The wealth of nations has come by adding “commercialization” on “invention” to produce a new outcome called “innovation”. Before AD 1500, over centuries, the gross world product was flat. The world had inventors but few innovators. But things changed when property rights made it possible for the merchants (the rich class then) to find the mechanisms to invest in the ideas created by inventors. Magically, an inventing world became an innovating world.
As I chronicled it in a seminal article in the Harvard Business Review, once you understand this equation and the necessary fudge factors to keep it balanced, you will thrive as you lead a business. Create a community of innovators, not just inventors.
Innovators fix market frictions, inventors propose solutions! One has products, the old has ideas and postulations. Great things happen in companies and nations when innovators emerge. Open the path and make innovators out of your team.
Tekedia Mini-MBA edition 16 (Feb 10 – May 3, 2025) opens registrations; register today for early bird discounts.
Tekedia AI in Business Masterclass opens registrations here.
Join Tekedia Capital Syndicate and invest in Africa’s finest startups here.
Invent. INNOVATE. GROW. Join us at Tekedia Mini-MBA
---
Register for Tekedia Mini-MBA (Feb 10 - May 3, 2025), and join Prof Ndubuisi Ekekwe and our global faculty; click here.