Great Innovation Quotes & Sayings

Great things often come from actions and decisions taken by others, that are deemed wild, stupid or unreasonable at the time, but later prove to be very useful. — Innocent Mwatsikesimbe

Social innovation thrives on collaboration; on doing things with others, rather than just to them or for them: hence the great interest in new ways of using the web to 'crowdsource' ideas, or the many experiments involving users in designing services. — Geoff Mulgan

If you go back and look at the historical record, it turns out that a lot of important ideas have very long incubation periods. I call this the 'slow hunch.' We've heard a lot recently about hunch and instinct and blink-like sudden moments of clarity, but in fact, a lot of great ideas linger on, sometimes for decades, in the back of people's minds. They have a feeling that there's an interesting problem, but they don't quite have the tools yet to discover them." Solving the problem means being in the right place at the right time - available to the propitious moment, the kairos. Perhaps counterintuitively, protecting what is left of this flow from the pressing obligation of new choices gives us a leg up on innovation. — Douglas Rushkoff

The transformation of part of the northern part of this continent into "America" inaugurated a nearly boundless epoch of opportunity and innovation, and thus deserves to be celebrated with great vim and gusto, with or without the participation of those who wish they had never been born. — Christopher Hitchens

The years after 50 can be a time of great productivity, meaningful work, pleasure, creativity, and innovation. It's a huge opportunity. — Jane Pauley

Not every innovation in transportation is going to come from government or even a large enterprise. There are smart people out there with tools and skills to come up with great ideas. — Anthony Foxx

Our country is great because it is built on principles of self-reliance, opportunity, innovation, and compassion for others. — Ronald Reagan

The mindset, vision, competency, capability, culture and marketing opportunity are all great starting point for business model innovation. — Pearl Zhu

Net Neutrality is what makes the Internet so great - and so vital for innovation and creativity. — Justine Bateman

Every great brand goes back to a courageous individual who dared to say 'NO' to the status quo. — David Brier

America became a great nation early on not because it was flooded with politicians, but because it was flooded with people who understood the value of personal responsibility, hard work, creativity, innovation, and that's what will get us on the right track now, as well. — Benjamin Carson

I appear as a skeptic, who believes that doubt is the great engine, the great fuel of all inquiry, all discovery and all innovation. — Christopher Hitchens

In an incongruity, as these cases exemplify, the innovative solution has to be clearly definable. It has to be feasible with the existing, known technology, and with easily available resources. It requires hard developmental work, of course. But if a great deal of research and new knowledge is still needed, it is not yet ready for the entrepreneur, not yet 'ripe'. The innovation that successfully exploits an incongruity between economic realities has to be simple rather than complicated, 'obvious' rather than grandiose. — Peter F. Drucker

Innovations succeed when failure is seen as a learning step to great success. — Pearl Zhu

Each week I am forced to revise my original opinion that Facebook is a great innovation for keeping people in touch, to believing that it is merely a canvas for members to act out strange, unresolved conflicts and desires. — Emily Yoffe

Once an innovation reaches a certain level of popularity, its success is virtually assured. By the same token, great innovations can fail because the domino effect doesn't kick in.15 — Michael J. Mauboussin

Great innovations should not be forced on slender majorities. — Thomas Jefferson

I think one of the great innovations of sexual harassment law was that it did not use the word "consent." It used the word "welcome." — Gloria Steinem

We need innovation. We need great ideas that can be simply and effectively produced all over the place. — Helen Clark

The rook is a skilled survivor. He is ancient and has inhabited the planet longer than humans. This you can tell from his singing voice: his cry is harsh and grating, made for a more ancient world that existed before the innovation of the pipe, the lute, and the viol. Before music was invented he was taught to sing by the planet itself. He mimicked the great rumble of the sea, the fearsome eruption of volcanoes, the creaking of glaciers, and the geological groaning as the world split apart in its agony and remade itself. — Diane Setterfield

The greater the contrast, the greater the potential. Great energy only comes from a correspondingly great tension of opposites. — Carl Jung

The United States is definitely ahead in culture of innovation. If someone wants to accomplish great things, there is no better place than the U.S. — Elon Musk

