The Innovative Executive

The future of work is changing. But over time organizations are building new competencies by growing different functions to impact long term development and professional impact. Today, the economy relies on colleges and universities to train students to be the next generation of workers with practical skill sets. Humber College is training the next generation of workers and positioning Ontario to meet the demands of the labor market now and into the future. Dr. Ginger Grant discusses how her organization is creating an innovation culture, increasing engagement, optimizing processes to boost productivity and retention. What we cover in this episode: 01:50 Shifting culture in academics 09:30 What innovation management assessment uncovers 16:10 Polytechnic and innovation to solve community problems 19:50 Talent management 21:56 Global partnerships – work integrated learning Follow Dr. Ginger Grant Follow Me: LinkedInInstagramThe Innovative Executive Leading Intelligently in The Age of Disruption What is “The Innovative Executive” Podcast? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

It’s no secret that technology is driving innovation in the gaming industry today. There are over approx. 3.1 billion gamers across the globe. The gaming industry has increased focus on not only for gamers, but for game developers and publishers. Investments are made around cloud gaming, subscription service and cross- platform play to enable access anytime, anywhere. To learn more about the gaming ecosystem, I spoke to Brian Cheney, former CIO of Nintendo Americas about how the gaming industry creates interactive user experience, global reach and the social and shared connections it generates. The gaming industry is so huge that the number of viewers actually exceed the number of online players. And it’s predicted that the gaming industry is going to overtake the movie and entertainment industry. What we cover in this episode: 3:25 Did not see new markets with barriers but as requirements 6:40 Feedback from local perspectives 7:24 Corporate strategy – embrace your legacy and customer base that keeps up with your consumer 09:09 Gaming industry predictions and market trends around social content 11:23 Animal Crossing – ongoing engagement and longevity after 20 years 13:26 Innovation is a necessity in the gaming industry and creating a pipeline of products 14:32 Big I and small “i” Innovation, our organization supported both 17:50 Understand the user to create a better experience and not for new products Follow Brian Cheney Follow Me: LinkedInInstagramThe Innovative Executive Leading Intelligently in The Age of Disruption What is “The Innovative Executive” Podcast? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

In today’s episode, I share Chapter 6 from my book - When You’re Not Innovating Enough- and What to Do About it. The chapter discusses the following: Follow Me: LinkedInInstagramAuthor websiteOrder my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of Disruption What is “The Innovative Executive” Podcast? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

In today’s episode, I share an overview about my book The Innovative Executive Leading Intelligently in the Age of Disruption. What does it mean to become an Innovative Executive? I also share my favorite stories to discuss from the book and some topic questions that are addressed in the book. Follow Me: LinkedInInstagramPre-order my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of Disruption What is “The Innovative Executive” Podcast? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

Consumers often struggle to articulate their needs and data contains gaps that can be difficult to identify without seeing consumers conducting tasks in-context. The focus often lies in what the anthropologist notices that the consumer may not have thought to demonstrate. More companies are taking an anthropological approach to their business because they understand that qualitative research skills are essential to making sense of the big data. An Anthropologists lens helps you to framing or reframing your work in a way that makes sense to stakeholders and overturn any misconceptions. In the show I talk with Mike Youngblood who bridges the gap between big data and the consumer. We dive into inhibiting Factors of Innovation, Rethinking About Your User Design Framework, how to Capture Observations and setting Goals & Thinking Systemically. What we cover in this episode: 03:20 Corporate anthropology on the rise 05:34 Anthropologist mindset- reflectiveness 08:19 Four inhibiting factors of innovation 12:30 Rethinking about your user design 16:14 framework to capture observations 21:13 Goal is not to have data points but understand what it means 23:32 holistic thinking/ systems thinking when solving for sustainability Follow Mike Youngblood Follow Me: LinkedInInstagramPre-order my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of Disruption What is “The Innovative Executive” Podcast? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

