A free companion
to Innovation on Tap
© Eric B. Schultz, 2020
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Innovation
on Tap is written for any reader interested in exploring the history of entrepreneurship
in America.
But the book
also includes features designed to help modern entrepreneurs improve their
innovation and leadership skills. The
set of questions below has been developed to highlight these ideas for both entrepreneurs
working through the book individually or as a team, and for instructors using
chapters as case studies.
One issue
highlighted in the chapter on Eli Whitney, for example, wonders how a New
England native and liberal arts graduate who had never seen a cotton plant was
able to solve, in a matter of months, a mechanization problem that had stumped
industry insiders for a century. Likewise,
the story of King Camp Gillette goes to the heart of how strong personal
networks are necessary, but ancillary “weak” networks can be pivotal to
success. And the chapter on Elizabeth
Arden asks if it is ethical to sell a product that provides value but does not work, at least as advertised.
Entrepreneurs
will likely find many other issues worth exploring, but the questions offered
below should be a good start to profiting from the ideas captured by Innovation
on Tap.
Corrections
and additions are always welcome. Please
contact me at ericbschultz@gmail.com.
To download a PDF version of this guide, click here. (If this link does not work, please email me and I will send you a copy of the PDF.)
Contents
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
1.
The value of education: Whitney’s career
as an entrepreneur may never have required the Latin and Greek taught to him at
Yale, but this collegiate network proved invaluable to his success. There has been much written about the value
of a liberal arts education in a STEM world, and about the value of college in
general to an entrepreneur.
How do you assess the worth of such
an intangible in your life? How has it
influenced development of your community?
What advice would you give to a “modern Eli Whitney” who is gifted at
software coding and wonders if pursuing his degree would be worth the time and
money?
·
“Peter Thiel Pays Students to Drop Out of
School,” September 4, 2015, https://www.popsci.com/article/science/why-peter-thiel-pays-students-drop-out-school/
·
Gregory Ferenstein, “Thiel Fellows Program Is
‘Most Misdirected Piece Of Philanthropy,’ Says Larry Summers,” TechCrunch,
2013, Verizon Media, 2013–2019, https://techcrunch.com/2013/10/10/thiel-fellows-program-is-most-misdirected-piece-of-philanthropy-says-larry-summers/
·
Ilana Kowarski, “How Having an MBA on Your
Resume Affects Your Career,” US News and World Report, February 4, 2019,
https://www.usnews.com/education/best-graduate-schools/top-business-schools/articles/2019-02-04/how-having-an-mba-on-your-resume-affects-your-career-prospects
2.
How innovation arises: Innovation on
Tap suggests that Whitney’s invention of the cotton gin was “as close to a
‘flash of genius’ as exists in the annual of invention.” But there may have been precedent in the
form of a paper/pulp-making machine he saw on route to his first job in South
Carolina. The question of how innovation
arises has received considerable attention in the last generation. In the reader’s experience, how does
innovation form?
·
Scott Berkun, “The Ten Myths of Innovation: The
Best Summary,” Scott Berkun, March 26, 2013, https://scottberkun.com/2013/ten-myths-of-innnovation/
·
Malcolm Gladwell, “Who Says Big Ideas Are Rare?,”,
New Yorker, May 5, 2005, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/05/12/in-the-air
The other remarkable piece to
the Whitney story is how a person who had never seen a cotton plant and had no
experience in processing cotton could solve a problem in a matter of months
that had plagued farmers for a century. Even
today, some historians are unwilling to give Whitney credit for his invention,
feeling certain that he must have borrowed or stolen the idea from
elsewhere. How are outsiders able to
make such extraordinary leaps of innovation?
·
Karim R. Lakhani and Lars Bo Jeppesen, “Getting
Unusual Suspects to Solve R&D Puzzles,” Harvard Business Review, May
2007, https://hbr.org/2007/05/getting-unusual-suspects-to-solve-rd-puzzles
·
Henry Chesbrough, “R&D Through Open
Innovation,” TECH & INNOVATION, May 19, 2003 / Summer 2003 / Issue 31
(originally published by Booz & Company), https://www.strategy-business.com/article/21626?gko=c2045
·
Lori Valigra, “’Proudly Found Elsewhere’: The
Move to Distributed R&D,” Update from University of Warwick,
Science|Business Network, March 1, 2006, https://sciencebusiness.net/news/73911/%27Proudly-Found-Elsewhere%27%3A-the-move-to-distributed-R%26amp%3BD
3.