America has always been a country of innovation and dynamism, entrepreneurship. And I think that one of the things that has made our country great too is its heterogeneous population where people come here from all over the world. — Jimmy Carter

I must express in the strongest possible terms my profound opposition to the newly instituted practice which imposes severe and intolerable restrictions on the ingress and egress of senior members of the hierarchy and will, in all probability, should the current deplorable innovation be perpetuated, precipitate a progressive constriction of the channels of communication, culminating in a condition of organizational atrophy and administrative paralysis which will render effectively impossible the coherent and co-ordinated discharge of the function of government within Her Majesty's United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland."
..... "You mean you've lost your key?" I asked. — Jonathan Lynn & Anthony Jay

We need more math classes, we need more science. It's the art of math and the art of science that creates all the innovation, and we have a tradition of great arts, great music. — Wynton Marsalis

At the end of the day, if you have a great product and service paired with the wrong pricing strategy / business model, you don't have a business. — Richie Norton

The typical Anarchist, then, may be defined as follows: A man perceptible by the spirit of revolt under one or more of its forms, - opposition, investigation, criticism, innovation, - endowed with a strong love of liberty, egoistic or individualistic, and possessed of great curiosity, a keen desire to know. These traits are supplemented by an ardent love of others, a highly developed moral sensitiveness, a profound sentiment of justice, and imbued with missionary zeal." To the above characteristics, says Alvin F. Sanborn, must be added these sterling qualities: a rare love of animals, surpassing sweetness in all the ordinary relations of life, exceptional sobriety of demeanor, frugality and regularity, austerity, even, of living, and courage beyond compare.[2] — Emma Goldman

In the U.S. and Europe, there has been a lot of creative hobby innovation, and that's great. — Erik Hersman

Great inventors and discoverers seem to have made their discoveries and inventions as it were by the way, in the course of their everyday life. — Elizabeth Charles

You have to free your brain to roam to places that are a little impractical, and innovation consultants have come up with some great ways to encourage that. One of my favorites comes from Legrand, who tells people in group brainstorming sessions to try to come up with the WORST possible ideas that they can think of ... Once you have a list of really, really bad suggestions - and coming up with them does force your brain to work in a different way - you try to flip them over into the positive. — Amanda Lang

When part of this ecosystem was lacking, such as for John Atanasoff at Iowa State or Charles Babbage in the shed behind his London home, great concepts ended up being consigned to history's basement. And when great teams lacked passionate visionaries, such as Penn after Mauchly and Eckert left, Princeton after von Neumann, or Bell Labs after Shockley, innovation slowly withered. — Walter Isaacson

It is never an idea, technology, market forces, or access to capital that makes a company innovative. What differentiates an innovative company from an average company is the people working inside the company. — Jag Randhawa

I think most of the important stuff on the Internet has been built. There will be continued innovation, for sure, but the great problems of the Internet have essentially been solved. — Elon Musk

Who wouldn't love this jargon we dress common sense in: "formal innovation is no longer transformative, having been co-opted by the forces of stabilization and post-industrial inertia," blah, blah. But this co-optation might actually be a good thing if it helped keep younger writers from being able to treat mere formal ingenuity as an end in itself. MTV-type co-optation could end up a great prophylactic against cleveritis - you know, the dreaded grad-school syndrome of like "Watch me use seventeen different points of view in this scene of a guy eating a Saltine." The real point of that shit is "Like me because I'm clever" - which of course is itself derived from commercial art's axiom about audience-affection determining art's value. — David Foster Wallace

Measures of self-government and a school council, especially for such young children, were a great innovation. — Dora Russell

Our combination of great research universities, a pro-risk business culture, deep pools of innovation-seeking equity capital and reliable business and contract law is unprecedented and unparalleled in the world. — Marc Andreessen

The pace of innovation may slow down or speed up depending on the appetite in the public markets, but the constant progress of technology doesn't really ever stop. There's always opportunities for new ideas and creative people to go build great things. I'm always interested in learning about those kinds of opportunities. — Adam Dell

Our era has produced many great men
robber barons, masters of innovation, beast of business
whose staggering wealth, incomparable ruthlessness and personal legends would seem to prove they are dominant species but then one has a look at their son, and doubts the theory of evolution entirely.
-DR. Bertrand Legmam Cooper,
Problems of Science and Society,
Posted by One Who Has Known Both, 1900 — Anna Godbersen

