When it comes to innovation, trust your intuition

By Paul Sloane

MBA students are taught to treat business in a rational, scientific way. They analyze situations, develop financial models, critically examine management decisions and logically examine different scenarios. When they emerge from the hallowed halls of academia, they are often surprised to find that businesses run much less on logic and much more on emotion. It is not cold, intelligent analysis that drives most organizations forward. Emotional energy is often the real engine behind successful people and organisations.

Sure it helps to be analytical, intelligent and rational - but what makes people like Richard Branson, Bill Gates or Steve Jobs great business leaders is not their undoubted intelligence but their passion and commitment to their cause.

One of the richest men in Britain is Felix Dennis, who made his fortune in publishing. In 1971 he was jailed for publishing an obscene political cartoon but he was acquitted on appeal. His success started with Kung-Fu Monthly in 1974. In the 1980s he published a string of successful computer magazines. His publishing empire now spans IT, motoring, gambling and men’s magazines. A recent innovation was The Week – a brief summary of all the best articles from the press each week. In his book, How to Get Rich, he describes how he ignores conventional wisdom and sound advice from his directors, lawyers and accountants. He goes with his gut instincts instead. Time and again he trusted his intuition in making tough business decisions about innovative ventures.

Luc Mayrand, Concept Designer at Disney says, "If you find your logic is talking you out of a good idea, question the logic first, then question the idea. This is entertainment; logic is less important than the impact of the story and design."

There are many famous examples where eminent people used logic and analysis to trash an innovative idea which subsequently succeeded. Western Union turned down the telephone because they saw no need for people to chat to one another. IBM turned down Xerography when it was offered to them by its inventor Chester Carlson. Decca Records turned down the Beatles and so on.

Logic and analysis can always find fault with innovative ideas. Use these tools but use them warily. If your intuition tells you that you have a great idea then pursue it a little while longer.

Paul Sloane is the author of The Innovative Leader, published by Kogan Page. He gives talks and workshops on creativity, innovation and leadership. He is also the founder of Destination Innovation, which helps organisations improve innovation. He writes and speaks on lateral thinking and innovation.


Related Web site: http://www.destination-innovation.com

Full article: http://www.innovationtools.com/Articles/ArticleDetails.asp?a=271

yes, i cried... but not in t-group

Spring Break for me had always been skiing in Colorado or drinking beer on a beach. As a 1st year at the GSB, I did both and had a great time.

After returning from break last March, I kept hearing stories from friends about the great experiences they had on their Service Learning Trips. This year, I finally decided to apply for one when Andy Doyle reminded me that "the best thing [he] did at the GSB was [his] service learning trip to New Orleans."

I joined 14 GSB classmates and Elizabeth Macholan, a PMP staff member with the Service Learning Program, on a trip to New Orleans. The trip was led by Shara Tortora, MBA2, and Darren Dodson, MBA2, who both participated in last year's trip.

This year, the leaders designed a trip focused on having a more lasting impact on the New Orleans community by leveraging the unique business skills we have acquired at the GSB.

We partnered with Idea Village, a New Orleans-based organization that helps entrepreneurs and small businesses succeed, which introduced us to 25 small businesses. The businesses were located in three city corridors that are struggling to regain their economic footing post-Katrina.

We were divided into five teams of three and each team met with five businesses. After meetings with the business owners, the teams developed a set of tactical and strategic recommendations for each business.

Unbeknownst to the entrepreneurs, we had access to a fund of $50,000 from which to make small investments (NPV-positive, of course) across the 25 businesses. Part of the grant money was provided by a New Orleans entrepreneur who Idea Village had assisted a year ago.

Idea Village gives grants, not loans, but encourages recipients to "pay it forward". This contribution was generously matched by an anonymous GSB alum.

The task of allocating the grant funding, with the objective of maximizing community welfare, was extraordinarily difficult. The distribution was complicated by the special bonds formed between GSB teams and the entrepreneurs with whom they were working, resulting in a lively and emotional debate.

These are case studies of a business we chose to fund and a business we were not able to support financially, though we provided recommendations to each business.

Part of our mission in New Orleans was to educate ourselves about the situation from as many perspectives as possible. In addition to the service aspect of our trip, we had several meetings with civic leaders such as Mayor Ray Nagin, Lieutenant Governor Mitch Landrieu and Business Council leader Jay Lapeyre.