The value of patents: In a lifetime of
innovation, Whitney applied for and received one patent, the ill-fated issue
for his cotton gin. After a decade of
battling to defend this intellectual property, he gave up on the patent
process, preferring instead to secure contacts, innovate quickly, and allow
others to copy his practices if they were able.
Why or why not is this still a good strategy? Under what conditions does patenting make
sense today?
·
Shantal Erlich, “Should You Patent Your App?,” Kommbea
Inc., December 7, 2018, https://www.koombea.com/blog/should-you-patent-your-app/
·
Oliver E. Allen, “The Power of Patents,” American
Heritage, September/October 1990, https://www.americanheritage.com/power-patents
·
Allison, John R. and Lemley, Mark A. and Moore,
Kimberly A. and Trunkey, Robert Derek, “Valuable Patents.” Georgetown Law
Journal, Vol. 92, p. 435, 2004; George Mason Law & Economics Research
Paper No. 03-31; UC Berkeley Public Law Research Paper No. 133. Available at
SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=426020
4.
Choosing the business model: Whitney and
his partner, Phineas Miller, chose an outsourced business model for their
cotton gin that seemed ideal for their market, yet it failed almost from the
start. Why? What might they have done differently? What lessons might an entrepreneur take from
their experience?
·
Joan Magretta, “Why Business Models Matter,” Harvard
Business Review, May 2002, https://hbr.org/2002/05/why-business-models-matter
·
Kay Plante, “Why Business Model Innovation is
Critically Important Today,” Innovation Management, May 29, 2011, https://innovationmanagement.se/imtool-articles/why-business-model-innovation-is-critically-important-today/
·
Mark W. Johnson, “Digital Growth Depends More on
Business Models Than Technology,” Harvard Business Review, December 14,
2018, https://hbr.org/2018/12/digital-growth-depends-more-on-business-models-than-technology
5.
The role of “lying”: Whitney relied
heavily on government funding to construct his arms factory in
Connecticut. In the process of securing
an extension and new funding, he may have “lied” to government officials about
his ability to manufacture standardized parts.
Do you believe he did? Why or why
not were his questionable statements warranted?
When can or should an entrepreneur lie, if ever? What similar situation, if any, have you
faced?
·
Daniel Isenberg, “Should Entrepreneurs Lie?”,
HBR Blog Network, April 8, 2010, https://hbr.org/2010/04/is-it-ok-for-entrepreneurs-lie
·
Gideon Lewis-Kraus, “One Startup’s Struggle to
Survive the Silicon Valley Gold Rush,” Wired.com, April 22, 2014, https://www.wired.com/2014/04/no-exit/
·
Guy Kawasaki, “The Top Ten Lies of
Entrepreneurs,” The Harvard Business Review, from the January 2001
issue, https://hbr.org/2001/01/the-top-ten-lies-of-entrepreneurs
·
Rebekah Campbell, “The Large Cost of Small
Lies,” Financial Review, June 30, 2016, http://rebekahcampbell.com/large-cost-small-lies/
·
“When Lying is ‘A Business Plan,’”, MSNBC, April
17, 2012, http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/when-lying-business-plan
6.
The question of focus: Whitney was a
northern farmer, born in a state that had abolished slavery by the time he
turned 18 years old. His family did not
own slaves. It is unlikely that any of
his neighbors did. When Whitney traveled
to South Carolina and invented the cotton gin, however, he saw first-hand the
cruelty and depravity of a slave-based economy—yet he never once wrote about it
in his correspondence or papers. Why do
you think? What obligation, if any, does a driven, focused entrepreneur have to
the world beyond making his innovation a success?
·
“Bitcoin’s Climate Impact is Global. The Cures
Are Local.,” Wired, Condé Nast, June 12, 2019, https://www.wired.com/story/bitcoins-climate-impact-global-cures-local/
·
Tad Friend, “How Frightened Should We Be of AI,”
New Yorker, May 7, 2018, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/05/14/how-frightened-should-we-be-of-ai
2: Oliver Ames
1.
The advantage of context: Oliver Ames
operated his shovel business during America’s decades-long transportation
revolution, providing his enterprise a lifetime of skyrocketing demand, from
toll roads and canals to the growth of railroads. Whenever America went to war, the demand for
Ames shovels also spiked. How important
a role does context play in an entrepreneur’s success? What are other examples?