In 1970’s Pepsi introduced the Pepsi Challenge Campaign-“ let your taste decide”, the blind taste test that would run all over the world. Pepsi used “experience marketing” and became the largest selling consumer packaged goods in America. Fast forward to today, building customer experience is still critical today for long-term success. It's one of the core capabilities of innovation that companies need to have in order be successful and it can only happen through creativity—the kind where you're making connections with emotions –both in B2C experiences as well as B2B. My guest Adam Morgan shares his passion to get more creative leaders at the board room and c-suite level to bridge the gap in scaling teams, finding insights and scaling your business. He dives into his experience on mapping an entire journey, building trust in an unfamiliar experience, and telling stories and expanding accessibility. What we cover in this episode: 01:55 Using storytelling for long sales cycle 04:55 building trust with users 07:41 collaboration with your customers 10:37 creative leaders care about emotional experiences 16:42 Digital transformation during the pandemic 22:47 Creativity improves the bottom line 25:11 Data, logic, creativity and emotion- Repeat Follow Adam Morgan Follow Me: LinkedInInstagramPre-order my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of Disruption What is “The Innovative Executive” Podcast? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

A very few serial entrepreneurs are natural innovators. They use "effectual logic" to explore new opportunities and constantly learn how they can reimagine themselves for their business models or ideas to be more effective. They have strong innovation capabilities that include idea generation, clear vision, can quickly identify real need in the market, testing and relationship building. The process includes finding the right talent who are willing to take on challenges at every turn; reframing business models, (and sometimes even creating their own), understanding key differences between trends versus fads, testing and experimenting ideas based off data analysis throughout development stage. My guest Alex Mashinsky shares his successful journey with radical innovation, his purpose driven mindset and commitment to do good for communities. What we cover in this episode: 5:07 Using Effectual logic 8:39 Aligning soft skills and finding talent 11:02 Creating business model around new paradigm shifts 12:16 Being community-centric first 13:44 Learnings from failed ventures 17:07 Changing customer behavior for new adoption 21:20 Purpose and alignment leading to success Follow Alex Mashinsky Follow Me: LinkedInInstagramPre-order my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of Disruption What is “The Innovative Executive”? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

The future of business lies in data-driven decision making. On the show, we discuss how companies are using their insights from big data to generate better decisions faster and at scale about operations as well as customer satisfaction —all while rethinking traditional processes for success! The real value lie in generating insights that prioritize opportunities which lead them toward financial and business performance improvements. Tushar Nadkarni shares insights to make smarter decisions, rethink processes, and modify the portfolio of products and services. What we cover in this episode: 04:15 Building foundation around data and driving insights 08:56 Digital growth and training automation 15:27 Prioritizing new growth opportunities 17:11 What to focus on when there is no pattern, no data, no playbook 20:58 Continue testing and experimenting after the first set of data Follow Tushar Nadkarni Follow Me: LinkedInTwitter: @bellasymmetri04InstagramPre-order my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of Disruption What is “The Innovative Executive”? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

What does it take to be a successful leader in this new age of disruption? We all have different ideas about what makes up the best company, but as trends shift and technology advances there are some things that will never change. The best leaders are those who can successfully navigate a competitive environment, overcoming fear and failure along the way. This episode will help you determine your definition of success or how to create long-lasting growth for yourself as well as others in order make sure that everyone is moving forward together towards their goal! Listen to Dr. Ruth Gotian as she shares her learnings about what is success based on research and in-person interviews with astronauts, Nobel Prize winners, and Olympic champions. What we cover in this episode: 02:06 Success is a moving target 06:02 Fear of failure, focus on what you can control 07:28 Importance of networks and strengthen your capabilities 12:44 Why Benchmarks are average in culture 14:33 Retaining top performers 17:31 Lack of weakness is important to confront Follow Ruth Gotian Follow Me: LinkedInTwitter: @bellasymmetri04InstagramPre-order my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of DisruptionWhat is “The Innovative Executive”? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

Leaders who fail to think broadly will be left behind. Unless they can think flexibly and see organizations from multiple angles, they will be unable to deal with the full range of issues they inevitably encounter. Catherine Von Burg CEO of SimpliPhi Power links the connection between entrepreneurship and innovation with flexibility and adaptation in business activities, in which benefits the society, her industry and ultimately her core business. Join us for a conversation as the show examines how Catherine’s multiframe thinking provides direction to embracing innovation capabilities around partnerships, building strong supply chains using scenario planning, embracing diversity and company alignment. What we cover in this episode: Follow: Catherine Von Burg Follow Me: LinkedInInstagramPre-order my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of DisruptionWhat is “The Innovative Executive”? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

