Michael Schrage

Empiricism and the scientific method have had some positive impact on the practice of business. Most people recognize the market as a great external object of study, yet scientific impact on innovation is usually limited and relegated to the domain of hunches by analytic experts. For their part, business schools tend to crank out expert planners and analysts, but do not expressly delve into experimentation. Schrage thinks that is a mistake and writes this book to plead his case that experiments can drive innovation in the business world, much as it does in the sciences.

Empiricism as a practice functions as a core historic precept of the scientific method and continues to transform modern life. It simply means that theories/ideas need to be tested against reality for their truthfulness. Few have problems with this idea, and efforts to enact empiricism often expand into building useful and even revolutionary tools to do reality-checks. Even fields like psychology use this lingo in coaching clients how to approach life. Sometimes, humans believe deeply in their ideas, and experiments do not always prove those ideas to be completely correct.

Schrage thinks it’s time that the business world embrace such an ethic of experimentation. He, a PhD economist, tires of seeing businesses hide behind the analysis of MBAs instead of running inexpensive (“cheap”) tests to see if the market can bear such a practice. I am no businessperson, but in my field of software development, we often build slow so that we can quickly correct mistakes without misspending tens of thousands of dollars. Indeed, prototypes to test these reality often become the basis of the next innovation. Though no economic or management expert, it certainly makes good sense to me to expand this practice of hypothesis generation to business planning.

Of course, the devil is always in the details. The strength of this ethic lies in coming up with good hypotheses, itself an art-form. Many business schools churn out planners, not thinkers and experimenters. Implementing this ethic may require further education in order for such scientific thinking to become prevalent. I agree wholeheartedly with the sentiment that experiments trump analysis, but analysis is more prevalent because it’s easier. Scientific thinking is harder and more disciplined, but Schrage devotes the concluding chapters of this book to developing how this change can transpire. More thought and explanation could help businesses with this task because the potential is high.… (more)

I wanted to read this book because I frequently saw it cited in contemporary business and management books. It talks at length about how to foster creative collaboration through the use of technology. It presaged a vision of a workplace with abundant computerized interactions. More impressively, it did so without foreseeing most of the impact of the Internet.

Of course, the technologies described in this book are dated. Indeed, most of them are now in the domain of historians of technology. In the hindsight of history, it’s mostly right in that it references the right things – technologies that have since become a part of our daily lives. Still, reading this book for the technologies is probably a losing game because it’s outdated.

However, observing the powerful historical and interpersonal principles at work through technology makes a perusal of this book still relevant and worthwhile. Indeed, Schrage’s work is half-technology, but also half-behavior. Through example after example, he teaches us how to nurture and elicit certain behaviors of collaboration through the ways we communicate. That vision is philosophically lasting (and grounded in prior work done by Marshall McLuhan).

This work has relevance for those who, like me, have an interest in the history of technology. It also has value for business leaders who want to ignite more collaboration in their workplace. Everything from architecture to technologies is discussed. I was impressed with how much of Schrage’s vision has come reality thirty years later! Creative collaboration is an engine that drives much of the world economy, and this book, as no other does, points us in how to harness its profound forces for lasting results.… (more)

Michael Schrage provides a methodology for running creative experiments to produce high-impact innovations quickly, simply, and with less expense. This is an innovation process meant for the quick-moving business world of the 21st century. Schrage describes a team process that generates quick results to allow for quick decision making. This is not a process involving surveys and elaborate market research. Schrage’s methodology is about discovering what actually works and what doesn’t. He admits that not all executives are ready to embrace his methodology. The established R&D mindset that embraces elaborate planning and analysis is deeply embedded in organizational thinking. Schrage provides many examples, however, of cutting-edge companies that have adopted the cheap experiment approach and are prospering as a result. Schrage provides an innovation approach for those ready to jettison outdated methodologies and to compete in the 21st century.… (more)