- It’s interesting to group the richest Americans in history by their birthdates to see if there are patterns that suggest the role of time, place, and context on the ability to amass wealth. See Brian Warner, “The 40 Richest Americans Of All Time—Inflation Adjusted,” Celebrity Net Worth, July 4, 2015, https://www.celebritynetworth.com/articles/entertainment-articles/30-richest-americans-time-inflation-adjusted/
- Besides the transportation revolution, America has witnessed a communications revolution (telegraph, telephone, web), an entertainment revolution (movies, radio, television, cable, web), and a computer/digital revolution. You may be able to think of others. How have entrepreneurs benefited from each of these? From the point of view of innovation, were there lucky and unlucky times to be born in America? See Benjamin Wallace-Wells, “The Blip,” New Yorker, July 19, 2013 http://nymag.com/news/features/economic-growth-2013-7/: “The forces of the second industrial revolution, he believes, were so powerful and so unique that they will not be repeated.”
2.
The value of interning: Ames’s first job
experience was at the Springfield Armory, the epicenter of American innovation
in the early republic. As a young man he
met some of the finest craftsmen in the country and was exposed to cutting-edge
ideas about mechanization and interchangeable parts. How did this experience impact his future
shovel business? What other “schools for
entrepreneurs” exist today, and at other times in American history?
3.
Entrepreneurship and fragility: Ames, and
Whitney before him, experienced devastating fires, loss at sea, entire cities
abandoned to yellow fever, and workforces sidelined by seasonal epidemics. With the advent of insurance, improved
transportation, and modern medicine, these threats have been mitigated. What factors today create “fragility” for a
modern entrepreneur, and how are these threats mitigated?
3: Against the Odds
1.
Individuals that embody innovation: Innovation
on Tap makes the case that William Grimes, by virtue of being a person of
color operating in a world dominated by whites, is a living example of
Schumpeter’s “novel combination.” Do you
agree? Katherine Graham of the
Washington Post (The Post Co.) became the first female of a Fortune 500 company
in 1972, and Ursula Burns of Xerox the first African American female CEO of a
Fortune 500 company in 2009. Do you see any parallels in what the three
individuals might have faced in the workplace?
2.
The power of community: How did community
impact the career of William Grimes?
Compare Grimes’s experience to Whitney’s and, in chapter 4, King
Gillette’s.
3.
The place of social good: Both Thomas
Downing and James Forten used their wealth and position in the black community
to work to abolish slavery and fight for the rights of people of color. Did their choices enhance or distract from
their core businesses? Under what
circumstances should entrepreneurs “stick to the knitting” of their primary
businesses (see Whitney above) and under what circumstances should they use
their positions to advance a social agenda?
4.
Ahead of their times: James Forten’s
career was made possible by his Quaker friend, Robert Bridges, and the greater
Quaker community in Philadelphia. What
are modern parallels, when a community “ahead of its time” has helped to
inspire and support the success of an entrepreneur?
Discussion:
·
Michelle Ma, “This Venture Capital Firm Wants to
Hear From You,” Wall Street Journal, July 18, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/this-venture-capital-firm-wants-to-hear-from-you-11563458340?&mod=djemfoe
Note on Entrepreneurs of Color: Entrepreneurs
starting their careers in 1900 found 1 out of 8 Americans to be a race other
than white. A century later,
entrepreneurs found 1 in 4,[1] with
many entrepreneurs themselves being people of color.
Today’s demographers expect that
whites will no longer be a racial majority in America by about 2040.[2] This trend was foreshadowed in the 2000 US
Census when more people identified as “two or more races” than any other single
race,[3] and
in 2011 when more minority babies than white were born in America for the first
time.[4] Today’s entrepreneurs live in a country where
the traditional concept of majority “white America” is vanishing.
A report by the National Urban
League calculates an “equality index” made up of economic, health, education,
social justice, and civic engagement components intended to measure the
progress of Black Americans in the US.
In 2018, the index stood at 72.5 percent, meaning, the report explained,
that “rather than having a whole pie (100%), which would mean full equality
with whites in 2018, African Americans are missing about 28% of the pie.”[5] The median African American household income,
for example, was $38,555 compared to $63,155 for white households.
The 2018 report places special
focus on the digital revolution and its potential to enhance equality. Blacks were excluded from the advance of farm
technology in the nineteenth century because of slavery and its aftermath,
National Urban League President Marc H. Morial writes. When the Industrial Revolution brought
advances to transportation and manufacturing, “African Americans—once
again—found themselves on the outside looking in.” Today, Blacks are enthusiastic consumers of
digital technology but grossly underrepresented in the digital workforce, composing
just 1.8 percent of the combined workforces of Google, Facebook, and
Twitter.
