Lessons for Successful Long-term Innovation
April 18th, 2010 | 
Author: THE CLOCK OF THE LONG NOW AND DIVERGENT THINKING
The lessons for Successful Long-term Innovation I have retrieved from reflecting on “The Clock of the Long Now“, written by Steward Brand in year 2000. The book challenges readers to go beyond daily thinking to take long-term responsibility for sustainable development. By trying to think in a 10.000-year perspective, the book stimulates the brain to think in new ways about how business can be conducted. It opens for divergent thinking, exploring possibilities based on a bank of ideas, limitations, instructions or thoughts. This stimulates creativity which again may give competitive edge for your business. Unfortunately most academic schools train students to perform convergent thinking for example by reasoning based on specific articles and instructions. This can hamper creativity later in professional work situations and lead to sub-optimal performance.
FIVE LESSONS FOR SUCCESSFUL LONG-TERM INNOVATION
The first lesson from the book addressing long-term innovation comes from Brand’s (the author) parachute free-fall experience (1. never count totally on equipment 2. always have a back-up and 3. look for an outside frame of reference). With innovations, things are likely to go wrong and accounting for the unforeseen can reduce costs and increase success. Deeper undersanding can be enhanced by consultation and in networks and the shoelace theory developed by Barnes & Kriger, where departments and people are knitted together and makes the foundation and understanding of the innovation more comprehensive.
The second lesson comes from connecting to the past; ‘if you are going to do something meant to be interesting for ten millennia, it almost has to have been interesting for ten millennia’ says Stuart Brand. Many articles are written about how leaders extract insight from crucibles in their own life. However, this can also be applied to organizations and industries, and innovators should learn from crucibles in the history of their disciplin to shape the business of tomorrow.
The third lesson is that short-term thinking and ‘progress’ may create sub-optimal solutions and embed innovations in ‘dead technology’. Long-term innovations meant to be sustainable must value resilence above brilliance and evaluate its technological foundation. Here software can be a good example when new editions of programs are built upon foundations of old coding with ad-hoc approaches to problems. Eventually it may collapse big time or be disrupted by products that are easier to understand and develop.
The fourth lesson is when moving beyond the short-term horizon a broader spectrum of innovative landscape becomes accessible. By entering the realm of chronos (the realm of long-term instead of kairos – the here and now) more innovative opporunities opens up that are less attractive in the financial world (that typically has a short term perspective, e.g. 5 years). This realm is more powerful than the short-term realm because it is more linked to sustainability, culture and values of people. It also avoids Moore’s law that is not sustainable in the long run.
The fifth lesson is to avoid a conceptual poverty of here and now. With broad thinking, one can create strong and flexible structures built to absorb and incorporate shocks and revolutions. This can be done by being open-minded, building networks and never stop dreaming.
FINAL PIECE OF ADVICE
Based on the book by Stewart Brand, it is clear that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The greatest good for the greatest number is the future good, as majority is yet to come. However, the future is always extraordinary and the best way to manage it is to preserve and create options. Still, future value needs to be addressed on a daily basis to be preserved (think about how religions are preserved because they are relevant in a wide set of circumstances). This creates an alignment between today and tomorrow.
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