Soken and Wengert reveal groundbreaking insights into consumers’ minds regarding the adoption of new products and services, connecting the dots to psychological factors and influences on innovation. The deep insights, tips, and examples provide gifts to the reader that keep on giving. Keep it handy.
David Zuzick, director of product planning, Medtronic Diabetes
Lead the Pack offers a step-by-step approach to stimulating creative thought with methods and techniques to counter resistance to change and bring about the development of innovations that meet and exceed customer needs and expectations.
John (Jack) McCormack, founding member of American Honda Motor Company, co-founder of U.S. Suzuki Motor Corporation and the Napa Valley Wine Train, former chairman and CEO of Cunningham Motor Company.
Lead the Pack is a must-read play book for gaining competitive advantage in the marketplace. Soken and Wengert explore why people think and behave the way they do, and how to use this knowledge to create innovations that capture the hearts and minds of customers.
B. Kim Barnes, CEO of Barnes & Conti Associates, author of Exercising Influence and co-developer of Managing Innovation: Optimizing the Power of New Ideas.
Chairman of the Board Analysts International Corp, partner at Clotho and Associates,
former VP of R&D 3M, CTO of Imation, and VP of Technology at Honeywell Inc.
In my twenty years as an R&D executive at 3M, Imation, and Honeywell, I continually struggled to balance the requests of innovators for more money, resources, and time, on one hand, and the demands of the corporation for less investment, more speed, and better results. Year after year 3M inducts into their Carlton Society individuals who have made significant contributions to 3M’s commercial success. The members are an elite group of the most revered innovators and/or contributors at 3M. When speaking to these inductees one-on-one, I discovered that their success was based on their persistence and ability to overcome organizational and management resistance to their ideas. Our best innovators had succeeded in spite of the organization (which, by the way, was quite supportive of innovation).
Soken and Wengert offer a new lens through which to view this conundrum. They focus on the human side of innovation. They provide an in-depth explanation of how an understanding of human nature and psychology can unlock the power of creativity in organizations and employees, and increase customer acceptance of new ideas. Why do people, whether customers or organizations or individual employees, think and behave the way they do? Soken and Wengert take the reader on an innovation journey, from uncovering innovations with customer value to molding the innovation into a concept that can be validated with customers and assessed by the company for development feasibility, and to nurturing and shepherding the innovation to fruition.
Soken and Wengert also provide practical advice and tips on improving innovation efforts from the perspective of the customer and the organization. Successful innovation requires an understanding and deep appreciation of the psychology of customers and organizations. How to uncover what customers’ need or desire before they even know it? How to get customer feedback early and often? How to build customer excitement and demand? On the flip side, how to get internal company support and, more importantly, reduce active resistance? How to build a culture of innovation that is continually creating innovations and reinventing itself? These are the types of issues that Soken and Wengert address in this book. This is an important book that can unblock your organization and lead to greater business success and professional satisfaction.