A 2017 study of nearly 190,000 tech
employees in Silicon Valley concludes that race is a greater impediment than
gender to promotion in Silicon Valley.[6] Morial sees the promise of the digital age to
right historical wrongs, but only if the nation is willing to “strategically
leverage this moment for broader goals of justice, equity and economic
opportunity.”[7]
No group in the twenty-first
century faces steeper barriers in the workplace than women of color, who
represent 17 percent of entry-level positions but just 12 percent of manager-level
and 3 percent of executive-suite positions.[8] In 2016, there were only 88 US-based, Black
women-led tech start-ups[9] of
almost 18,000 total.
America’s Hispanic population has
been increasing rapidly and represents a force onto itself. In 1980, Hispanics constituted 6.4 percent of
the US population, growing to 13.5 percent in 2002 when, for the first time, the
Hispanic population in America surpassed the 12.7 percent who identified as
African Americans.[10] Most of America’s Hispanic population are
legal residents, and recent growth has come primarily from births, not
immigration.[11] Demographers believe that by 2060, America’s
Hispanic population could be 30 percent of the total US population.[12] With a forecast of some 400 million US
citizens by then, the Hispanic-American population at mid-twenty-first century
could be equal to or larger than today’s Mexico.
With size comes economic
clout. Hispanic buying power in the US
in 2015 was already equal to the gross domestic products of Mexico, the
Dominican Republic, Guatemala, and El Salvador combined.[13] However, there remains a sizeable economic
gap between the opportunities afforded Hispanic and white Americans. The National Urban League’s “equality index”
for American Hispanics is 79.3 percent, suggesting that, as a group, Hispanics
are missing move than 20 percent of the economic, education, and civic
engagement pie.[14] A study by the Brookings Institute reports
that Hispanics had increased their presence in occupations related to computers
and math from 5.5 percent in 2002 to only 6.8 percent in 2016, which represents
some progress but well below their 16.7 percent representation in the
workforce.[15]
Research on team and company
performance shows the importance of diversity.
The top quartile of public companies for racial and ethnic diversity in
management were 35 percent more likely to have financial returns above their
industry mean.[16] Research conducted by professor Sahil Raina
shows that venture capital firms with female partners are richly rewarded;
their superiority in selecting and advising women-led start-ups results in “a
whopping 25 percentage-point difference” in successful exits.[17] Mixed gender teams have been found to be
more generous, build stronger work processes, create more meaningful
relationships, and generate more sales and profits than all-male teams.[18] And organizations that are gender and
racially diverse process information more carefully, are more willing to
challenge one another, and are more innovative.
Every percentage-point increase in diversity, one study suggests, can
lead to a three-point increase in revenue, or $400 billion dollars annually.[19]
4: King Gillette
1.
The anxious entrepreneur: King Gillette
demonstrates a dual personality, one that seemed to embrace both capitalism and
socialist utopia at the same time. His
biographer, Russell R. Adams, jokes that it’s as if Karl Marx paused after
writing The Communist Manifesto to develop a dissolving toothbrush. What signals did this contradiction seem to
send to people around Gillette? How did
it hurt or help his entrepreneurial efforts?
What are instances today where entrepreneurs have spoken out about social
causes in ways that impact their businesses and careers?
·
David Gelles, “How the Social Mission of Ben
& Jerry’s Survived Being Gobbled Up,” The New York Times, August 21,
2015, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/23/business/how-ben-jerrys-social-mission-survived-being-gobbled-up.html
·
Oliver Balch, “Patagonia Founder Yvon Chouinard:
‘Denying climate change is evil’,” The Guardian, May 10, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/may/10/yvon-chouinard-patagonia-founder-denying-climate-change-is-evil
2.
The nature of community: How did Gillette
and his eventual partner, William Emery Nickerson, come to meet? What does this circumstance teach about the
nature of community?
·
Eileen Brown, “Strong and Weak Ties: Why Your
Weak Ties Matter,” Social Media Today, June 30, 2011, https://www.socialmediatoday.com/content/strong-and-weak-ties-why-your-weak-ties-matter
3.
The myths of business: Gillette gets
credit for a razor-and-razor-blades business model that he did not invent and
that his company did not practice until its patents on the manufacture of
disposable blades expired. What does
this example say about the nature of myth in business? What other myths influence modern
entrepreneurs?