This is all about having great leaders who can drive agile innovation and agile decision-making. — Steve Ballmer

Though determinants and matrices received a great deal of attention in the nineteenth century and thousands of papers were written on these subjects, they do not constitute great innovations in mathematics ... Neither determinants nor matrices have influenced deeply the course of mathematics despite their utility as compact expressions and despite the suggestiveness of matrices as concrete groups for the discernment of general theorems of group theory ... — Morris Kline

Contrary to what we hear, the great American divide is not a clash between conservatives who advocate liberty versus progressives who oppose liberty. Rather, the two sides each affirm a certain type of liberty. One side, for example, cherishes economic liberty while the other champions liberty in the sexual and social domain. Nor is it a clash between patriots and anti-patriots. Both sides love America, but they love a different type of America. One side loves the America of Columbus and the Fourth of July, of innovation and work and the "animal spirit" of capitalism, of the Boy Scouts and parochial schools, of traditional families and flag-saluting veterans. The other side loves the America of tolerance and social entitlements, of income and wealth redistribution, of affirmative action and abortion, of feminism and gay marriage. — Dinesh D'Souza

Healthy curiosity is a great key in innovation. — Ifeanyi Enoch Onuoha

The problems in every country are the same. Bureaucracy is strangling innovation. Overgrown political sectors are sucking away resources that could otherwise lead to growth. Regulations and taxes are punishing innovation. Public sector services are breaking down and no longer serving people's needs. Laws and prevailing legislation control a world that no longer exists. People who go into politics to change the system end up getting co-opted by it. Workers feel trapped and fear a lack out options outside the status quo. In every case, it comes down to the great evil of our time and all times: government itself. There is no place on earth in which more liberty and less or no government would not be welcome and bring about real progress. — Jeffrey Tucker

My parents did a great job of creating a home we wanted to return to...and all of our friends wanted to be there too. — Richie Norton

So, I think the output of our innovation is great. We have a culture of self-improvement. I know we can continue to improve. There is no issue. But at the same time, our absolute level of output is fantastic. — Steve Ballmer

If one sentence were to sum up the mechanism driving the Great Stagnation, it is this: Recent and current innovation is more geared to private goods than to public goods. That simple observation ties together the three major macroeconomic events of our time: growing income inequality, stagnant median income, and the financial crisis. — Tyler Cowen

Our two nations both faced great challenges when they were founded, and our two nations have both relied on the same principles to help us succeed. We've built strong democracies to protect the freedoms given to us by an Almighty God. We've welcomed immigrants, who have helped us thrive. We've built prosperous economies by rewarding innovation and risk-taking and trade. And we've built an enduring alliance to confront terrorists and tyrants. — George W. Bush

We know that defence work results in more than great defence hardware - it can drive innovation and advances in all areas of our life. — Jay Weatherill

If your great-great-great-grandfather wanted to read his book after dark, some poor soul had to crawl around in a whale's head for an afternoon. — Steven Johnson

Were I to make the announcement and to run, the reasons I would run is because I have a great belief in this country [America] ... There's more natural resources than any nation in the world; the greatest education population in the world; the greatest technology of any country in the world; the greatest capacity for innovation in the world; and the greatest political system in the world. — Edward Kennedy

And then you take a look at Spaces, there is this great innovation that came out of nowhere. We have the number one blogging site in the world because of the innovation that's there. — Steve Ballmer

Innovators are pioneers, great problem-solvers; and creators of a better context. — Pearl Zhu

Great innovation only happens when people aren't afraid to do things differently. — Georg Cantor

Success doesn't necessarily come from breakthrough innovation but from flawless execution. A great strategy alone won't win a game or a battle; the win comes from basic blocking and tackling. — Naveen Jain

A great brand is a promise, a compact with a customer about quality, reliability, innovation, and even community. And while the concept of brand is intangible, brand equity is far from it. — Stephen B. Shepard

In the 1970s, what I, as a young foreign student studying in the United States, found most dynamic, exciting and impressive about this country is what much of the world continues to value most about the U.S. today: its open intellectual culture, its great universities, its capacity for discovery and innovation. — Ahmed Zewail

