The First Mile

The author’s objective is to help us accelerate the innovation process by optimizing the very first phases, consisting in planning, assessment, experimentation, and initial adjustment. These key stages for the subsequent success of a project seem difficult to nail down, since no one knows what will come out of them. In fact, this period of uncertainty benefits from being rigorously structured. Concrete and pragmatic, this book is a goldmine of useful tips for steering start-ups as well as for managing intrapreneurs. This book also possesses the merit of combining common-sense advice, sometimes well known, with more unusual and unexpected tips. For example, the author suggests purposely keeping allocated resources tight rather than giving people all they might need, in order to whet their capacity to be creative, make do with what they have, and find free resources. He also puts the importance of failure into perspective by showing that good ideas have quite often required changing direction two or three times since their initial conception.

By providing original examples and insights, this book serves as a useful complement to foundational works on the innovation process.