·
Kaitlyn Tiffany, “The Absurd Quest to Make the
‘Best” Razor,” Vox, December 11, 2018, Web August 29, 2019, https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2018/12/11/18134456/best-razor-gillette-harrys-dollar-shave-club
·
Pino G. Audia and Christopher I. Rider, “A
Garage and an Idea: What More Does an Entrepreneur Need?,” California
Management Review, Vol. 48, No. 1, Fall 2005, https://mba.tuck.dartmouth.edu/pages/faculty/pino.audia/docs/garage%20myth%20CMR.pdf
·
Jill Lepore, “The Disruption Machine: What the
Gospel of Innovation Gets Wrong,” The New Yorker, June 16, 2014, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/06/23/the-disruption-machine
5: Mary Elizabeth Evans Sharpe
1.
Moving ahead of regulations: Mary
Elizabeth began making homemade candy, in part, because the manufacture of
store candy was unregulated, and product could be adulterated and dangerous to
consumers. What are other examples where
entrepreneurs have taken advantage of perceived unhealthy, dangerous, or unsustainable
practices by offering better product, even when regulations did not require it?
·
Clare O’Conner, “How Jessica Alba Built A $1
Billion Company, And $200 Million Fortune, Selling Parents Peace Of Mind,” Forbes,
June 15, 2015, https://www.forbes.com/sites/clareoconnor/2015/05/27/how-jessica-alba-built-a-1-billion-company-and-200-million-fortune-selling-parents-peace-of-mind/#103f569542b4
and, what happens if the brand does not live up to its promise: Julia Horowitz,
“Jessica Alba's The Honest Company Can’t Catch a Break,” CNN Business, June
12, 2017, https://money.cnn.com/2017/06/12/news/companies/honest-company-problems/index.html
·
Deena Shanker, Lydia Mulvany, Mike Hytha, and
Bloomberg, “Beyond Meat Just Had the Best IPO of 2019 as Value Soars to $3.8
Billion,” Fortune, May 2, 2019, https://fortune.com/2019/05/02/beyond-meat-ipo-stock-price/
2.
Defining courage: Mary Elizabeth found
the act of meeting customers to be difficult.
“I felt,” she wrote, “like I was just a tiny little any in a great big
world.” Alfred Sloan had a similar
feeling. Have you ever felt this
way? What is courage, and how does it play
a role in entrepreneurship?
·
Jenna McGregor, “Introverts Tend to Be Better CEOs—And
Other Surprising Traits of Top-Performing Executives,” Washington Post, April
17, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/on-leadership/wp/2017/04/17/introverts-tend-to-be-better-ceos-and-other-surprising-traits-of-top-performing-executives/?utm_term=.a6190a46de60
3.
Brand vs. reality: Mary Elizabeth
cultivated a homespun brand while employing modern automation and
organizational practices to scale her business.
What are other examples where consumer brand and backroom operations are
so different? What customer risks might
this brand vs. reality contrast present?
·
Andy Meek, “Former Executive Shares The Secrets
To How Disney Runs Its Empire,” Fast Company, January 27, 2015, https://www.fastcompany.com/3041284/former-executive-shares-the-secrets-to-how-disney-runs-its-empire
6: John Merrick
1.
The “third place”: John Merrick gets his
start in a barbershop in Durham, North Carolina, a setting that sociologist Ray
Oldenburg calls a “third place.” How
does a “third place” work to inspire innovation and support entrepreneurs? What “third places” have you taken advantage
of to build your career?
·
Matthew Dollinger, “Starbucks, ‘The Third
Place’, and Creating the Ultimate Customer Experience,” Fast Company,
June 11, 2008, https://www.fastcompany.com/887990/starbucks-third-place-and-creating-ultimate-customer-experience
·
Stuart M. Butler and Carmen Diaz, “’Third places’
As Community Builders,” Brookings, September 14, 2016, https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2016/09/14/third-places-as-community-builders/
2.
The value of charisma: When one of
Merrick’s employees decides to quit, Merrick convinces him to stay. Describe the situation. What happened? How did it happen? What does the fact that the employee spoke
with Merrick about quitting before he made the decision say about Merrick’s
style? What lessons do you take away
from this story?
·
Ronald E Riggio Ph.D., “Charisma: What Is It? Do
You Have It?”, Psychology Today, February 15, 2010, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/cutting-edge-leadership/201002/charisma-what-is-it-do-you-have-it
·
Fabiola H. Gerpott and Alfred Kieser,
“Charismatic: A Second-Order Surveillance of the Self-Reinforcing Entrepreneurial
Ideology,” May 22, 2017, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/317203597_It's_not_charisma_that_makes_extraordinarily_successful_entrepreneurs_but_extraordinary_success_that_makes_entrepreneurs_charismatic_A_second-order_observation_of_the_self-reinforcing_entrepreneurial_(can
be downloaded as PDF)
3.
