Coursera – Leading Strategic Innovation in Organizations – very insightful and entertaining course!  “Thinking outside the box” becomes a completely different concept after watching the lectures and pondering the concepts.  there are constraints – they are “the box” and the “thinking” should consider “the box” to be successful.

The class rightfully points out that successful innovation is the innovation that has a chance to be implemented.  A successful idea should satisfy several constraints.  Though some constraints seem to be obvious, such as technological constraints and societal constraints, other constraints are particularly interesting, such as organizational constraints.

Particularly interesting: Organizational constraints – strategy constraints.  The innovation may be in conflict with the company’s strategy; in this case it would be rejected by the organization.  The important part for organization is to have a strategy, and also to make sure that this strategy is communicated to employees.

The class describes an excellent example of a case study – Segway – to explain constraints and what can be easily overlooked.

Oh, yes, the recommendation to start small needs to be highlighted in my notes – I have made the mistake of trying larger projects before 😉

Highly recommend the course!