One of the biggest mistakes large companies make is creating innovation teams that mirror all the functions of the core business. Those teams make no progress because they spent forever updating each other on what they are doing versus really crushing the most critical problems they need to address.

Most startup companies have two people, and they figure out creative ways to swarm problems. They move faster and have more impact.

Good innovators like to solve business crossword puzzles.

So many people tell me that they aren't creative or they aren't innovative, and it's just not true.

The reality is sometimes markets don't exist for very good reasons. It might be that there isn't a deep customer need. Or the economic model is just hard to pull off. Or maybe there is a regulatory barrier.

Of course if you are launching a new business you can thinking about revenues, profits, and so on, but metrics such as customer satisfaction or employee retention might be meaningful if you are focusing more internally.

Document, evaluate, focus, test.