What do you think about Sir Isaac Newton?
Was he a genius thinker?
Of course, yes.
Did he invent the law of gravity by miraculous experimentation?
Of course, not. It was by a powerful rational creative thinking.
As we all know, gravitation existed well before Newton’s time in this universe but the whole world was unaware of it.
There was gravity at the time the universe was formed.
The law of gravity was non existent before Newton but he made it living.
That’s why Newton became the greatest scientist of all time.
Non existent is imaginary but living is usable that influences and prospers our lives directly or indirectly.
What about instantaneous change?
Did it exist before Newton?
Of course, yes, but it was again non existent before Newton.
It was also only imaginary before Newton but now we have the whole world of calculus in mathematics, the extension of instantaneous change.
We are utilizing the whole world of calculus in different forms and formats.
“Invention is a pure science but innovation is a business of value creation, the value which is flexible and can be rediscovered and reused again and again.”
Even as of today in the modern world, when we think about science, we still largely think only about invention.
Our curriculum, school, college, and society knows science mainly through invention and teaches us the same thing from the very beginning.
The younger generation is quite unaware about the other side of invention which is innovation.
At the same time, our society must teach innovation as the extension of invention in our institutions.
Unless we make people aware about innovation from the very beginning, society mixes invention and innovation and we never distinguish their priority.
As a matter of fact, invention and innovation have different core meanings.
Invention is a pure science but innovation is a business of value creation, the value which is flexible and can be rediscovered and reused again and again.
As management guru Peter Drucker, the author of ‘Innovation and Entrepreneurship‘ said “Invention expands human knowledge but innovation utilizes it and accelerates human values and prospers us.”
“Innovation could be a very small idea, mini project but astounding management, little twist and turn on existing product or service, and a continuous thought process about people’s life.”
As a professional scientist, I see a huge knowledge gap even among the scientific community regarding the concept of innovation in both business and science.
Business itself is a branch of science, and innovation drives it forward for our prosperity.
There is still a confusing perception among people.
We are not fully able to make them understand the concept of business and innovation.
Business and innovation complement to each other but invention bridges them together.
Many ordinary people still think that business people are crooks, they loot the poor and they become rich.
As a matter of fact, business itself is a group of many different people.
It is a community of scientists, inventors, innovators, customers, employees, and suppliers.
All are integral parts of this mutual interconnectedness.
This is a business of innovation.
They all have specific missions but work together to prosper the human society.
If only one part is out of balance, then it affects others and would make our society unsustainable for the long run.
If scientists make supersonic jets available to travel space, then how many of us can go matters because it affects our life and society directly and indirectly.
Steve Jobs, the co-founder of Apple used to say that innovation comes into play when ordinary people feel its influence in their lives. Jobs’s commitment of innovation and values are expressed heavily in his must read biography by Walter Isaacson.
Remember, the Wright brothers invented the airplane in 1903, the first commercial flight took place after 11 years in 1914, and the whole world changed.
Scientists may tell you a great deal of information about the topic they study but they tell you nothing about the future of innovation because innovation is a basically the product of time.
Innovation captures great science and makes our life easy and comfortable.
Scientists must acquire innovation to lead not only an easy and comfortable life but also a happy and healthy life.
If we look back at the history of science, there is an endless series of stories of genius scientists who created inventions but then died broke and largely unhappy.
At the same time many other innovators utilized their inventions and made millions.
There are many examples of these situations, here are some few modern examples.
Julius Lilienfeld, an American physicist and electrical engineer, patented the first transistor, but AT&T got the credit for the first working transistor.
Intel is earning billions of dollars from semiconductors, which is a product made based on the transistor.
Charles Babbage, a mathematician and philosopher, invented the first computer, but IBM innovated it and developed software applications for it.
IBM created an enormous and durable business serving billions of people across the globe, and is also earning billions of dollars.
In 1990, Alan Emtage, Bill Heelan, and Peter J. Deutsch, all students at McGill University at Montreal, Canada, invented the web content search engine but Google’s Larry Page and Sergey Brin became the most successful innovative winners.
They utilized it as their core business, they revised and perfected it, they are serving billions of people now, and already became billionaires themselves.
Just think of our life without Google today.
It’s very difficult to produce many Newtons and many Einsteins as inventors in our society.