Oh and New Orleans happens to be a lot of fun. The group spent most nights on Bourbon Street or in other areas of town enjoying great food, amazing music and plenty of drinks.

Having completed a service learning trip, I am in agreement with Andy Doyle that it was the best experience I had at the GSB. The trip was a powerful reminder of how special the people at the GSB are and how the teachings of the GSB enable us to make an impact in the real world.

Finally, I want to encourage people to visit New Orleans as the city continues the tradition of good times despite the fact that it remains in need of continued help.

IDEAcorps Summer

IDEAcorps™ was truly a great experience. The knowledge that I gained from that summer has been extremely valuable to me as I grow as a professional. I feel very fortunate to have been a part of the initial IDEAcorps™ team.

Hubig's pie begins shipping namesake pastries to evacuees

Stacey Plaisance / Associated Press
For 85 years, New Orleans residents didn't have to look far for a fruit-filled, fried Hubig's pie.

The hand-sized pastry, wrapped in white paper emblazoned with the sketch of a plump man in a white apron and tall baker's hat, could be found at the counter of almost any grocery store or gas station -- even at the local hardware store and jail.

Hurricane Katrina changed that, when it brought the Simon Hubig Pie Co. to a halt and washed away its customer base. But the resilient culinary touchstone is slowly recovering and changing its business model along the way.

For the first time, Hubig's is making Internet sales to meet demand from displaced residents. Third-generation co-owner Andrew Ramsey said phone calls and e-mails for pies have come in steadily, from just about every state, since Katrina.

"We miss a lot about New Orleans, especially the Hubig's Pies ," one former Orleanian wrote in a recent online order from Chicago. Another writes: "My transplanted grandson yearns for Hubig's Pies. Do you ship to Las Vegas?" And another: "Does anyone carry your pies in Dallas?"

For four months after the August 2005 hurricane, Hubig's couldn't fry pies because of damage to the bakery and a lack of basic city services and workers. There was no shortage of tears as Ramsey recounted the company's struggles to reopen, one of the biggest being with the insurance company.

"Our neighborhood was either without water or the water was contaminated. There was water in the gas lines, and we certainly didn't have enough gas pressure to run the big boilers and big cookers that we use," Ramsey said. "But they just couldn't understand why we weren't making pies."

Hubig's used a $5,000 grant from a nonprofit entrepreneur group called the Idea Village to launch an online ordering service for T-shirts with the Hubig's logo. One of the stipulations of the grant was that the money go toward a new business concept or project.

"So while the company wasn't making pies, we sold T-shirts," Ramsey said.

In January 2006, when the insurance company finally settled and Hubig's started making pies again, Hubig's added pies to its online T-shirt orders. Drivers delivered pies to reopened stores and gas stations in New Orleans and to residents and workers living in tents in hard-hit coastal parishes.

Ramsey got emotional recalling parking a delivery van near a parade route and handing out hundreds of free pies to crowds gathered for the first post-Katrina Mardi Gras, last year.

"You have no idea," he said. "It was a good feeling, not just the feeling that people enjoyed the pies , but the feeling of, it's over, and we're going to be OK."

Today, the bakery produces as many turnovers as it did before Katrina -- sometimes more, depending on online orders, Ramsey said. The company is making roughly 100,000 pies a week, or 5 million a year, he said.

The bakery itself is right where its been for more than 80 years, tucked among shotgun homes and cottages just blocks from the French Quarter.

One recent day, a worker poured hot apple pie filling into buckets for cooling while another pinched dough between his fingers to check its consistency.

Dough was pushed through a machine, flattened into long, narrow strips. Sweet-smelling filling, lumpy with apple chunks, was squirted onto the dough in palm-sized doses as a machine folded the dough in half.

A large metal cutter -- one the bakery has used for at least 75 years -- rolled over the dough, cutting it into shape. The turnovers were dropped into a fryer, drained, and glazed with hot icing. They were cooled on rotating, circular racks with fans then dropped onto a conveyor belt, where a worker lined them up to be wrapped.
Hubig's hasn't resumed production of its 8- and 9-inch round pies . Ramsey said demand was declining before Katrina, and only about half the company's pre-Katrina work force of 60 is back.

