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The Art of Innovation : Lessons in Creativity from IDEO, America's Leading Design Firm (精装)
by Tom Kelley, Jonathan Littman
| Category:
Innovation |
| Market price: ¥ 318.00
MSL price:
¥ 288.00
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| Stock:
Pre-order item, lead time 3-7 weeks upon payment [ COD term does not apply to pre-order items ] |
MSL rating:
 Good for Gifts |
| MSL Pointer Review:
An insightful and eye-opening read on the art of innovation for entrepreneurs and managers in this brutal age of "Innovate or Die." |
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AllReviews |
1 Total 1 pages 10 items |
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Bruce Nussbaum (Business Week) (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-28 00:00>
Tom Kelley has unlocked the magic box of innovation for corporate America. At a time when creativity and innovation are the driving forces for the New Economy, Kelley shows how IDEO does it - and how companies everywhere can learn to build the products and services we all crave. If you're trying to create product lust, The Art of Innovation shows you how to do it." |
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Jeffrey Pfeffer (Professor, Stanford Business School & author of The Knowing-Doing Gap) (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-28 00:00>
Everyone talks about innovation and creativity, but IDEO has actually done it. The Art of Innovation provides detailed, actionable ideas about how to build an innovative culture and an organization that makes creativity seem routine. Its well-placed emphasis on management practices makes it a great read for anyone in any organization who wants to get better at what they do." |
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Fast Company (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-28 00:00>
IDEO Product Development is the world's most celebrated design firm. Its ultimate creation is the process of creativity itself. For founder David M. Kelley and his colleagues, work is play, brainstorming is a science, and the most important rule is to break the rules... Can this formula for creativity work in other places? Some of the world's leading companies certainly think so." |
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An American reader (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-28 00:00>
It is sad to say that, as a business writer, I read few business books. The reason is that the vast majority are bad: either they wildly exaggerate the novelty, hence the effectiveness, of some new technique or "movement," or they are supremely dull. Either way, the reporting in most of them is bad and conforms more to the ideology of the reporter than to any reality. A really good business book - one that stimulates genuine new thinking and that reports the facts freshly and accurately - are few and very far between.
I am happy to report that Kelley's book is positively excellent. Not only did it get me to re-think certain things I took for granted, such as the effectiveness of traditional marketing techniques, but it actually got me to imagine a different way of conceiving products, the "IDEO way." From now on, when I think of the flaws in things that I buy or processes that I encounter (and pay for), I will immediately question whether they could be better designed. As banal as it sounds, this book got me into that mode of thinking like virtually nothing else I have read in the business genre. I am almost embarrassed to admit that I found the book genuinely inspiring.
Even more astounding, the book reports accurately about a truly remarkable company, IDEO. It is a design and engineering company in Palo Alto, CA with offices worldwide, that designed the first mouse for Apple as well as an array of products that are working their way into the consumer mainstream (e.g. heart pacemakers, thick-handled toothbrushes, and the Aerobie football). From Kelley's telling of it, the place is full of creative individuals, healthy competition, and zaniness: with virtually no hierarchy or bureaucracy, they sit around playing and brainstorming and joking, coming up with innovations in great flashes of insight and lots of hard work. To put it mildly, I was skeptical: it sounded like many of the places that mediocre reporters extol as the "future" of innovative companies with ridiculous regularity and that are merely booster science fiction, complete with its own vocabulary ("Think verbs, not nouns"). When I went to the company for a writing project, I expected to find the ugly underbelly that went little reported, the "reality" that was typically hidden from all but those who worked there. Instead, I was delighted to find that I was being too cynical: I witnessed an organization that blended talent, discipline, and fun in its own unique way, the secrets of which Kelley attempts to pass on in "The Art of Innovation."
There are far too many nuggets of wisdom to summarize here. Regarding traditional marketing, for example, Kelley (and co-author Littman, who has a wonderful, clear writing style) argues that "observation-fueled insights" - both personal and via tests - will lead to more innovation than merely asking consumers what they like and want. This is, in my opinion, a fascinating insight that requires far more thought than the reader may imagine. All too often, market professionals take at face value what consumers say, rather than questioning whether they are trying to please the interviewer or don't really know their preferences. The key, Kelley asserts, is to anticipate their desires. He also shares the IDEO experience on the "perfect brainstorm" - and I watched them in awe myself - as they think outside the normal barriers of out thought. But there are many, many other subjects, such as their ideas on the control of personal space in the organization.