Our society has certain limitations to produce this type of genius.
This also equally applies to innovators who generally perfect the inventions and change the livelihood of the general public.
We still have a vague perception that innovation includes only grandiose scientific advancement. But in reality, innovation is a very small idea, mini project but astounding management, little twist and turn on existing product or service, and a continuous thought process about people’s life.
“Nobody starts invention and innovation with the hope of serendipity, it just happens as a by-product of continuous effort and thought process.”
For every Bill Gates and for every Elon Musk, there are hundreds of innovators who are still working tirelessly but have little or nothing to show to the world.
They started something and they failed few times, and they never tried again.
Failing means to give up, throw in the towel, but to keep trying is not failing, as Tomas Edison said, it’s the best way to know that current form of thinking isn’t working. Innovation is to keep trying.
Jennifer Aniston and Sandra Bullock worked as waitresses before they became Hollywood icons.
There were thousands of waiters and waitresses who never got a casting call from Hollywood.
During their time as waitresses also, Jennifer and Sandra were working mentally all the time for acting.
They never gave up and kept trying and trying.
Kevin Durant, an American professional basketball player, said “Hard work beats talent if talent isn’t put into mental work.”
As invention, innovation is also expensive and it requires a lot of multidimensional efforts otherwise innovative efforts will disappear after a certain time.
We have to reduce many kinds of risks in research and development otherwise there is a high chance of going out of business.
We’ve heard that big Pharma buys potential small drug companies so that they can minimize their research effort.
This is done to reduce the risk and at the same time they can accelerate late stage development of small buying companies.
There is a high advantage to capture the market by going fast in the race.
There are many other versions of risk reduction on innovation.
When we think of big companies, we assume that they invest so much on research, design, and development but they invest way more on patent litigation in comparison to pure research and development.
Pure scientific research and development has no guaranteed result on fixed time but still needs continuous emphasis for future directions.
In science, sometimes, pure research and development also invites serendipity.
Artificial organs and black holes are unexpected discoveries but airplanes and automobiles are expected discoveries.
When there is an unexpected finding, it always becomes a promising area of innovation because there is almost no competition.
They are mostly the by-products of other major invention efforts so that there is no investment cost associated with.
Louis Pasteur, a French chemist said, “In the field of observation, chance favors only the prepared mind”. Nobody starts invention and innovation with the hope of serendipity, it just happens as a by-product of continuous effort and thought process.
“Innovative scientists estimate the root and its underground depth and spread while watching the branches on top, root is new knowledge and the branch is a next new innovation for them.”
For any scientist, failure is a recurring part of any research project.
Any scientist who adapts all possible conditions to himself or herself, every single result depends on that person’s thought, emotion, and working model.
This is the reason scientists are sometimes quoted as unpredictable or mad people.
Unpredictable basically indicates the free flow thinking patterns in the behavior.
Thinking pattern in innovation is a key habit in producing valuable results.
Most of us see only branches of the tree because they are up above the ground, no mental pressure.
We can not see roots because they are underground, needs more digging to see.
We don’t have time and energy to see roots, we see branches, enjoy it, and pass-by.
Whether you are just a scientist or an innovative scientist depends on why and where your focus is: on root or branch or both?
Innovative scientists also try to estimate the root and its underground depth and spread while watching the branches on top.
The extension of root is new knowledge, new invention, and new science.
The decoration by the branches is a new innovation.
Root represents fundamental knowledge but branch represents more of an art than science.
Branches still need the support of root but they can give us many beautiful things in our life depending on how good interior designers we are.
Stronger the root, more the branches; more the branches, greater the selection of artistic decorations.
We ultimately want all: strong roots, strong branches, and beautiful decorations.
“The people in the past, people in the present, and people in future would be different in various ways, understanding this interconnectedness is innovation.”
Innovation in any thing doesn’t see only black and white, it actually sees in shades of gray.
To adapt to the innovative world, scientist must be curious and interested in learning, as said by Leonardo Da Vinci, a great painter and scientist, “Learning never exhausts the mind”.
As an innovative scientist, one must see things from others’ views and find out nuggets in people before judging them.
Everybody says that diets of green vegetables and fruits contain fewer calories, there is nothing new but the hidden part is both foods are less attractive eating materials.