Economic power: Discuss the ways that
Merrick used his economic muscle to improve the social conditions of black
Americans in Durham and throughout the American South. Merrick believed that economic power was the
key to political power. Do you agree or
disagree, and why?
·
Buttonwood, “Where Economic Power Goes,
Political Power Will Follow,” The Economist, November 6, 2017, https://www.economist.com/buttonwoods-notebook/2017/11/06/where-economic-power-goes-political-power-will-follow
7: Willis Carrier
1.
Thinking small: Carrier’s introduction to
the science of air conditioning came about when he tried to solve the problems
of humidity in a small, Brooklyn, New York, printing plant. Today, HVAC is a global, multibillion-dollar
industry. Modern entrepreneurs are often
told that they must “think big” about the future. Carrier thought small about the present. Can you think of other instances when
“thinking small about the present” led to longer-term, fundamental, global
change? In what ways is “thinking big” a
myth of entrepreneurship.
·
“Transcript and Video of Speech by Sheryl
Sandberg, Chief Operating Officer, Facebook,” Barnard College Commencement, May
17, 2011, New York City, https://alumnae.smith.edu/smithcms/europe/files/2014/04/Sandberg_Barnard-Commencement-2011.pdf
2.
Becoming the “father of”: What actions
did Carrier take to earn the “Father of Modern Air Conditioning” title? What are other examples of someone becoming
known as the “Father of” an invention?
Do you agree that such a title is justified? Why or why not? (And why are there not many “Mother of”
titles conferred?)
·
Stephen Jay Gould, “The Creation Myths of
Cooperstown,” Natural History, November 1989, https://www.naturalhistorymag.com/picks-from-the-past/02484/the-creation-myths-of-cooperstown
·
(Also above😊 Malcolm Gladwell, “Who Says Big Ideas Are
Rare?,”, New Yorker, May 5, 2005, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/05/12/in-the-air
3.
The nature of luck: Carrier and his
partner, J.I. Lyle, launched Carrier Engineering Corporation at the start of
World War I, a time filled with potential commercial disaster. Yet, they succeeded. What role did luck play? What role does luck play more generally in
entrepreneurship? Can an entrepreneur
improve his luck and, if so, how?
·
Diego Liechti, Claudio Loderer, and Urs Peyer, “Luck
and Entrepreneurial Success,” 2014, SSRN
Electronic Journal, 10.2139/ssrn.2476839, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/323984961_Luck_and_Entrepreneurial_Success
4.
From industrial to consumer: The pivot of
air conditioning from the factory floor to consumer applications represented a
complete rethinking of the product. What
factors brought this about? Why was it
successful? What risk did it hold for
Carrier’s established industrial lines?
8: Charles “Buddy” Bolden
1.
The nature of innovation communities:
Compare the world of New Orleans in 1900 to Detroit in 1920 and Silicon Valley in 2000.
How did each community nurture innovation and support entrepreneurs? From what weaknesses did each community
suffer?
·
AnnaLee Saxenian, “Inside Out: Regional
Networks and Industrial Adaptation in Silicon Valley and Route 128,” Cityscape:
A Journal of Policy Development and Research, Volume 2, Number 2, May 1996,
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/c199/4a53f305bd2affd052f72d9cd24b7a7075c2.pdf
·
Steven Klepper, “The Origin and Growth of
Industry Clusters: The Making of Silicon Valley and Detroit,” Journal of
Urban Economics, Volume 67, Issue 1, January 2010, 15-32, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0094119009000655?via%3Dihub
2.
The nature of genius: What, if anything,
made Bolden a musical “genius”? What was
the downside of his prodigious talent? What
are other examples can you think where tortured genius has generated
innovation?
·
Nick Romeo, “What is a Genius?,” The Daily
Beast, November 9, 2013, https://www.thedailybeast.com/what-is-a-genius?ref=scroll
·
Walter Isaacson “The Genius of Jobs,” New
York Times Sunday Review, October 29, 2011, https://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/opinion/sunday/steve-jobss-genius.html
·
Gilbert King, “The Rise and Fall of Nikola Tesla
and his Tower,” Smithsonianmag.com, February 4, 2013, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-rise-and-fall-of-nikola-tesla-and-his-tower-11074324/
9: Elizabeth Arden
1.