Delivery routes also have changed: before the storm, the bakery delivered pies within about a 200 radius of New Orleans. Today, population shifts have caused changes in many routes. Some, including one to Gulfport, Miss., have been nixed altogether.

Depending on the destination, the cost of shipping is as much, or more, than the price of the pie. That's because shipping often must be expedited due to the short shelf-life of the pies, and the weight of the pies also affects the shipping cost, Ramsey said.

Pies retail for less than a dollar each, but a case of a dozen purchased online is $25. Shipping for that case, to such cities Baltimore and Chicago, runs about $18.18. It's about $22.38 to Boston and Denver, and $24.54 to San Francisco.

"It's embarrassingly pricey," Ramsey said. "But people want them."

The company buys many ingredients locally and makes its own filling. The best-selling flavors are apple and lemon. Other flavors include peach, pineapple, chocolate, banana and coconut.

Seasonal flavors include blueberry, blackberry and sweet potato.

Hubig's was started more than 100 years ago by baker Simon Hubig in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. New Orleans became a branch bakery for the southeastern U.S. chain, opening at its present location in the Faubourg Marigny in 1922. New Orleans was the only Hubig's to survive after the Depression, when the pies sold for just pennies.

Read full article
On the Net: Hubig's, http://www.hubigs.com

DISNEY ROCKS PRESCHOOL 'MOVERS'

By Kimberly Nordyke
From the Hollywood Reporter

Disney Channel has given a series pickup to "Imagination Movers," a show for the preschool-targeted "Playhouse Disney" daily programming block that stars the New Orleans-based music group of the same name.

In addition, the group, whose music videos have been airing on Disney Channel since the fall, has signed with Walt Disney Records.

"Movers," which will include music performances, stories and skits, is intended to emphasize creative problem-solving skills and introduce "high-energy" rock music to kids. It will feature the band members as "everyday guy" brain-stormers working hard to solve "idea emergencies."

The band comprises former journalist Rich Collins, former teacher Scott Durbin, architect Dave Poche and Scott "Smitty" Smith, a New Orleans firefighter who was a member of the Hurricane Katrina search-and-rescue team. Three of the band members lost their homes, production office, instruments and props to Katrina.

The series, which begins production at the NIMS Center in New Orleans in early October, is targeted for a 2008 premiere.

"After seeing the musical group perform at Jazzfest 2005 in New Orleans, we were determined to find a way to bring their energetic and infectious music to preschoolers everywhere," Disney Channel senior vp original programming Nancy Kanter said. "They have already struck a resounding chord with our viewers through their music videos, and we look forward to adding this talented group to our series lineup."

Skot Bright and Sascha Penn are executive producers on the series. The band members are co-executive producing with Rick Gitelson.

In October, Walt Disney Records will release a "definitive introduction" to the Movers with a collection of songs titled "Juicebox Heroes," culled from the group's three albums. A new studio album will follow next year that will feature original songs from the series. The group is currently on tour.

iSeatz sits pretty in N.Y., but misses N.O.

Revenue mushrooms after Katrina move

By Pam Radtke Russell, Business writer

Before Hurricane Katrina hit, New Orleans-based iSeatz was relatively content booking restaurant tables online for $2 an honored reservation.

But when the city flooded, and the company was forced to relocate to high-cost New York, $2 a table didn't seem like much.

"Being kicked out of home was really a jarring experience," said Kenneth Purcell, founder and president of iSeatz.

The astronomical costs of Manhattan forced Purcell to take risks he wouldn't have taken in New Orleans.

"Honestly, before Katrina we would have said we don't do hotels or rental cars," he said of his company.

While relocated, Purcell accelerated the company's foray into other travel booking. Compared with $2 a reservation for restaurants, online travel agencies earn as much as a 30 percent commission for booking travel, Purcell said.

The company had started working with Expedia and Orbitz by 2003. But after Katrina, the company started tailoring their offerings to different vendors such MasterCard.

Most recently, the company started providing travel-related services to Delta.com customers.

Through Delta's Web page, iSeatz technology allows people who book their airline tickets to also reserve everything from hotels and ground transportation to tours of Hollywood stars' homes and and carbon offsets -- or purchasing reductions in greenhouse gases.

Purcell, who won't reveal his company's exact earnings, says that before Katrina, iSeatz's revenue was in the "lower digit millions." But since then, iSeatz's gross revenues have increased by more than 1,000 percent, he said. He's also increased his staff from five before the storm to more than 50, including contract workers.