The folding bike market is booming with new innovations and sustainability at play. Brompton bicycle has been a major player in the global market for over three decades with their innovative products and aligning everything R&D teams come up with through true customer service. In the show, we examine key strategies for adoption in global markets, what the upcoming trends are ahead and how sustainability plays a huge role on the market. What we cover in this episode: 02:26 Why sustainability is crucial06:39 Our product differentiator is the ingenious design08:49 Inhouse R&D and external partners10:24 Brompton community biggest source of insights14:19 Changing behavior and getting more cyclists on the road14:30 partnership to create urban freedomFollow Juliet Scott-CroxfordFollow Me: LinkedInTwitter: @bellasymmetri04InstagramPre-order my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of DisruptionWhat is “The Innovative Executive”? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

Contract manufacturing has grown into an integral part of product development. In this week’s podcast, we discuss several leading practices while working with contract manufacturing which entails idea generation to production processes, decision making around critical steps in projects that involve these companies among things like market regulation. What we cover in this episode: Follow Julie ChristiansenFollow Me: LinkedInInstagramPre-order my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of DisruptionWhat is “The Innovative Executive”? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

Today I’m joined by Candace MacDonald, Co-Founder & Managing Director of Carbonate, Inc. Her agency helps clients with brand strategy and Integrated Marketing Communications for the Hospitality Industry. Candace is a brand strategist, experienced at translating insights and creative vision into marketing programs that build brands. Her areas of expertise include restaurants, hotels, real estate, products, and technology. Candace shares with us the importance of collaborating with customers, what marketing practices looks like for Gen Z and millennials and how brands are shifting focus on sustainability marketing. What we cover in this episode: 05:00 Gen Z audience are influencing buying decision for peers ad prior generations06:47 Short-form content offers tremendous potential to engage audience 09:07 Nimble solutions from start-ups13:45 Food technology trends17:02 How brands are using influencer marketing 20:59 Rise in sustainable marketingFollow Candace MacDonald LinkedInFollow Me: LinkedInInstagramPre-order my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of DisruptionWhat is “The Innovative Executive”? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

The struggle for clarity in organizations is a constant one. The organizational strategies created by leaders are often vague and ineffective. They result in inefficient company that is not coherence with its own structure and don’t know how to prioritize on key growth strategies. On the show, I speak with Former Director of Amazon – John Rossman in which he shares with us lessons about Amazon’s customer obsession, finding ways to simplify, and leadership mindset of being collaborative, iterative, and strategic. What we cover in this episode: 0:45 Constraint theory in a time of scarcity05:15 Using technology with customer in mind09:45 Knowing how to mobilize strengths for marketing and operations teams13:26 Invent and create the future – Day 1 mindset23:43 Explore process automation moreFollow John Rossman LinkedInFollow Me: LinkedInTwitter: @bellasymmetri04InstagramPre-order my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of DisruptionWhat is “The Innovative Executive”? Insightful conversation with business and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about project selection and company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

What we cover in this episode: Follow Chuck Dougherty LinkedIn Follow Me LinkedIn Pre-order my book: The Innovative Executive Leading in the Age of Disruption What is “The Innovative Executive”? Insightful conversation with industry experts and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about applying key innovation capabilities to create new company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.

Businesses that are not prepared for disruption will be replaced. The business landscape is changing faster than ever before, companies could face extinction over the next ten years if they don't adapt quickly enough to survive in this new environment where technology-based disruptors like Amazon rainmaker Jeff Bezos can come from behind with a surprise attack at any time--even suggesting what customers might want even before those products exist! The Innovative Executive podcast show is for you if you’re looking to generate new growth and want to reallocate your R&D towards a better future. In each episode, we explore how innovative executives are driving their businesses forward by focusing on innovation that comes from customer priorities or new market opportunities - examining capabilities they use which have made them successful as well as mindset when dealing with uncertainty. If you're ready to focus on the future, subscribe and let's get started.

Insightful conversations with industry experts and thought leaders who share knowledge and stories about applying key innovation capabilities to create new company growth. With a focus on Rethinking your business model, innovation and collaboration and leveraging technology. You’ll learn how to strengthen your innovation capabilities.