Folks, for those of you who know me, you know that I LOVE large enterprises. I believe in the massive potential in large companies (be it in technology and or any sector), I find the global distribution of possibilities intriguing and the complexity fascinating. Equally, there are days that the politics and inefficiency drive me nuts! Large companies, hire very talented people, with huge skillsets who can rock the world. You know my frustration – so why are we not innovating much more aggressively in the large enterprise? Why is the talent which we so feverishly recruited quieting down globally?! For the record, let’s be clear, a small fraction of innovation comes from startups, and yes, while exciting and fascinating, large enterprises are the ones offering ‘deployable, large scale’ innovation. So how can we innovate much more actively and broadly in the large enterprise? That is what ProVoke is all about.

In my last 3 part blog series on innovation and the large enterprise, we started exploring the various ways we can innovate in the enterprise and along the way, we continue to explore the challenges and opportunities. However, a HUGE part of successful and meaningful innovation requires inspiration and supporting folks in nurturing those innovation ideas. We cannot and should not promote ‘innovation’ and ‘innovative thinking’ in enterprises, *IF* we are not willing to support the individuals, and nurture their enthusiasm. Nothing kills innovation faster than this counter-productive approach.

So, while deep in these thoughts, I was elated to see the following article in Forbes! Innovation inherently has risk and possibility of failure. Also, to be innovative you are totally out-of-the-box! The best innovators are those who think without restriction! Hey- a computer company could have not been a music company, a phone company and an iPad company IF they had not thought about the impossible. A sure way to have failed, would have been to ridicule and put to shame those in the company who said ‘what-if’! Sure, Steve Jobs was a key player, but so were the thousands of other engineers and people who made these products work flawlessly and bring vision to execution. When Amazon said, “Hey, what if we become a book company, a distribution company, the biggest retail company and among other thing, oh by the way, let’s start changing the world of infrastructure-as-a-service”, WAY BEFORE cloud computing was accepted as it is today; a bunch of people had crazy, wacky, what-if ideas, and a bunch more, supported the necessary experimentation (risk taking), to make the what-if’s become huge realities of today! What would have happened if these ideas had been shut down?

There are many factors involved in creating a stronger Culture of Disruption, CofD [ProVoke concept] and Culture of Innovation, but equally important is the human and emotional perspective. More to come from this for sure as this is a necessary and global dialogue, as without a doubt we need to innovate at a much larger and broader scale.

Would love to hear your thoughts.