The successful companies try to keep the new entrants down. Now that's great for a company like ours. We make more money that way because we have less competition and less innovation. But for the country as a whole, it's horrible. — Charles Koch

Perhaps then one reason why we have no great poet, novelist or critic writing today is that we refuse to allow words their liberty. We pin them down to one meaning, their useful meaning: the meaning which makes us catch the train, the meaning which makes us pass the examination. — Virginia Woolf

is to read things that are not yet on the page. Edwin Land of Polaroid talked about the intersection of the humanities and science. I like that intersection. There's something magical about that place. There are a lot of people innovating, and that's not the main distinction of my career. The reason Apple resonates with people is that there's a deep current of humanity in our innovation. I think great artists and great engineers are similar, in that they both have a desire to express themselves. In fact some of the best people working on the original Mac were poets and musicians on the side. In the seventies computers became a way for people to express their creativity. Great artists like Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo were also great at science. Michelangelo knew a lot about how to quarry stone, not just how to be a sculptor. People pay us to integrate things for them, because they don't have the time to think about this stuff 24/7. If you have an extreme passion for producing — Walter Isaacson

Americans understand that one of our great national strengths is innovation. Great innovators - Benjamin Franklin, Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and others - are household names. — Robert Hormats

For all great innovations, someone took a risk. They risked capital; they risked their energy; they risked their opportunity cost; and more important, they risked failure. We can't innovate without the belief that we can succeed, the confidence that others will be there to help us on the journey, and the security that we will not be punished if we fail to reach our goal. A fast-moving world demands innovation for long-term success. — Dov Seidman

Technological innovation has done great damage ... to eating habits. Food is now available in such unpleasant forms that one frequently finds smoking between courses to be an aid to digestion. — Fran Lebowitz

When counting on learning from innovation, there are great successes but also failures. The Wright Brothers invented the aircraft and started an amazing process of innovation, where we now have planes that carry 500 passengers. Along the way there were some silly looking vehicles that crashed early on. — Sheldon Whitehouse

In the incongruous role of the insurgent party-builder, he made crystal clear the whole host of inferences we have drawn from the experiences of Monroe and Polk: that innovation, however orthodox, is inherently destabilizing; that the purely constructive leadership project is an illusion; that the affiliated leader cannot assume independent ground without ultimately embracing the role of the heretic; that the only way ever to be president in your own right is to become yourself a great repudiator and set yourself directly against the bulwark of received power; that political disruption parallels presidential significance. Roosevelt's insight was not simply that new achievements do not rest securely on old foundations, but that to save the handiwork of his presidency he would have to reconstruct its political base. — Stephen Skowronek

Most of the crackpot papers which are submitted to The Physical Review are rejected, not because it is impossible to understand them, but because it is possible. Those which are impossible to understand are usually published. When the great innovation appears, it will almost certainly be in a muddled, incomplete and confusing form. To the discoverer himself it will be only half-understood; to everybody else it will be a mystery. For any speculation which does not at first glance look crazy, there is no hope. — Freeman Dyson

I am a great believer in research and innovation. — Robert Mondavi

Edwin Land of Polaroid talked about the intersection of the humanities and science. I like that intersection. There's something magical about that place. There are a lot of people innovating, and that's not the main distinction of my career. The reason Apple resonates with people is that there's a deep current of humanity in our innovation. I think great artists and great engineers are similar in that they both have a desire to express themselves. In fact some of the best people working on the original Mac were poets and musicians on the side. In the seventies computers became a way for people to express their creativity. Great artists like Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo were also great art science. Michelangelo knew a lot about how to quarry stone, not just how to be a sculptor. — Walter Isaacson

Let's summarize. What is awesomeness? Awesomeness happens when thick - real, meaningful - value is created by people who love what they do, added to insanely great stuff, and multiplied by communities who are delighted and inspired because they are authentically better off. That's a better kind of innovation, built for 21st century economics. — Umair Haque

I want MIT to be the dream of every child who wants to grow up to make the world a better place. We need to reach those young explorers and bring them with us on the great adventure of discovery and innovation. — Susan Hockfield

