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    How breakthrough happens - Chapter 1 & Chapter 2

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    How breakthrough happens - Chapter 1 & Chapter 2

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
    0 views27 pages

    How Breakthroughs Happen (CH 1 & 2 Hargadon)

    Uploaded by

    Nikil dsilva
    How breakthrough happens - Chapter 1 & Chapter 2

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
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    | How Breakthroughs Happen The Surprising Truth About How Companies Innovate ANDREW HARGADON Harvard Busnes School Press, ston Masahets The Business of Innovation 11877, on single workbench at a smal collection of objects that ‘would in the next few years profoundly change the technological landscape of America and, in short order, the rest ofthe world. The ‘workbench ran the length of Thomas Edison's laboratory in Menlo Park New Jersey. From 1876 to 1881, that lb produced innovations in high-speed, automatic, and repeating telegraphs; telephones; pphonographs: generators; voltmeters; mimeographss lightbulbs and filaments; and vacuum pumps. To be fair, during that time the lab also produced many promising but ultimately utes innovations in iron mining, electric railroads thermal sensors ink forthe bling, clectic sewing machines, and vacuum storage of food. Edison built the laboratory, in his own words, forthe rapid and cheap development ofan invention” and promised “a minor inven tion every ten days anda big thing every sic months or so" And he elivered. In sc years of operation, the laboratory generated over 400 patente and was known worldwide as an invention factory. It was Edison's most profi period as an inventor on leaving Menlo Park, he turned his efforts to exploiting a numberof the business ‘opportunites the lab had create. The Menlo Park laboratory represented the fist dedicated re- search and development failty and shoved the industrial world + ssunencyyovonerng aa te Pura oF inowaon the power of organized innovation. Over a hundred years late, it still provides valuable insights into the novation process For mod: ‘em managers and researchers ‘Thomas Edison, for example, remains the prototypical inventive ‘genius, Countless books and articles have tracked his every move since childhood: He was born in 1847 n Milan, Oho, the youngest ‘of seven children He was.a poor student, with lesinterstin sehoole {ng than in the agricultural and industrial machinery tha ay about the town, He sold newspapers and candy on the Grand Trunk Ril- road to Detroit. He was a constant experimenter. He disrespected authority He tooks lot of naps. He invented alot of things. ‘We know a great deal about the man but, forall that we know, ve'veleared very tle about how to manage modern eompaniesin the pursuit of innovation. Historians and journalists alike provide a lear picture of Edison’schildhood and his workhabits but realy tell usltdesbout how to replicate his succes. Allof this knowledge, told and retold countless times tellus more about ourassumptions con cerning the innovation process than about Edison’ssuccess—that innovation is about the invention of revolutions, carried out by in- dividuals capable of abandoning the past and embracing the future Gary Hamel, for instance, writes in Leading the Revolution that those ‘of us incapable of exaping the pull ofthe past wil be los tothe fe ture. In Hamels words, and building on the ideas of Charles Handy, entrepreneur (like Edison and his laboratory) must be able topo duce something out of nothing. They struggle not against Nature ‘but agaist the hegemony of established practice” In such deep- seated belies, the notion remains that innovation isbest undertaken by those gifted few who are capable of ignoring established practice. Edison certainly exploited this image ofthe inventor asa heroic genius fighting against the misguided ways ofthe existing markets and technologies Indeed, when the group at Menlo Patk realized the valu of Edison's growing image inthe pres they all ook to the process of mythmaking, sone ofthe engineers at Menlo Park re- called. Edison's worldwide search for the"most perfect” fiber for his lightbulb filament, for example, took place largely as « publicity Tredusneoflnontion = 5 ‘campaign to advertise hislightbulb and hisinvention process —Eai- son had already found a perfectly acceptable material in bamboo ‘bers pulled From a fan lying about." The image of inventive genius served Edison well by drawing potential investors, the media, and ‘imately customers te his innovations and influencing the inevitable patent disputes with other inventors‘ When Edison died in 1931 the New York Times said of him: No figures completely sie the popular conception of ‘what an ivestor shoul be Here was solitary genius tvo Iutonzing the world and making an invxble force do his bidding genus that conquered conservatism, garanded ‘ier in ight. and crested wonders that transcended the pre- Aictions of wopian poets? Edisons lone genius tapped into the American dream that anyone ‘with an idea and energy could make it big. But while that image of solitary genius may have helped Edison, it doesnt help—and may ven hurt—those of us trying to understand and replicate is abo ratory success. Networks of novation “Ths ook