Nonetheless, in spite of their inspiration and irrepressible enthusiasm, IDEO engineers are not dreamers. They are down to earth businessmen and they know the limits of how far they can go in search of the "next big thing." Kelley continually warms the reader not to get carried away, not to become unmoored from deep-seated consumer preferences: as he puts it, "color outside the lines, but... stay on the same page." While a hit product combines good design and cost-efficiency, he warns, they also need good timing, which is extremely difficult to predict: you need some luck as well. In other words, there is substantial risk in what they do, and they fail often. Interestingly, IDEO employees are allowed to fail so long as they learn thereby to stay at the cutting edge or to take their idea and apply it in some new way in another product.
While most business books peter out long before the end - some do not even merit getting beyond the book flap - this book just kept getting better for me. The concluding chapters were just as interesting as the earlier ones, making new points and offering sound advice rather than merely recapitulating some banality. For example, at the very end, Kelley talks about one way that IDEO employees try to see the future: rather than seek to pull something out of thin air, they attempt to find "early adopters" of cutting-edge technologies that are not yet well known (or "distributed"). This is a subtle insight that I will study in the years to come. Indeed, this book seemed better to me on the second reading, which virtually never occurs, at least for me, in the business book genre.
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Rolf Dobelli (MSL quote), Switzerland
<2006-12-28 00:00>
With his tour through the inner-workings of design firm and idea-factory IDEO, Tom Kelley achieves the nearly impossible: He presents creative and innovative observations about creativity and innovation. We'll put it simply: Toss aside all the books about the topics that you've ever bought, and tear into this beautifully constructed showpiece. Kelley distills the often amorphous concepts of brainstorming and teamwork into directives with honest-to-goodness real-life applications. His notions about prototyping are fresh, insightful and practical. His bigger-picture ruminations illustrate not only how organizations should work at innovation, but also how easily creative initiative can be smashed by dumb bureaucracy. If the book has one failing it is this: Reading it can be a bit like watching a home movie of a friend's children - Your role is clearly to join in the adulation. That aside, we [...] recommend The Art of Innovation as one of the few can't-miss books in the creativity genre. |
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Robert Morris (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-28 00:00>
There are dozens of excellent books which discuss innovation. This is one of the best but don't be misled by the title, "Lessons in creativity from IDEO, America's leading design firm." Unlike almost all other authors of worthy books on the same subject, Kelley does NOT organize his material in terms of a sequence of specific "lessons"... nor does he inundate his reader with checklists, "executive summaries", bullet points, do's and don'ts, "key points", etc. Rather, he shares what I guess you could characterize as "stories" based on real-world situations in which he and his IDEO associates solved various problems when completing industrial design assignments for their clients. "We've linked those organizational achievements to specific methodologies and tools you can use to build innovation into your own organization... [However, IDEO's] “secret formula” is actually not very formulaic. It's a blend of methodologies, work practices, culture, and infrastructure. Methodology alone is not enough." One of the greatest benefits of the book is derived from direct access to that "blend" when activated.
It is extremely difficult to overcome what James O'Toole characterizes, in Leading Change, as "the ideology of comfort and the tyranny of custom." He and Kelley seem to be kindred spirits: Both fully understand how and why truly innovative thinking encounters so much resistance within organizations. Whereas O'Toole suggests all manner of strategies to overcome that resistance, Kelley concentrates on the combination ("blend") of ingredients which, when integrated and then applied with both rigor and passion, may (just may) produce what Jobs once referred to as "insanely great." What both O'Toole and Kelley have in mind is creating and sustaining an innovative culture, one from within which "insanely great" ideas can result in breakthrough products and (yes) services.
"Loosely described", Kelley shares IDEO's five-step methodology: Understand the market, the client, the technology, and the perceived constraints on the given problem; observe real people in real-life situations; literally visualize new-to-the-world concepts AND the customers who will use them; evaluate and refine the prototypes in a series of quick iterations; and finally, implement the new concept for commercialization. With regard to the last "step", as Bennis explains in Organizing Genius, Apple executives immediately recognized the commercial opportunities for PARC's technology. Larry Tesler (who later left PARC for Apple) noted that Jobs and companions "wanted to get it out to the world." But first, obviously, create that "it."
Kelley and his associates at IDEO have won numerous awards for designing all manner of innovative products such as the Apple mouse, the Palm Pilot, a one-piece fishing mechanism for children, the in-vehicle beverage holder, toothpaste tubes that don't "gunk up" in the cap area, "mud-free" water bottles for mountain bikers, a small digital camera for the handspring Visor, and the Sun Tracker Beach Chair.