I think 3D is a great innovation for the film business. But I hope it's not the thing that kills the golden egg because what's happening now is every movie there's pressure from the studio to turn it into a 3D movie. — Neal H. Moritz

In 1847 I gave an address at Newton, Mass., before a Teachers' Institute conducted by Horace Mann. My subject was grasshoppers. I passed around a large jar of these insects, and made every teacher take one and hold it while I was speaking. If any one dropped the insect, I stopped till he picked it up. This was at that time a great innovation, and excited much laughter and derision. There can be no true progress in the teaching of natural science until such methods become general. — Louis Agassiz

A great sports car that goes from 0-60 in 3.9 seconds is just a fact. To the wrong audience, it's irrelevant. But to the right audience, it's a passion. — David Brier

Burke, and the better men among his disciples, knew that change in society is natural, inevitable, and beneficial; the statesman should not struggle vainly to dam the whole stream of alteration, because then he would be opposing Providence; instead, his duty is to reconcile innovation and prescriptive truth, to lead the waters of novelty into the canals of custom. This accomplished, even though he may seem to himself to have failed, the conservative has executed his destined work in the great mysterious incorporation of the human race; and if he has not preserved intact the old ways he loved, still he has modified greatly the ugly aspect of the new ways. — Russell Kirk

Authentic leadership is at the root of cultures of great innovation, engagement, outstanding client experiences, and growth. — Henna Inam

Intuit's mission, values, and culture of innovation set us apart as a great place to work. Our 8,000 employees are innovators and entrepreneurs that are inspired by the important work they do that is delighting customers and improving the financial lives of millions of people. — Brad D. Smith

Inevitably, this is how Christianity has come to be understood by a great many good people who have no better instruction in it than they receive from ranters and politicians. Under such circumstances, it is only to their credit that they reject it. Though I am not competent to judge in such matters, it would not surprise me at all to learn in any ultimate reckoning that these "Nones" as they are called, for the box they check when asked their religion, are better Christians than the Christians. But they have not been given the chance even to reject the beautiful, generous heritage that might otherwise have come to them. The learned and uncantankerous traditions seem, as I have said, to have fallen silent, to have retreated within their walls to dabble in feckless innovation and to watch their numbers dwindle. — Marilynne Robinson

Demographics need not be destiny. The waning West became what it is not by out-breeding the undeveloped world. We were once great not because of huge numbers, but due to human capital people of superior ideas and abilities, capable of innovation, exploration, science, philosophy. — Ilana Mercer

The iPhone is made on a global scale, and it blends computers, the Internet, communications, and artificial intelligence in one blockbuster, game-changing innovation. It reflects so many of the things that our contemporary world is good at - indeed, great at. — Tyler Cowen

It's important to remember something: California is not a state built on moderation. We invented motion pictures. We made an electric sports car. We're both the brain (Silicon Valley) and the heart (Hollywood, alas) of this great nation, and meanwhile we grow everyone's strawberries. We're open to innovation. We're open to new ideas. We're open to odd couples - and to strays from all parts of the world. Look at our last governor: an Austrian body builder and son of a Nazi married to John F. Kennedy's niece. Anything can happen. — Scott Hutchins

Innovation requires having at least three things: a great idea, the engineering talent to execute it, and the business savvy (plus deal-making moxie) to turn it into a successful product. — Walter Isaacson

The cream of a generation was lost in the mud of Flanders. Etonians went over the top with the Illiad in their knapsacks and Athens in their hearts. To protest that such men were statistically not even a trace among the British soldiers killed is to miss the point. At all times the great majority of people have been ignorant of the classics; but the men who mattered; who governed, declared wars and resisted innovation have always had Latin and Greek. — William Donaldson

The Great Wall of Facebook:

Having just visited the Great Wall of China, I'm thinking about the walls we build on FB. They are real. They keep people in and others out.

