Successful strategies adhere to a basic pattern.

I feel for today's leaders. I really do. They got to where they are by doing a series of jobs exceptionally well. And that doesn't help them at all with the challenges they now face.

Teams working on disruptive ideas need to be small enough that they can be fed by no more than two pizzas.

Make sure that you take the time to think about how other companies might respond to your idea, both those companies already in the market you plan to target as well as others that might imagine targeting that market.

Good innovators like to solve business crossword puzzles.

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.

You still want to be thoughtful about what you do, no doubt, but you have to learn through trial-and-error experimentation as well.