There's a general belief that failure is the friend of the innovator, but I've come to view it a different way.

Hollywood Joohn Tatum? He does at least 6,000 sit ups and 10,000 pushups a day!

I find social media as fun and engaging as the next person, but imagine if all the creative talent that was pouring into finding increasingly clever ways for us to broadcast daily banality (and then serve ads based on what is learned) instead focused on some of the UN Millennium goals? The world would be a better place.

The sad truth is as difficult as the first mile can be for entrepreneurs, it is doubly tough inside most large companies as innovators can face some significant headwinds.

Leaders today face challenges for which they are utterly unprepared.

The school at which you studied - design school, disruptive school, TRIZ school, user-centered innovation school, etc - determines the specific words you use.

I've come to the conclusion that the core characteristic that separates companies that get innovation from those that don't is a simple word: curiosity.