Book Club for the 21st Century

The Ten Faces of Innovation
by Tom Kelley

Student : Chan Sung (Jason) Kang
Student # : 260213389

About the Book…
Tom Kelley, the author of this informative and instructive book, reveals the secret strategy that IDEO, the world-famous design firm, adopted in order to boost innovative thinking and overcome “Devil’s Advocate” who sees only the problems and extremely negative possible outcomes. The book suggests a solution for such Devil’s Advocate by providing a clear image of ten important roles in our surroundings, our companies, and our society: the anthropologist, the experimenter, the cross-pollinator, the hurdler, the collaborator, the director, the experience architect, the set designer, the caregiver, and the storyteller.

Key Ideas…
1) The Anthropologist: The Anthropologists are the Seers. They observe the organization and bring their new learning and new insights for better understanding of both physical and emotional environment of the organization. They have this ability of “seeing” things that others usually overlook in unusual places. When the anthropologist faces a problem, he or she, with innovative concepts, recomposes the problem and suggests countless solutions.

2) The Experimenter: The experimenter is a master of practicing. It’s uncertain whether the new idea, the anthropologist comes up with, would succeed or not. In order to make ideas tangible and to achieve success, the experimenters undergo numerous experimentation and implementation. They learn from the ceaseless process of trial and error and lead the experiment to be successful.

3) The Cross-Pollinator: The cross-pollinator explores other industries, cultures, or geographies and co-relates the findings with his or her own organization. The cross-pollinator seeks out for diverse projects for further improved and innovated services and products and divers solutions for problems by crossing ideas. One good example might be the pie tins from the world of baking became Frisbee.

4) The Hurdler: The Hurdlers, by instinct, know how to overcome the obstacles of the path to innovation. Although they perfectly know the possibility of failure, they never stop. They are tireless problem-solvers. They, with optimistic and positive determination, are ready to take any risk and pay any cost for failure. Also, they have the ability of seeing beyond initial failure.

5) The Collaborator: The Collaborator is a crucial role for the 21st century, who values the team over the individual. The collaborator is able to firmly tighten every individual together as a group. The existence of collaborators would result cooperative teamwork and each individual’s skills molten well into one project.

6) The Director: The Director is not just ordering each individual what to do, but also helps to ignite their creative and innovative talents. They are capable of drawing a bigger picture of organization and grasping the group firmly. They are also responsible for motivating and inspiring each group members to bring the best result of the group.

7) The Experience Architect: The Experience Architects designs deeper and better quality of services in order to meet customers’ expressed needs and their satisfaction. They are eager to offer notable impression and delightful experiences to each individual through products, services, spaces or events.

8) The Set Designer: The Set Designer is a supporter who takes care of the organization’s or firm’s workspace. By providing with energetic environments which will encourage innovative and inspired thinking, he or she is able to stimulate each individual’s creativity. For example, IDEO created “brainstorming area” with whiteboards, oversized posti-its, comfortable seats, and stylish café tables.

9) The Caregiver: The Caregiver, founded on human-powered innovation, has a role of understanding each individual customer and have a close relationship with them. The caregiver’s job is to make customers feel comfortable and emotionally rely on him and his own organization.

10) The Storyteller: The Storyteller captures our imagination with convincing narratives and commemorates success or emotive recoveries from failure in terms of business. Through work in medium best fits their skills and message: video, narrative, animation, even comic strips, this person is able to initiate emotion and action, transmit values and goals, boost collaboration, create heroes of business, and lead the organizations into the brighter future.

Most Appealing Concepts…
There were so many concepts and ideas that will help us, the leaders of our future and our societies. However, one of the most appealing concepts is “T-shaped persona.” Throughout the book, each chapter strongly emphasizes on each role’s power and contribution to the organization. However, at the end, it also emphasizes on having overlapping talents and abilities. Not forced by traditional rules, which is to concentrate on solely one role, people nowadays need to have more flexibility. The book suggests that it might be useful to know how to blend a traditional, discipline-based role with an innovative persona: “You can be a Hurdler in Accounts Payable. A storyteller even if your degree is in finance. If you have spent years building depth of experience in your functional area, then becoming a Collaborator or a Caregiver or an Experimenter might give you breadth.” In this way, one will be able to prevent himself being outsourced or replaced by other flexible personas. The path of innovation is not a single path; rather, it is a mixture of trails, narrow paths, some shortcuts, and highway.

Another concept which arrested my attention is the idea of presence of “Devil’s Advocate.” Although it only shows up in the introduction, it is well explained how they hinder further inventive progress. It allows individuals to step outside themselves and raise doubts that effectively kill new ideas, while claiming no personal conscientiousness. Even slight of negativism will cause collapsing of every individual’s innovation like a small hole in the middle of dam, which will cause fractures and cracks eventually. Even “Devil’s Advocate” is dangerous for himself. Pessimism will soon put heavy damage on one’s self-esteem and dignity, resulting in declining efficiency of work. The existence of “Devil’s Advocate” will bring awful effect to both the whole community and oneself.

The last, but not the least concept is the power as the mix of ten roles. Innovative progress doesn’t occur on just each individual role’s account. In the last chapter of this book, it’s stating, “Innovation is ultimately a team sport.” Whenever one is trying to create something new, it doesn’t mean that he or she needs to employ every ten roles per a project. However, hiring a wise combination of the Set Designer and the Anthropologist, or the Cross-Pollinator and the Caregiver, will boost innovative thinking and help achieving true excellence to the highest degree. This book might mislead by emphasizing each role’s power separately, but the truth is that each individual is nothing without acting as a team, as it is well explained at the end. If you desire to innovate yourself, work hard for your entire team’s innovation.

Significance…
If you wish to be a leader of a organization or a firm or you are already a leader, you certainly want to have this book. Without knowing each individual’s potential power as the Hurdler or the Story teller, you won’t be able to put right man into a right job. You will be able to find a new pathway quickly with three learners: the Anthropologist, the Experimenter, and the Cross-Pollinator. Also, this book will promise you of easy organizing and building your stage with the Sat Designer, the Hurdler, and the Collaborator. Furthermore, you will fully understand how important the role of the Experience Architect, the Caregiver, and the Storyteller in order to maintain good relationship with customers or audiences. Not only that, you will soon question yourself whether you are suitable for the Director. If not, you might come up with new training program of directing skills with the help of this book.

In order to run business effectively without any failure, knowledge will be a handy tool. Read this noteworthy book, called “The Ten Faces of Innovation.” Learn about ten personas. Now you are ready to launch for success.