In the study of management, unfortunately, many writers have been so anxious to articulate a theory in the form of, "If you do this, this will result," that they never go through this careful effort.

Breaking an old business model is always going to require leaders to follow their instinct. There will always be persuasive reasons not to take a risk. But if you only do what worked in the past, you will wake up one day and find that you’ve been passed by.

In a large successful company where your power base as CEO isn't all that secure, it's hard for a CEO to pursue a truly disruptive strategy.

The important thing is that over time, scientific progress transforms things that used to have to be dealt with in a problem-solving mode down to the pattern-recognition space; and from pattern recognition into the rules-based mode. This is the mechanism by which less-trained people are enabled to do more sophisticated things. This is always the way disruption happens. It enables a larger population of less-experienced people to do more sophisticated things.

In 15 years from now half of US universities may be in bankruptcy ... in the end I'm excited to see that happen. So pray for Harvard Business School if you wouldn't mind.

We have found that companies need to speak a common language, because some of the suggested ways to harness disruptive innovation are seemingly counter-intuitive. If companies don't have that common language, it is hard for them to come to consensus on a counter-intuitive course of action.

It is when the product is not good enough that proprietary integration gives you a competitive edge. You cannot outsource and be competitively successful in this situation. But at the other end, where standard components assembled in standard ways can yield acceptable performance, you must outsource.