links for 2011-07-28

• The Five Qualities of the Consummate Innovator
  1. Associating: “innovative thinkers connect fields, problems, or ideas that others find unrelated.” 2. Questioning: ”We found that innovators consistently demonstrate a high Q/A ratio, where questions (Q) not only outnumber answers (A) in a typical conversation, but are valued at least as highly as good answers.” 3. Observing: ”Innovators… carefully watch the world around them—including customers, products, services, technologies, and companies—and the observations help them gain insights into and ideas for new ways of doing things.” 4. Networking: ”Innovators… actively search for new ideas by talking to people who may offer a radically different view of things.” 5. Experimenting: ”Innovators are constantly trying out new experiences and piloting new ideas. Experimenters unceasingly explore the world intellectually and experientially, holding convictions at bay and testing hypotheses along the way.”
  (tags: innovation quotes)