getAbstract Marketing
Kill the Company
Book

Kill the Company

End the Status Quo, Start an Innovation Revolution

Lisa Bodell
Bibliomotion, 2012
Buy book or audiobook

Read or listen offline

Amazon Kindle
  • 0.5×
  • 0.75×
  • 1×
  • 1.25×
  • 1.5×
  • 1.75×
1×

Editorial Rating

8

Qualities

  • Applicable
  • Well Structured
  • Concrete Examples

Recommendation

Creativity coach Lisa Bodell is the founder and CEO of Futurethink, an innovation consultancy. Over the years, she has developed a system for turning tired, risk-averse corporate cultures into inventive juggernauts in relatively short order. Bodell tells you to “kill your company” and do it now, before someone else does. She urges you to look at your organization through the eyes of a ruthless competitor. Find your weaknesses, imagine the future of your industry and figure out how you’ll get there. While some of the book’s exercises might seem corny, each one is simple, yields immediate insights and connects to an overall approach that is engaging enough to win the attention of busy leaders, even skeptical ones. getAbstract believes this book will help CEOs, executives and managers spark creative change from the top down or, as Bodell recommends, from the “middle out.”

Summary

Remove the Barriers

While leaders often complain about a lack of innovation from employees, the impediment that holds back most organizations is executives’ insistence on innovating within the constraints of the current modus operandi. Most employees have no shortage of ideas, yet, even if you’re in a company that is open to new concepts, you may be caught in a time trap, where the emphasis on production is so strong that you don’t have time to think about how to perform better. To break this cycle, think first about the “four essential tenets” of change:

  1. “Everyone is a change agent” – All employees are creative in some way; involve them in innovation.
  2. “Created by the employees, for the employees” – Staffers should lead change initiatives. They know the challenges intimately, and they are most able to solve them.
  3. “Little changes, big impact” – Focus on the small, “quick wins” and the steady progress that can add up to real change.
  4. “Evolve and iterate” – Encourage trial and error, get feedback, adjust along the way, and keep removing the obstacles to innovation.

About the Author

Lisa Bodell is the founder and CEO of Futurethink, an innovation-training consultancy.

Comment on this summary or Start Discussion

  • Avatar
    Sign in to share your opinion
  • Avatar
    F. H. 1 decade ago
    Lisa is talking about stepping out of the mundane status quo business environment, taking a peek at it from outside, comprehending and then analyzing what is hurting the business and then to get a plan in order to go fix it.