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Need, Speed, and Greed

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Need, Speed, and Greed

How the New Rules of Innovation Can Transform Businesses, Propel Nations to Greatness, and Tame the World's Most Wicked Problems

HarperBusiness,

15 min read
10 take-aways
Audio & text

What's inside?

What does innovation look like in a changing world?

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8

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Zoom co-author Vijay V. Vaitheeswaran blends the old and the new to produce something striking in his latest examination of innovation. Vaitheeswaran, The Economist’s China business editor, mixes familiar points – the world is globalizing, innovation is essential – with surprising insights – innovation has innate dangers. The book’s title refers to three key aspects of innovation: the need to innovate now, the speed of approaching singularity and the direction of innovation, and greed for what success looks like today, though the author actually warns against greediness. However, perhaps because portions of the text already appeared in The Economist as distinct articles, the various sections don’t always fully integrate. That caveat aside, every reader is sure to find something new and useful. getAbstract recommends this smart, interesting exegesis to innovators, those managing innovators and anyone who wants to prepare for a changing world.

Summary

Entering the “Ideas Economy”

You live and work in a knowledge-dominated world. Today’s ideas economy operates under different rules than older economies, in which manufacturing dominated. To compete, you must innovate. This new economy isn’t a zero-sum game in which you fight for your share of a finite set of resources. Instead, the pie is infinite. Innovation is democratically distributed. It does not descend from central planning on high or flow only from the developed to the developing world. New ideas, products and processes can and should come from anywhere around the globe and from all levels of your organization. Innovation itself has transformed. It has become a discipline you can apply methodically. Shifting to this new innovation paradigm requires networking and being open to ideas from new sources.

In recent years, innovation has come from “global economic integration and disruptive new technologies” or “Googlization.” That, too, will change. To develop new innovations, look toward specific technologies that address environmental issues, sustainability, health and an aging population. Guard against complacency; no technological advantage is permanent. You...

About the Author

Vijay V. Vaitheeswaran also wrote Power to the People and co-wrote Zoom. He is the US Business Editor of The Economist.

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