With all due respect to products such as these, what interested me most was the material in the book which focuses on (a) the physical environment in which those at IDEO interact and (b) the nature and extent of that interaction, principally the brainstorm sessions. In the Foreword, Tom Peters has this in mind when explaining why Kelley's is a marvelous book: "It carefully walks us through each stage of the IDEO innovation process - from creating hot teams (IDEO is perpetually on `boil') to learning to see through the customer's eyes (forget focus groups!) and brainstorming (trust me, nobody but nobody does it better) to rapid prototyping (and nobody, but nobody does it better...)." Whatever your current situation, whatever the size and nature of your organization, surely you and it need to avoid or escape from "the ideology of comfort and the tyranny of custom." Granted, you may never be involved in the creation of an "insanely great" product but Kelley can at least help you to gain "the true spirit of innovation" in your life. I join him in wishing you "some serious fun." |
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Michael (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-28 00:00>
There is usually a reason why a menu is accompanied by a separate list of items commonly known as "specials." It may be that there was an overabundance of an item ordered or it could be that the Chef has prepared something he or she truly thinks you will enjoy. Strategically, it is there for those of us that want more than just the average meal without leaving the restaurant. "The Art of Innovation" is that special list. It is in itself a testament of what a company (that is in the business of innovation) has learned by helping others successfully discover their full potential. It has been my experience, working in the industries of manufacturing and Internet commerce, that unless managers are aware of the lessons given in this book, they will suffer a fate of "free agent" lack of loyalty. This has plagued most professional teams in this country, either in the office or on the field, this can't be healthy. This book outlines the components that by nature we strive for, but all too often are set aside and sometimes led away by the possibility of receiving something better in return. So have something from the daily special. I really liked this book, enjoyed it and had it a second time. Yea, I read it twice. |
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An American reader (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-28 00:00>
This book really looks more at the proper design of a good workplace and how people thrive in the right environment. While reading this book, I was deciding whether to accept a new job. Many of the things Mr. Kelley discussed factored into my decision to jump ship. Hearing the stories of how their team pulled together to bring new products to market (or in some cases not) was a great testament to the creative process and what a positive environment can do. |
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Scott Brookhart (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-28 00:00>
If you have ever wondered what it would be like to work in a creative environment and how to pull one together modeled on what IDEO does, this is just the book. I really came to be a little jealous of the workplace and people described in the book as it sounded like a really fun place to work and a really stimulating place as well. I was also trying to imagine how some of these principles in the book could be implemented in my current workplace and had a hard time imagining many of my colleagues really going along with them, but then... maybe I am in the wrong workplace?? |
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Stephen Funk (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-28 00:00>
The Art of Innovation is the story of the famous Palo Alto based design firm, IDEO. The book is easy to read and moves quickly. The author, Tom Kelley, is the brother of founder David Kelley. Tom is the General Manager and is an ex-management consultant. This is important because the book really devolves into a light treatise on business management practices. This makes sense since given Tom Kelley's responsibilities at IDEO and his background. It also explains the Tom Peter's Foreword. If you like Tom Peter's books, you will enjoy this book.
If you are looking for real insights into the IDEO design process you will be disappointed. Most of the insights are of a personnel management nature, and even those are at a relatively high level. Mr. Kelley pokes more than a few veiled barbs at the slow industrial giants who simply cannot compete with the brain power and management prowess at IDEO. That may sound sarcastic, but Mr. Kelley's pride in his company often crosses that fine line into arrogance.
There are a few actual projects described to point out how valuable a certain IDEO practice is. There are repeated references to IDEO's contribution to the invention of the Apple mouse and follow-up work on the Microsoft Mouse. Also, a great deal of time is spent talking about the redesign of the common shopping cart that was done in one week for a segment on Nightline. I know that IDEO has had many important clients and recent important projects. Perhaps they can't talk about them because of non-disclosure agreements. There are color pictures of some products at the beginning of each of 15 chapters but often there is no mention of those products in the text. Some black & white photographs of products and the IDEO workspaces also accompany the text. There are no diagrams or illustrations.
A great deal of the book outlines the emphasis that IDEO puts on the treatment of their employees and their penchant for quick and frequent prototyping as a key to success. All projects start by assigning a "hot" team and letting them brainstorm and prototype their way into some great ideas. No details are given on how the teams are formed or managed.
This book is for you if you are looking for a light management practices book and just a little insight into a premier design firm. You will probably be disappointed if you want to find out how products are designed or what specific processes are used to manage the design process. You also will not get a great deal of competitive information about IDEO. The book assumes that you have at least a general idea of what Industrial Design is about.
Tom Kelley admits that workshops about the "IDEO way" have been turned into a profit center. They give seminars on how to organize product development at client companies. I could see IDEO including this book with their seminar, or perhaps they could give it to a prospective client to whet their appetite. It definitely leaves you wanting more information. I am left wondering, "How much is that seminar, and will they let me in?" |
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1 Total 1 pages 10 items |
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