Customer trust: Arden sold products that
she may have known did not work. Yet, it
appears her customers did not care or were convinced otherwise. In your opinion, is it ethical to sell
products that you believe do not perform as promised? Can you think of other examples where entrepreneurs
have sold products they knew were ineffective or harmful?
·
Charlotte Markey, “5 Lies from the Diet
Industry,” Psychology Today, January 21, 2015, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/smart-people-don-t-diet/201501/5-lies-the-diet-industry
·
Lindsay Goldwert, “Skechers Must Pay $40
Million For Lying to Consumers About Benefits of Shape-Ups ‘Toning’ Shoes, New
York Daily News, May 16, 2012, https://www.nydailynews.com/life-style/health/skechers-pay-40-million-lying-consumers-benefits-shape-ups-toning-shoes-article-1.1079202
·
Tom Peter, “Tom Peters True Confessions,” Fast
Company, November 30, 2001, https://www.fastcompany.com/44077/tom-peterss-true-confessions
2.
The nature of leadership: Arden was a
perfectionist and micromanager. She
could also be a bully. (This description might also apply to Oliver Ames and
Steve Jobs.) Yet, she was wildly
successful and her people were loyal.
How do you explain this? What are
the advantages and disadvantages to such a leadership style?
·
David Aaker, “Steve Jobs and The Bobby Knight
School of Leadership,” Harvard Business Review, March 13, 2012, https://hbr.org/2012/03/steve-jobs-and-the-bobby-knigh
3.
Catching a wave: Just as Oliver Ames
leveraged America’s transportation revolution to sell shovels, Arden leveraged
a consumer revolution. Describe this
consumer revolution. Was Arden a force
behind the revolution, a beneficiary of the revolution, or both? What are other examples of entrepreneurs
taking advantage of large-scale changes in the industrial or consumer worlds to
grow their businesses?
·
Natalie Wolchover, “The Real Skinny: Expert
Traces America's Thin Obsession,” Live Science, January 26, 2012, https://www.livescience.com/18131-women-thin-dieting-history.html
·
Christine Miao, “Why You Don’t Care About
Internet Privacy. (And Why You Need To.),” Medium, May 24, 2018, https://medium.com/@christinemiao/you-dont-care-about-internet-privacy-you-should-7b16ef2fcc71
10: J. K. Milliken:
1.
The invasiveness of work: Milliken
constructed a town around his cloth-bleaching factory that was described as an
extension of the factory. In what ways
do modern companies, both manufacturing and knowledge-based organizations,
“extend their factories” into the lives of their employees? Is this a good or bad thing, and why?
·
Pullman was an iconic company town in
America. See “A Brief Overview of the
Pullman Story,” NPS.gov, Web July 22, 2019, https://www.nps.gov/pull/learn/historyculture/a-brief-overview-of-the-pullman-story.htm
·
Elizabeth C. Tippett, “This Is the Real
Cost of Company Perks and Benefits,” Fast Company, April 28, 2019, https://www.fastcompany.com/90340966/this-is-the-real-cost-of-company-perks-and-benefits
2.
Differing perspectives: The celebration
that Mount Hope Finishing threw for its customers and employees in 1951 was
intended to improve the company’s fortunes.
Employees saw something different, however. What happened? How do the “good works” of management
sometimes go awry? What might the
company have done differently?
3.
A changing employee landscape: It can be
argued that Milliken was consistent across fifty years in his employee
practices. Yet, what employees in 1901
would tolerate was different than what employees in 1951 would tolerate. What had changed? What signs might Milliken have missed? In your opinion, could Milliken have
adapted? What signposts do you feel
modern organizations need to monitor to ensure they do not miss radical changes
in the employee landscape?
·
Kristen Bialik and Richard Fry, “Millennial
Life: How Young Adulthood Today Compares With Prior Generations,” Pew Research
Center, February 14, 2019, https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/essay/millennial-life-how-young-adulthood-today-compares-with-prior-generations/
11: Alfred Sloan
1.
Being an introvert: Sloan was a lifelong
introvert--nothing like the stereotypical entrepreneur—yet he was effective and
successful. Was he successful because he
was an introvert, or despite being an introvert, or both?
2.
Explaining innovation communities: Some
people look to regional advantage to explain the rise of an innovation
community. Others look to the power of
spin-offs. Compare the two theories. Are both credible? Are they mutually exclusive?