Build your wall carefully by answering this question:

What are you building your wall around? — Richie Norton

The earliest lock gates moved vertically, subjecting them to great pressure and friction. Leonardo's innovation was paired mitered lock gates forming a V pointed in the direction of the higher water. Water was deflected to the sides when the gates were swung open, and pressure sealed the lock when the gates were closed. Over half a millennium later, canal locks are still built — Gerard Koeppel

Our lives are marked by the people who choose to matter more: the teacher who encouraged our curiosity, the neighbor who lent a helping hand in time of need, the great leaders and perceptive thinkers whose vision and innovation improve the quality of our lives. And that's what it means to matter more. It's not about pursuit of riches or fame. It's about making a difference in people's lives. Remembered or not, lived out in a small town or on the world stage, the journey of relevance matters. — Marian Deegan

If you look at America, one of the great strengths of America is its university towns and the way a lot of their businesses and a lot of their innovation and enormous economic growth have come from reducing that gap, getting those universities directly involved in start-up businesses, green field businesses, new development businesses. — Denis Napthine

Innovation comes out of great human ingenuity and very personal passions. — Megan Smith

My guess is the great majority of teachers would welcome a system where innovation is embraced, where their hard work and their students' achievement are applauded and rewarded. — Lionel Sosa

FIND YOUR WEIRD

Finding your weird is a lot like finding your voice. Although, your voice is more about your passion, your story, your way of communicating with the world.

Your weird is that thing you do that people would miss if you were gone.

Your weird is the thing that keeps your followers following you.

Your weird puts a smile on a face or an idea in a mind or money in your pocket.

Your weird is how we remember you.

What's your weird?

If you don't know, ask someone. Ask lots of people!

When you embrace your weird, you
love your life, share your story, meet new people, experience great things, freak yourself out, live on purpose, "save the whales," enjoy the moment.

Find your weird.

But first, breathe. — Richie Norton

Ten million dead. Gas. Passchendaele. Let that be now a large figure, now a chemical formula, now an historical account. But dear lord, not the Nameless Horror, the sudden prodigy sprung on a world unaware. We all saw it. There was no innovation, no special breach of nature, or suspension of familiar principles. If it came as any surprise to the public then their own blindness is the Great Tragedy, hardly the war itself. — Thomas Pynchon

There is a big push that we all are engaged in, in wanting to have the newest in innovation - and I think that's all really great. But I also feel that human beings need to be aware of, and grounded in, history. — Bill Viola

Our country is a place where hope can be born and great companies, organizations and non-profits can spring up from an idea birthed on the back of a coffee-shop napkin. — Todd Stocker

Long term, I have a lot of confidence in the United States. We have an excellent record in terms of innovation. We have great universities that are involved in technological change and progress. We have an entrepreneurial culture, much more than almost any other country. — Ben Bernanke

Innovation is this amazing intersection between someone's imagination and the reality in which they live. The problem is, many companies don't have great imagination, but their view of reality tells them that it's impossible to do what they imagine. — Ron Johnson

The momentum of all those wheels are too great for one person's passionate will. — K. Melissa Kennedy

In his first year in office, President Obama pulled us back from the brink of the greatest economic crisis since the Great Depression and worked to lay a new foundation for economic growth. The president identified three key strategies to build that lasting prosperity: innovation, investment, and education. — Tom Vilsack

You can create value with breakthrough innovation, incremental refinement, or complex coordination. Great companies often do two of these. The very best companies do all three. — Sam Altman

What's precious about somebody like Bill Vollmann is that, even though there's a great deal of formal innovation in his fictions, it rarely seems to exist for just its own sake. It's almost always deployed to make some point (Vollmann's the most editorial young novelist going right now, and he's great at using formal ingenuity to make the editorializing a component of his narrative instead of an interruption) or to create an effect that's internal to the text. His narrator's always weirdly effaced, the writing unself-conscious, despite all the "By-the-way-Dear-reader" intrusions. In a way it's sad that Vollmann's integrity is so remarkable. Its remarkability means it's rare — David Foster Wallace

Things like WhatsApp are a great example of success that others have had on Android, which we see as welcome innovation on the platform. — Sundar Pichai

Ever since Sir Isaac Newton's times, scientists have worked in the same sort of way: They show a great respect for experiment and observation, They don't cherry pick data, They take a skeptical approach to what they do. And then scientists work together to get a consensus as to what should be believed And that generates very reliable knowledge and that reliable knowledge drives innovation — Paul Nurse

I'm a great believer in the competitive system, and think that competition will bring us greater innovation and put American industry in information ahead of everyone also. — Harold H. Greene