tabout Editon andthe who vs thy ace pb of roan bethroughinnoraton ine agai to tout cleing sy the sk, king end the ier and sein bot innovation poss ct ok pa ne sot Menlo ut ihre Pods ign Prat crane many rege ons many orbenches ought th ps entry. ating pst the smoke and iors requis ew pepecive ontieimeraon proces etvoted epee Te eve we ane noe ot the cea and Sine notions of metoss thet doin ainsi tw no cn ob silage whee communion nntancos and conection (6 + Technology Boks andthe Past of notion bound not the networks that corporations use to build virtual r= tanizatons, manage distributed project teams, or form global al- liances; not the networks that made up our rolodetes yesterday and ‘make up our Palm Pilot today; not even the networks thet link ant colonies, beehives, and other complex commsnitie—though all of these do have their effects. The networks we are interested in are much messi But if we are willing to tolerate their ambiguity, wel see that their influence on ou beliefs and actions is more profound. ‘The networks we are interested in are those that link people, ideas, and objects together in ways that form effective and lasting ‘communities and technologies. Max Weber, the father of modem sociology, once said that man is suspended in webs of significance the himself has spun. These webs form the networks we're intrested because they give order tothe infinite numberof people, ideas, and objects that surround us. You won't find these networks listed ‘onan organiation chart in some root directory, o in the assembly instructions of your computer. Yet we confront their reality daily ‘The network that surrounded the electric lightbulb inthe 1870s, for example, connected Edison to Moses Fatmer, whose own inca descent bulb Edison had seen in 1859 ina shop window in Boston, Ik connected Edison to Joseph Swann, a contemporary working in "Newcastle, whose experiments in the 1850 and agai inthe 1870s with the incandescent bull may have led Edion to this design a5 well Andit connected tothe intriguigly elusive J. W.Start, who had filed a caveat fora U.S. patenton the incandescent bulb in 1845, but wh died on his retur rp from England, where he had ile asim ilar patent. Edison’s original patent application for the electri ight ‘was rejected twas reported inthe Fanuary 18,1879, iss ofScen- ‘fe American, because “Edivon's invention wes an infingement ‘pon tat of John W. Starr, of Cincinnati, who fed a caveat fr adi- visible ight in 1845?" The web of innovation that surrounded Edi- son'selectric light involved othersas well Most ofthe time in Menlo Park, between fiveandffcen engineers all worked in relatively tight ‘quarters upstairs, in a single long room where the workbenches, {echnical apparatus, books, and raw materials were kept. Working | | Thedushes ofmartion + 7 0 near to one another meant that each was intimately involved in the projects and experiments ofthe others. Inthe words of one en- _gineer who was lucky enough to work there,“we wera interested im what we were doing and what the others were doing” ‘But the network that surrounded Elson was more than simply other people. Edison learned much by using building, and tinker- ing with the objects ofthe emerging telegraph industry and else where. He learned from the wiring that connected telegraph lines across the city, so dense in places that it darkened the skies. He learned from the eituits that allowed to, then four, and then eight telegraph signals to use single line, He eared from the generators and other artifacts being built round arc lighting. And he shared in the rapidly changing ideas about electricity both in the scientific ‘community and in industry. . ‘To single Edison out from this growing web isto record one tuth—that Elson was quite remarkable—and inthe proces expe renee many les: Edison neither invented the lightbulb nor acted slone i improving upon itThe web around Edison was thick with tiesto other people, ideas, and objects that together made up his particular “invention” Who Edison knew, what heand hisengincers learned from the existing technologies ofthe day, what they believed possible, and who they convinced tooin in their venturesall created the landscape in which his innovations took shape. Ignoring these connections hides ental insights into how innovations unfold be ‘cause this web shapes the behavior of individuals and organizations in profound ways “The price we pay foranetvorked perspective, for abandoning the simplicity of individual inventors and thei inventions, issignfiant Established facts need tobe revisited, old assumptions questioned, and traditional stories retold. Reading so many modern business tomes it seems as though we have in the words of one student of technology, John Lav, "lst the capacity to apprehend complexiy”* ‘Ofcourss, thereisaslittle value in finding out that "it'sall very com: plicated” But those who stay with this book until the end will find the value of a more nuanced view ofthe innovation proces ite 8 + Tecnology rokesngard the asi of ovation ‘Technologies as People, dens and Objects ‘We tend to think about technologies as hardware or software—nuts and bolts, bits and bytes—the purely physical objets that come to ‘mind easly But these objects are themselves deeply enmeshed in particular networks of people ideas, and other objects, To work as imended, they need