command-and control leadership style, the leadership was identified by its position, authority and power, whereas in this new age – this paradigm has suffered a lot – resulting in lack of innovation, participation and creativity, passion and accountability. The new positioning is for business to recreate leaders embracing open leadership who see themselves more as coaches, facilitators, investors and partners. The boundaries inside an organization have become more permeable; knowledge and innovations can easily transfer inward and outward. All involved elements in the organization participate and influence decisions in the process helping these companies to perform better than their rivals on employee retention and morale, and other performance measures like innovation, profitability and market leadership. A very towering presence serves as the backdrop for this change: your business does not embrace social media – its social media that embraces your business and creates a huge perturbation effect so to say! Every organization is becoming a social organization. The challenges organization faces is how to evolve into a social organization. This evolution will affect individual staff, internal processes, and the structure and culture of the organization association – every part of the organization gets affected and that includes leadership within the organization.

Simple and appealing right ? No, not that easy for all business to embrace such things so easily. As they say in organizational change management, hard change( say process, technology) is soft and soft change( human beaviour) is hard. Ask the question why is social hard ? Charlene has the answer: It’s because real relationship requires you to cede control and win by influence! She explains, having the confidence and humility to give up the need to be in control, while inspiring commitment from people to accomplish goals is the basic tenet of open leadership. Open leadership is coming to organizations—companies, non-profits, governments, schools—because we are in the middle of a fundamental shift in power, one in which individuals have the ability to broadcast their views to the world. It means that the person at the top no longer controls the flow of information, and without that the leader is no longer the best person to make all the decisions. To be open, you need to let go of the need to be in control. You need to develop the confidence—to develop the trust—that when you let go of control, the people to whom you pass the power will act responsibly. Leaders who are unable to let go in this new world of social media will eventually find themselves at the head of a sorry band of unimaginative time-servers.

Open Leadership argues that a new organizational structure is required to accommodate and benefit from the culture of sharing that social media has fueled over the last few years. Charlene’s new book, “Open Leadership: How Social Technology Can Transform the Way You Lead”, is essentially about how leaders can tap into the power of the social technology revolution and how to be “open” while still maintaining control. Does it sound paradoxical? No! Not at all.
Charlene argues for openness but cautions toprovide for disciplined control. Practically speaking, this is being more grounded on reality – open leadership is not like laissez-fair leadership. While this may look like a natural progression in the business scheme of embracing technology advances, the reality is that there is a huge challenge for executives and leadership teams to embrace openness while maintaining control. Charlene helps provide that framework with her new book - this is relevant to all business that are exploring the new social web and creating/refining an approach towards effectively embracing them. This has come at the right moment, when almost all business – big and small have been confronted with this challenge /opportunity of embracing the social web actively and in an effective manner.

And, now about the structure of the book: I like the fact the book is organized into three sections – 1. Upside of giving up control. 2. Crafting Your Open Strategy, 3.Redefining Relationships. The book starts with a persuasive argument as to why giving up control is non-negotiable and goes on to define ten characteristics of being open (In my view, openness is a journey – difficult to define in a scientific way, but can only be characterized – the more we travel this route, the more enriching the characteristics become). Section two helps delineate the methods of custom creating open strategy - with means to initializing with determinations of how open to be, followed by understanding benefits and measuring the value of being open. The idea of “Sandbox Covenants” is a very powerful metaphor and can act as a tool for strategizing openness and executing the strategy.
Creating a robust mechanism for social graphic profile definitions – the steps include Social Audit, Engagement Audit and Influence Audit is a powerful tool and as told by Charlene in the chapter of orchestrating your own social strategy is a very powerful message and a robust mechanism for business to follow with a social fabric while on the open leadership path. The framework of organic, centralized, co-ordinated forms of openness is an important advance in the study and practice of openness. Part three focuses on the mind set changes and skills, executives need to learn to foster a climate of openness inside their business and means to nurture openness, imperative of failures and transformational case studies centered on organizations like Cisco, Dell and Proctor & Gamble.

Very rich and well known examples and case studies from an array of organizations have been included and widely quoted within the book – Best Buy, Cisco, Google, Kodak, Microsoft, The State Bank Of India, United Airlines, U.S.Department Of State, etc I like the book’s structure and presentation for three reasons :

A.Its about strategy but highly actionable Refreshingly, most chapters come with actionable lists.

