Learning innovation theory: one exercise

This week I tried out a new exercise in one of my seminars, and wanted to share it with you all.

The class is a graduate seminar on technology, innovation, and design in Georgetown’s great LDT program.  There’s a lot of tech history and theory involved, and I’m always looking for ways to make that material live for the students.

During the past two weeks the class worked through Everett Rogers‘ Diffusion of Innovations textbook (5th edition). This is the great work on early adoptions, change agents, opinion leaders, homophily vs heterophilia, etc. Rich, deep stuff, clearly organized and studded with neat stories.

I admired how the students reflected on the material, thinking through its different concepts and exploring examples.  Yet I still wanted more.

In one class session we were scheduled to finish Rogers, then start into Clayton M. Christensen’s disruption theory with one short yet pungent reading.* I was concerned that they were starting from a vague sense of disruption as chaos. Besides discussing the texts, what else could the students do to deepen their understanding?

Hence the exercise:

First, I asked the class (all students masked up, as well as myself) to come up with a hypothetical product, one which didn’t exist now. Fearing that might be too broad or daunting, I narrowed down the charge to imagining a holographic projector.  They thought about this. I mentioned the Star Wars chess game as one example. They thought some more, then started developing an idea.

The thing included an overhead projector, below which a 3d scene would take place.  This would be true 3d, a vision which would display differently as you walked around it, much like a vase shows different sides from different viewpoints.  Users could interact with it with their hands on a very basic level, reaching into the displayed scene. It didn’t require user tech at all – i.e., no 3d glasses or headsets.

I encouraged them to reach back in the syllabus and bring up previous readings and topics for inspiration. They started fleshing it out in terms of use, business model, and limitations.  Then over to Rogers – who would use it?  How would uptake spread, or how wouldn’t it? Now they dove into early adopters, skeptics, laggards. Picking out opinion leaders and change agents became very practical.

We toyed with names for it.  The nerdiest member suggested EMH.  That’s what I’ll call it for now.

Then I switched things up.  Set aside the EMH for now, I told them, and let’s dive into disruption. We quickly assembled Christensen’s theory, along the way setting aside less nuanced senses of disruption. They considered different examples which might or might not fit.

Then back to the EMH.  “OK,” I told them, “the EMH company is now the big incumbent in the holographic display market.  What does a disruptive competitor look like?”

Ah. Now the exercise and the readings came together.  Small, was the first idea, smaller than the EMH, like a handheld or arm-mounted display. Cheaper.  Lower quality.  They realized that EMH customers tended to be institutions or groups: schools, theaters, the military.  The competitor would be cheap enough for less well resourced groups – and individuals! – to purchase.  As it spread the EMH firm could easily scoff at the lower quality and smaller size… until the competitor’s product evolved past that low-market end and started competing with it.  Now we were talking disruption.  Students started imagining ways the competition would proceed, including through further innovations.

At that point we hit the last minute of class, and I had to switch over to prepping them for next week.

I think it went well.  I’d like to try it again with a bit more time and perhaps some more props. Perhaps create a digital or physical sketch of the first product.  Or have the whole class built the first innovation, then split them into two, with one group stewarding that product while the other sneakily builds the down-market disruptor.

*If you’re critical of Christensen, don’t worry.  Check the linked syllabus.  In a few weeks we read Jill Lepore’s critique.