Continuous Sustainable Innovation

This blur of a picture happens to be our guest speaker from Entrepreneurship and Innovation this week, Mr. Frank Paul, Co-Founder of Golfsmith.  (My phone's camera make a loud noise right as the picture took, which embarrassed me and thus- the blur).  He was tremendously warm and engaging... really seemed down to earth, which I had a whole new level of respect for after hearing his story about how he and his brother grew this business out of a home basement to what Golfsmith was in 2002 when they sold it.

He took the time to prepare notes and shared with us what it was like to grow a business, as well as some of the humorous stories that accompanied the journey.  It was nice to see a man of his stature take seriously imparting his wisdom to us as students.  Often times, not that it is wrong, speakers come in for a "fireside chat", and while I appreciate the candor that accompanies this style, there's also just something to a person who could do that, but taking anyways the time to show they value and prepared for the group.

One thing that really stood out to me about Mr. Paul was this constant grasp for innovation.  Going from selling your own club, to extending to new product materials like Graphite, to opening large stores when none existed before.  And that seemed to be so much of the case for Golfsmith, looking and seeing the opportunity that didn't seem to exist before.  Someone in the class relayed this idea to Steve Jobs, and how Apple also seemed to sense and create a demand in their own market.  Makes sense, but how do you do it?

Peter Drucker seems to fit right about here.  His ideas for innovation and entrepreneurship stretched beyond being your own business owner.  He was challenging the industries to go where they hadn't gone before.  To look for the unexpected.  To seek true innovation.

In my pre-grad school days, my psychology background would suggest that there is not an original thought, only new combinations of what has been relayed.  How does this fit in with innovation?  How do you maintain a working knowledge of your competitors, keep up, if not stay in front of them, and continually seek the "original thought"... the point of differentiation?

My minds flows to a thousand other questions- what does differentiation look like in nonprofit?  What is true innovation in nonprofit?  How do you stay innovative, when funders can initiatives direct the course of programming?  Are there ways to work with funders to do research on the needs of the community and challenge beyond collaboration- to innovation?

I may not have all the answers, but I feel like questions fit me better than answers anyway...

And with that statement, perhaps I answered my own question about Golfsmith's sustainable innovation... they weren't afraid of not having the answers, and took on the challenge of asking that next question.