B. The examples are of Large corporate behemoths – the Fortune 500 types and this shows the power, reach and results of openness as we can all see. (Charlene must be complemented for this – by relating to examples that all can find out with some efforts and research adds to the credibility) and the need to embrace failure where needed and learn from those.

C. The very easy to read style and the fact the actionable frameworks can be applied to business of all sizes, shape and color.

Needless to say, this is a good read for leaders planning to effectively embrace openness and leverage social technologies inside their organizations.

Apple Innovation eBook - Innovation Strategy, Innovation Process

How did Apple do it?
• Increase revenue more than 400% in 8 years…
• Increase net profit more than 650% in 8 years…
• Increase market cap more than twenty times to over $170 billion and
counting…

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The Apple Innovation eBook has been revised in 2011, and includes new insights, iPad innovation, Steve Jobs interview and more!

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About the author:
Sanjay Dalal is an innovator and entrepreneur with over fifteen years of leadership experience in Silicon Valley and High Tech companies. Dalal authored and launched the Innovation Faculty eBook and Definitive Guide on Creativity and Innovation in business in 2008, used by over 550 leading organizations and professionals all over the world including HP, Hallmark, Cleveland Clinic, Pepsi, EDS, and major universities. Dalal published over 200 articles in the last two years on the real-time state of innovation in business at this blog on Creativity and Innovation Driving Business, and introduced the Innovation Index in December 2006 that correlates business, innovation and stock performance. Dalal filed joint U.S. Patent on "Hands-On Labs" for delivering live, hands-on training over Web Meetings by simulating a training lab environment. Dalal has launched innovative products such as WebEx Training Center and WebEx Sales Center to market, and grown product line revenue to tens of million dollars in annual revenue. Dalal holds executive certification on Leading Management Teams from Cornell University, and is an engineering scholar graduate in Computer Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin. Dalal attended Arizona State University for graduate education in Computer Science.

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The "Four Cs" for 21st Century Education

Most of us know that "there is a profound gap between the knowledge and skills most students learn in school and the knowledge and skills they need in typical 21st century communities and workplaces." So states the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, a national organization comprised of both business (Apple, Intel, Adobe, HP) and education (National Education Association, Pearson, Scholastic) leaders, committed to "fusing the three Rs and four Cs." As an advocate for the skills of innovation, I'm thrilled to see attention now placed on these Four Cs, with 14 states, including Illinois, having signed on to adopt the Partnership framework as a way to ready students for the 21st century. Most of us know the three Rs are reading, writing and arithmetic, but what are the Cs?

In the Partnership framework above, the Four Cs make up the "Learning and Innovation Skills" and are as follows:
1. Creativity and Innovation
2. Critical Thinking and Problem Solving
3. Communication and Collaboration

For creativity and innovation, the framework emphasizes Thinking Creatively (brainstorming techniques, creating new ideas, refining and evaluating ideas), Working Creatively with Others (communicating new ideas, being open to diverse perspectives, demonstrating orginality, viewing failure as part of the process) and Implementing Innovations (Acting on creative ideas and contributing to a field). These are terrific guideposts.

So the question is, how do we really teach creativity, critical thinking, communication and collaboration? These are right brain skills, those that are most difficult to teach in a codified, regimented way. With most school systems now fixated on measurable outcomes (usually test scores), how do we make these Four Cs a priority when they are so hard to measure? Illinois, for one, has charged "core content teams" with several tasks including to "ensure that the Illinois Learning Standards embody the fusion of the three Rs and the four Cs." I'm looking forward to delving into this question and learning more about what states are really doing to embrace the framework. Let me hear from you if you know more about the progress being made.

In this Pearson Foundation video below, "Teaching Teachers to Teach 21st Century Learners," we hear from various leaders from the worlds of business and education as they discuss the importance of 21st century learning and the need for change. Partnership for 21st Century Skills President Ken Kay begins to describe the skills needed with this distinctive pairing: "Non-routine thinking" and "complex communications."

The education world has long been averse to change--in many ways we are still preparing students for a world that no longer exists. The fact that the Four Cs have been defined and already embraced by many leaders is a promising step. The conversation is happening. We'll see if that can lead to real change and better learning for our kids in the near future.

innovation to day

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