“Recovery demands a clear-out of the old-guard,” says Luke Johnson in the Financial Times, March 17. If the big ideas of this decade are reinvention, we need leaders who can innovate.

Innovative leaders make the most of opportunities when they arise. They step up to the challenge when there’s a need and look for opportunities to do things differently. They pay attention to the environment and believe that they can instigate change.

Roger Ochs, President of HD Vest Financial, a subsidiary of Wells Fargo, believes that leaders are developed by giving people the responsibility or by letting them take responsibility without having the authority. “You earn the authority from your peers,” he observed.  Continue reading…

There’s strong agreement that innovation will drive success in modern business, yet a growing concern that companies are not taking the steps to innovate. The business press asserts that innovation is hard to measure, expensive and often compromised for short-term gains. CEOs don’t understand innovation, we’re told - they do little more than talk about new ideas. I feel compelled to set the record straight, based on my research and personal business experience.

Fear not, America’s businesses will not sink into oblivion and stagnation, at least not in the next few years. The urgent call for action ignores what’s actually happening throughout the private sector. Now more than ever, innovation is important… and there are leaders who are getting it right. Further, many of these executives are baby boomers, the very generation that missed learning about innovation in business school. Continue reading…