Principles of Innovation

Over the past couple of years, I have been thinking about innovation. Specifically, what (and should ) I do with my teams to encourage innovations. Someone brought to my attention a video from Google's Vice President, Search Products & User Experience, Marisa Mayer.



Marisa talks about nine guiding principles that she believes are key enablers of innovation in her business. I would not argue that we all should adopt her principles, just that it was an interesting discussion and that having such a set of guiding principles is probably something worth thinking about. Mine are (somewhat redundantly with Marisa's):

1. Transparency is your friend.
2. Don't be afraid to iterate and experiment. Always test. Without it, you will not learn.
3. Noble failure is ok. The corollary is that stupid failure is not ok.
5. Share the credit. There is plenty to go around and you will likely have more than 1 good idea in your life.
6. Try to work around people you would be honored to hang with - and recruit someone when you find them! I am fortunate in this regard.
7. Don't have an opinion. Have facts.
8. You can build a business on users, but you need to run it on money. So, while you are innovative, think about how you are going to make money with the idea.
9. Be brave (but not disrespectful) in the presence of senior executives. That is how most of them got to be in their position.
10. Encourage dissent in your organization.
11. Be dissatisfied, but don't be a jerk. It makes you want to make things better.