The Innovation Delusion

Innovationisthehottest buzzword in business. But what if our obsession with findingthenext big thing has distracted us from the work that matters most?The most important book Ive read in a long time . . . It explains so much about what is wrong with our technology our economy and the world and gives a simple recipe for how to fix it: Focus on understanding what it takes for your products and services to last.Tim OReilly founder of OReilly MediaIts hard to avoidinnovationthese days. Nearly every product gets marketed as being disruptive whether its genuinely a new invention or just a new toothbrush. But in this manifesto onthestate of American work historians of technology Lee Vinsel and Andrew L. Russell argue that our way of thinking about and pursuinginnovationhas made us poorer less safe andironicallyless innovative.Drawing on years of original research and reportingThe InnovationDelusionshows howtheideology of change for its own sake has proved a disaster. Corporations have spent millions hiring chiefinnovationofficers whiletheir core businesses tank. Computer science programs have drilledtheir students on programming and design even thoughtheoverwhelming majority of jobs are in IT and maintenance. In countless cities suburban sprawl has left local governments with loads of deferred repairs thatthey cant afford to fix. And sometimesinnovationeven killslike in 2018 when a Miami bridge hailed for its innovative design collapsed onto a highway and killed six people.In this provocative deeply researched book Vinsel and Russell tellthestory of how we devaluedthework that underpins modern lifeand in doing so wrecked our economy and public infrastructure while liningthepockets of consultants who combinetheego of Silicon Valley withtheworst of Wall Streets greed.Theauthors offer a compelling plan for how we can shift our focus away fromthepursuit of growth at all costs and back toward neglected activities like maintenance care and upkeep.For anyone concerned bythecrumbling state of our roads and bridges orthedirection our economy is headedTheInnovation Delusionis a deeply necessary reevaluation of a trend we can still disrupt.