We don’t like to eat them.
Our psychology is that we are more tempted to eat chocolate, sugary or tasty than salad.
Innovation also lies in the mixture of hidden and known facts of human psychology so that great thinkers like Mark Twain and Aristotle always suggested that truly original ideas are rare.
We all know scientists are trained to design experiments rather than to develop people systems, but innovative scientists do both.
Emotional intelligence (EQ) is a tool for innovative people, it is bigger than talent (IQ).
Daniel Goleman, PhD, the author of groundbreaking book ‘Emotional Intelligence‘ always emphasize that emotional intelligence teaches us to collaborate with new dots which were unknown before to take a new direction.
Why did Bill Gates and late Steve Jobs adopt a daily meditation routine?
Because they wanted to excel in the world of innovation.
Emotional intelligence navigates society through which innovation emerges and sustains.
Innovation is our need to make our life easy in our society.
Majority of us pretty quickly know the cost of a bottle of water in the nearest gas station because there is a price tag but very few of us are able to estimate the value of the same water halfway through a marathon because there is no price tag.
The fact is, cost comes from IQ but value comes from EQ.
We have no prediction of the future, we have only ideas from the past.
This is called literature search in research and development.
In any human project, the future we are trying to predict will indicate a past but a different past, another past having very little sameness of the previous past.
The people in the past, people in the present, and people in future would be different in various ways.
Understanding of this interconnectedness is innovation and very few smart scientists can actually comprehend this.
There is a beauty in the interconnectedness: best innovators always become more eager to play with it.
“Slow and boring is also sometimes very good, especially in scientific and innovative development, be slow but always keep moving.”
R&D in any organization is the center of Innovation.
We must see the continuity of existing products and services to fulfill human needs.
We must set priority on either the long run of existing product with less emphasis on R&D or short run of existing product or service with high emphasis on R&D.
This is a difficult battle to choose but innovation seeks this distinction and balance.
Any technology company who does business for us if that doesn’t add new features or products continuously, they lose their customers and audience over the time.
If we aren’t emphasizing R&D, then innovative people will leave the company. This is a big risk in the sustainability of businesses.
If innovative companies stopped hiring new talents for research and development, their existing products would be obsolete very soon and there is a high chance that companies would go out of business.
We must seek the competitive advantage in research and development.
It could be more patent production, it could be a new kind of technological advancement.
If it is by patents, after a certain time, they will expire and the company’s competitive advantage will disappear.
If it is a technological advantage, there is always the threat that another newer technology will replace the old one.
And both are very true.
This is the main reason why Microsoft always competes with Google and Facebook always competes with X.
Today’s advanced technology may become tomorrow’s obsolescence, if we don’t rediscover technology constantly based on ordinary peoples’ interest.
Martina Navratilova, the greatest tennis player of all time, said, “what matters isn’t how well you play when you are playing well; what matters is how well you play when you’re playing badly.” This clearly applies in research and innovation.
Slow and boring is also sometimes very good, especially in scientific and innovative development, be slow but always keep moving.
Conclusion
If you want to be an innovative scientist, be a good scientist first with enough scientific understanding and make a habit of watching branches of a tree with artistic flavor and decoration.
Mostly, innovation is an art on science.
As a scientist, if you acquire artistic intuition and judgement, you will become innovative.
As Albert Einstein said, “The measure of intelligence is the ability to change.” Innovation is flexibility, innovation is change which makes our life exciting.
But we must be careful of change. If we have to constantly change in various ways without meaningful purpose then we are destined to fail.
Then, there will be no fun at all in both personal and professional life.
As always, innovation needs a correct but slow change.
Peter Thiel, an entrepreneur and author of ‘Zero to One‘, emphasize that progress is always slow and always boring. Thiel’s ‘Zero to One‘ teaches us a new way of thinking about innovation by learning to ask questions that lead us to find value in unexpected places. Peter Thiel’s TedTalk on innovation and true innovation is really inspiring.
Enjoy the boredom because after boredom you have to rest, and after rest you will rediscover yourselves.
Yam Timsina, PhD, writes primarily on health basics, scientific progress, social upliftment, and value creation.
Disclaimer: “Please note that some links in this post are affiliate links, which means I may receive a small commission if you make a purchase through them, at no extra cost to you.”
