Design Sojourn

Scott Berkun, author of “The Myths of Innovation”, shares on the Economist why we should all ban the word innovation. He writes:

Einstein, Ford, Picasso and Edison rarely said the word innovation and neither should you. Every Fortune 500 crowd I’ve said this to laughs and agrees. The abuse of words like innovation, disruption, game changing and breakthrough is killing us.
(snip…)
Ask people who say innovation what they mean. If ever anyone says the word in a meeting, ask “Can you give an example of what you mean by innovative?” If they can’t, you’ve just saved everyone in the room hours of time. Using the i-word is often a cop-out for clear thinking. They are trying to signify creativity, without actually being creative.

Quite true, Innovation is a horrible word to use especially when you are taking a design brief from a client! One of Scott’s points is that Innovation often has a blurred definition and what we need instead are clear actionable points. A design brief with actionable points has clear structured deliverables designers can work towards.

In my mind, innovation or being innovative is the type of word that you get labeled by, and not something you shamelessly declare. Saying “I’m Innovative” is like saying “I’m fat”, or “My life is tough”, it is all relative. So always focus on doing the best possible work you can, and the rest, such as being called innovative, will all fall into place.

Via: Economist

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