Its success in New York aside, Purcell said his startup technology firm is considering returning to New Orleans in the near future.

"The real advantage (of New Orleans) is quality of life and cost of living," Purcell said. "No matter how much money you make in New York, you can't drive down St. Charles Avenue. You can't have a slow-paced walking day."

The company currently is talking to the city of New Orleans and GNO Inc., the local economic development group, about the possibility of its headquarters returning.

Pam Meyer, director of business development for GNO, said iSeatz has been told of all of the incentives that would be available to it if it relocated to New Orleans.

Meyer said she's excited about the prospect of iSeatz returning to the city.

"I think it's a great sign," she said.

"If we're going to have a more progressive economy, we need this sort of creative entrepreneurial technology," she said.

But even if its headquarters don't return, the company will continue to expand in New Orleans, with more iSeatz employees in the city than there were before storm. Ten people work in the company's office in CanalPlace, and Purcell plans to add four more in the New Orleans office by the end of the year.

Custom site offerings

What iSeatz does is difficult to explain. The company not only provides the technology to various companies to be able to sell hotel, plane and restaurant reservations on one site, it also puts together customized offerings for Web sites and notifies everyone about upcoming reservations.

All of that is done without ever leaving the site a person is viewing, Purcell said. All of the reservation requests made on Delta.com or MasterCard's priceless.com, for instance, are sent by encoded message to iSeatz, which then processes them.

"You never really know you're using iSeatz," he said.

Henry H. Harteveldt, vice president and principal analyst of travel research for Forrester Research in San Francisco, likened using iSeatz to shopping in a department store and picking up a shirt, shoes and socks in different parts of the store, then paying for them at one counter.

"It gives the customer a chance to say 'yes' " to booking something other than airline reservations without ever leaving the Web site, he said.

"People who make reservations on Delta.com often want to book ancillary services, and they look to other ways online to find those," said Joel Weiss, managing director of Delta.com. Weiss said the company wanted to offer their customers those services without having to leave the Delta site.

Harteveldt doesn't expect people will visit Delta.com simply because of the added features. But he said the added features should keep customers on Delta's Web site instead of going elsewhere.

Weiss said there's a big upside for Delta too. The company can make money by booking hotels and other services through the site.

On its own, booking airline tickets is not usually a profit maker, Harteveldt said. But by cross-selling other products, airlines can make "tens of millions of dollars," Harteveldt said.

Only about 1 percent to 3 percent of customers who book on airline sites currently take advantage of cross-sell offers, he said.

If Delta, through its additional offerings, can increase that to 5 percent or more, it "will stand to make a nice bit of incremental revenue, and iSeatz will make revenue," Harteveldt said.

That increase wouldn't be a stretch. About 29 percent of all leisure travelers book online, up from 11 percent in 2002, he said. By 2009, online booking will account for one-third of all leisure traveling, according to Forrester Research. Harteveldt said 55 percent of leisure travelers research their trips online, and about $86 billion worth of online travel was booked last year, he said.

'A lot of vision'

Weiss said Delta chose iSeatz because it was fast and flexible, and could give the company what it needed quickly.

"iSeatz came to the table with a lot of vision and energy," he said. "They really had a long-term view of what this thing could be."

Without iSeatz, Delta could have worked with Expedia or Orbitz, but those companies would not have provided what iSeatz offered and would have cost more, Harteveldt said. Though it's too early to tell how well Delta's enhanced site is doing, Weiss said the company has definitely seen a positive reaction.

"Customers seem to be really reacting," he said.

Purcell said his company is in discussions with other airlines to provide them with similar services.

Harteveldt expects it won't take long for other airlines to follow Delta's lead.

"This is the direction that airlines should go in," he said.

And iSeatz is continuing talks with those in New Orleans about where it will be permanently located.

Purcell said one of his concerns is being able to hire the type of employee his company would need.

Meyer said other technology companies are successfully hiring new employees, and with more creative people coming to the city, "wanting to make a difference, I think you're going to see more of this here," she said of the prospects for iSeatz and for more creative technology companies to relocate to the area.

Purcell also is trying to convince some of his top executives, many of whom he recruited while in New York, that New Orleans is the best place for the business.

"It was never my intention to leave New Orleans," he said.