skilled people and appropriate ideas. The twrenty-two-ounce hammer on my desk ight now is fundamentally dliferentin the hands ofa killed frame, who knows how (and why) to drive a tenpenny nail home in two blows. More complex tech- nologies involve more complex objects, but also more complex links te particular people and ideas. From a networked perspective, these relatlonships among peo- ple, ideas, and objets are the technology. More formally, technology is defined here asthe arrangement of people, ides, and object fr ‘the accomplishment ofa particular goal. uch a perspective pro- Vides a way for us to consider the relationships among these three clement of technology. Existing technologies are unique combina- tions ofthese three elements. The objets ae hardware and software, the physical objects that re tangible and relatively unchanging, The ‘ideas ae understandings of how to interact with those objects. And the people are those wito know the ideas and objects. Their experi- ences have given them the tact knowledge that makes the ideas and objects work effectively together “Take a low-tech example: the guitar. As an object, itis a body, neck, headstock, and strings. Asan instrument for producing music ‘wecan cat technology—just aba milling machine cutsstel ora software accounting system keeps books, guitar produces mas. But it remains just an object. The idea of music varies across cul- tures, as do the ways that people use those ideas. To saya famenco guitarist anda classical guitarist are using the same technology isto recognize what’ common but deny some very valuable differences, Consider Bo Diddley, Dick Dale, ohn Lennon, and Pete Townshend. ech used a guitar butin fundamentally diferent ways, for different audiences, and for different purposes to sing the blues, ride the The Bushes of norton « 9 raves spread the word, or just vent, Changes in any ofthese three clements—the people the ideas. or the objects—can have profound changes on the overall system. "Now consider the telegraph. It has been called the “Victorian Internet" and its impact on the structure of business and society in the nineteenth century was rapid and revolutionary Its emergence asa technology describes the coming together of a particular set ‘of people, ideas, and objects: The First telegraph, in 1774, wasa setof| ‘wentysix conductors (one fr each eter ofthe alphabet), though nether electriity nor wiring was well understood atthe time. Over time, new ideas about generating electricity and insulating wires ‘were added But arguably the most important addition was Samuel Mors’ 1837 idea of conveying text messages through a series of dots and dashes over a single wire (Morse code) The next impor- tant addition tothe emerging telegraph network was the telegraph operator, who learned to hear, and speak in Morse code fluently. The technology continued to evolve throughout the nineteenth cen- tury, as people lke Thomas Edison and others developed new ob: jects and ideas that allowed the sending of more signals faster and farther, over the network of wires spanning the globe Ever more complex technical systems emerge from combina- ‘ions of smaller technologies. The Internet grew out ofan inital combination of computers, networking technologies, and commu ication protocols, to which optical fiber, network servers, local networks, mailservers, modems, personal computers, desktop ap- plications suchas e-mail and Web browsers, Internet portals such 8 AOL, retailers such as Amazon.com, Website designers, Java pro- tgrammers, and many other elements have been added. Organia- tions similarly represent the accumulated combination of people, ideas, and objects typically bundled ito smaller components rang: ing from research and development to manufacturing to order pro- cessing to sales and service. Markets and industries describe larger retworks that relate firms, complex systems, and customers to one snother, As we ascend the hierarchy, each larger network describes the arrangement of elements that were themselves arrangements of elements How Breakthroughs Happen Breakthrough innovations cause these networks to sift dramatically Whole groups of people, ideas, and objects form new relationships seemingly overnight. New technologies obsolete not just old ob jects butalo the people and ideas linked to them and, ina chain re action, the complex organizations and makes that grew up around these combinations. Edison's system of electric ight sent the exis ing 2s lighting companies scrambling to find their place in new ‘markets inthe same way thatthe personal computer reshaped the ‘ypeveriterand mainfiame industries. The same dramas unfold within ‘organizations: New people, new ideas, and new object overthrow traditional priorities in organizations. Peripheral upears, ike Intel's microprocessor group in the 1970s or Hewlet-Packard!’sinket printer division nthe 1950s, for instance, suddenly become central elements oftheir organization’ strategies. Physicists studying complexity theory call these sudden shifts from one network structure to another phase transitions Seemingly small changes in the inks between usta few nodes—in our case, small, changes in the relationships among peopl, ideas, and abjects— rapidly trigger other changes until the networked landscape sud

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