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Innovate Like Edison: The Success System of America's Greatest Inventor
by Michael J. Gelb, Sarah Miller Caldicott
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Dutton Adult (2007-10-25)
ISBN: 0525950311
EAN: 9780525950318
Dewey Decimal #: 608
Binding/Media: Hardcover - 320 pages
SKU: AManPro-0003075
Condition: Good
Comments: Used, hardcover, …. very good to like new condition, … dust jacket shows mild shelf wear, ... RiverboatSales ... audiobooks ... books ... DVDS ... new and used.....full refund if not satisfied
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Editorial Reviews
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Product Description
Michael Gelb, bestselling author of How to Think Like Leonardo Da Vinci, and Sarah Miller Caldicott, translate the genius of Edison into a revolutionary new success system for innovation.
Thomas Edison is the greatest innovator in American history. Edison’s focus on practical accomplishment set the stage for America’s global leadership in innovation. Now, for the first time ever, Innovate Like Edison translates the best practices of this supreme American inventor into contemporary terms to help today’s leaders harness their own innovative potential.
With their unique insight and expertise, Michael Gelb and Sarah Miller Caldicott introduce a carefully researched, easy-to-apply system of five success secrets inspired by the creative methods of Edison himself. Presented in a step-by-step fashion, Innovate Like Edison provides the tools and strategies you need to compete and win in the business world and in everyday life. Whether you’re an amateur or an executive, Innovate Like Edison is an indispensable tool that will enable you to revamp and revitalize your own creative genius and thrive in today’s culture of innovation.
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Customer Reviews
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Competency Model for Innovators Showcases Thomas Edison
Rating  (3)
Date: 2010-05-13
2 out of 2 customers found this reveiw helpful
I am not convinced that Thomas Edison would endorse all the ideas in Michael Gelb and Sarah Caldicott's book. But maybe that isn't so important. The authors present a five-competency, twenty-five element model of innovation, interwoven with stories about Edison's life, research, and business practices. While not an Edison biography, it is also something more than just another coffee-table business book.
The first chapter introduces the authors' five innovation competencies and the concept of "innovation literacy" that can be learned and measured. The second chapter is a well-written short biography of Thomas Edison, including a chronology of major life events, outline of family relationships, and exploration of special topics such as "Edison and Women" and "Edison's Follies and Foibles." A side-bar candidly covers Edison's stormy relationship with fellow inventor Nikola Tesla.
The next five chapters address the book's central question--what are the core competencies of innovation? Innovators who possess Competency #1, a Solution-Centered Mindset, align their goals with their passions, cultivate charismatic optimism, seek knowledge relentlessly, experiment persistently, and pursue rigorous objectivity. These qualities are illustrated with anecdotes from Edison's career and supported by developmental exercises.
The remaining four competencies are similarly treated. Competency #2, Kaleidoscopic Thinking, consists of maintaining a notebook, experiencing "ideaphoria"--the "delightful well-being that accompanies the effortless flow of insights and ideas"--discerning patterns, expressing ideas visually, and exploring roads not taken. Competency #3, Full-Spectrum Engagement, requires finding balance between intensity and relaxation; seriousness and playfulness; sharing and protecting; complexity and simplicity; and solitude and teamwork. Master-Mind Collaboration, Competency #4, has a social focus. It includes recruiting for both interpersonal chemistry and achieving results, designing multidisciplinary collaborative teams, inspiring an environment of open exchange, rewarding collaboration, and becoming a master networker.
The fifth Competency, Super-Value Creation, feels more boardroom than workbench and seems heavily influenced by post-Edison business school thinking. It consists of linking market trends with core strengths, tuning in to your target audience, applying the right business model, understanding scale-up effects, and creating an unforgettable, market-moving brand. (Please forgive me as I imagine Edison generating a weak magnetic field as he rotates in his grave after hearing about that last one.)
The books final section presents comprehensive self-assessment instruments that measure all twenty-five facets of the five innovation competencies. While these instruments have the usual weaknesses of self-rating tools, they offer a summary assessment experience that helps readers identify their greatest innovation weaknesses and plan for improvement.
I recommend this book to managers and marketeers who would add substance to their enthusiasm about innovation. It is also recommended to scientists and technical specialists who need to understand how their scientific innovations can become useful products outside the laboratory. It's not the best book for serious Edison scholars, but it is an enjoyable read for anyone with a general interest in Thomas Edison's ability to innovate.
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A new interpretation of Edison for the modern age
Rating  (4)
Date: 2009-11-02
2 out of 3 customers found this reveiw helpful
I read this book after it was given out by one of the authors at a seminar that I attended. Far from a typical business book, this is a novel and searching treatment of a great American icon. The authors' Thomas Edison is no "wizard" and no "boy genius." He's a remarkably modern thinker, one who used tools such as networking, the careful cultivation of key reporters, and out-of-the-box thinking and who invented the concept of the R&D laboratory. The Edison of this book is not the one you read about in your survey course of American history.
We have a lot to learn from Edison, and the book only wanted to make me learn more. Only four stars, not five, because it is repetitious in places.
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Great
Rating  (5)
Date: 2009-10-30
0 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
Very good model of Thomas Edson thinking and behavior. Good insights on how to replicate some qualities of this master.
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Innovative, just like Edison
Rating (5)
Date: 2009-08-29
0 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
Rather than just another innovation how-to book, Michael J. Gelb engages the reader by weaving key insights about innovation into the life of Thomas Edison. You will be fascinated by Edison's story as you learn how to think in new and creative ways. If you are ready to change the way that you think so that you can be more innovative, read this book.
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How to fawn over Edison
Rating  (2)
Date: 2009-06-18
4 out of 5 customers found this reveiw helpful
I'll briefly paraphrase Innovate Like Edison here. --- Edison was incredibly brilliant. Here's something Stephen Covey wrote about. Edison wasn't just incredibly brilliant, he was sooooo coooool. Here's a quote from Malcolm Gladwell's latest book. Edison was supercalifragilisticexpialidocious! That's from Mary Poppins.
Innovate Like Edison is a sycophantic, superficial history of Edison mixed with cursory highlights from the business and self-help literature. The fawning descriptions of Edison were outright painful to listen to by the end of the book. The added barrage of worthless jargon, e.g. "super-value", brought me close to chucking my mp3 player out the car window many times.
I bump my rating up to two stars, "it was ok", because I did learn a few things from the book and Rick Adamson's reading for the audiobook was very good. But I stop at two stars because when I was done, I wish I had spent those 5 & 1/2 hours on any of the books quoted by Innovate Like Edison rather than on the book itself.
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Retail Price: $25.95
Our Price:$8.49
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