·
AnnaLee Saxenian, “Inside Out: Regional
Networks and Industrial Adaptation in Silicon Valley and Route 128,” Cityscape:
A Journal of Policy Development and Research, Volume 2, Number 2, May 1996,
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/c199/4a53f305bd2affd052f72d9cd24b7a7075c2.pdf
·
Steven Klepper, “The Origin and Growth of
Industry Clusters: The Making of Silicon Valley and Detroit,” Journal of
Urban Economics, Volume 67, Issue 1, January 2010, 15-32, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0094119009000655?via%3Dihub
3.
The nature of memory: Henry Ford remains
one of the best-known entrepreneurs in history.
Alfred Sloan, who could have put Ford out of business (had he not wanted
to invite scrutiny by regulators) was as important to consumerism as Ford was
to mass production—yet is often forgotten.
Why are some extraordinary talents remembered and others not?
·
Chuck Klosterman, “Which Rock Star Will
Historians of the Future Remember?,” The New York Times Magazine, May
23, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/29/magazine/which-rock-star-will-historians-of-the-future-remember.html
·
Brandon Griggs, “Gladwell: In 50 Years, People
Will Forget Steve Jobs,” CNN Business, June 9, 2012, https://www.cnn.com/2012/06/08/tech/innovation/gladwell-jobs-gates/index.html
4.
The most successful: Make a case for or
against the idea that Alfred Sloan was the most successful entrepreneur in
America ever. What constitutes
“success”? Who else might challenge Sloan
for the title of “most successful American entrepreneur ever”? Why?
·
John Light, “The 25 Most Important Entrepreneurs
of the Past 25 Years,” Worth,
March 31, 2017, https://www.worth.com/25-entrepreneurs-25-years/
12: Branch Rickey
1.
Analytics driving decisions: Branch Rickey used analytics to assess his
pool of baseball talent, sometimes leading him to trade popular players in
moves that made him unpopular with fans. What are modern examples, from sports or in
business, where management has been willing to make the right decision for
their business despite it being unpopular with their customers? What are examples of when management has relied
on analytics to make the wrong decision?
·
Matt Day, “How Microsoft Emerged From the
Darkness to Embrace the Cloud,” The Seattle Times, December 12, 2016, https://www.seattletimes.com/business/technology/how-microsoft-emerged-from-darkness-to-embrace-the-cloud/
·
Uri
Friedman, “SunChips: A Brief History of a Packaging Disaster,” The Atlantic,
February 24, 2011, https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/02/sunchips-a-brief-history-of-a-packaging-disaster/342114/
·
Julia Curley, “McDonald's Just Changed Its Apple
Pie Recipe and People Are Not Happy About It,” Today, September 19,
2018, Web August 29, 2019, https://www.today.com/food/mcdonald-s-changes-apple-pie-recipe-people-are-upset-t137482.
·
Tim Murphy, “New Coke Didn’t Fail. It Was
Murdered,” Mother Jones, July 9, 2019, https://www.motherjones.com/food/2019/07/what-if-weve-all-been-wrong-about-what-killed-new-coke/?gclid=CjwKCAjwmtDpBRAQEiwAC6lm45O1RdEhK8JZbID8KMGtd5ADA9isDWvWyypN5R61EoL4aW-RBrXt4RoCZsYQAvD_BwE
2.
Profit or prophet: Together, Rickey and
Jackie Robinson integrated Major League Baseball. Assess Rickey’s motivations. Was he attempting to do good, make money, or
both? Do you care? Why? What
are modern examples where doing good and doing well complement one another?
·
K. Aleisha Fetters, “Why Ecotourism Is
Booming,” U.S. New and World Report LP, November 16, 2017, https://travel.usnews.com/features/why-ecotourism-is-booming
·
Entrepreneur Staff, “10 Companies That Are Doing
Good While Doing Well,” Entrepreneur, May 31, 2018, https://www.entrepreneur.com/slideshow/313598
13: Stephen Mather
1.
Something from nothing: Stephen Mather
was gifted at generating interest and revenue (“going viral”) from promotions
that required little investment. Who are
other modern entrepreneurs who have accomplished similar feats? What other products
have been successful with minimal traditional marketing investment? What
lessons can you learn?
·
Nidhi Dave, “Top 3 Viral Marketing Campaigns to
Take Inspiration From,” SEMRush blog, March 9, 2018, https://www.semrush.com/blog/viral-marketing-campaign-inspiration/
2.
Preservation vs. conservation: Describe
the difference. When is each
appropriate? Where is this debate
playing out today?
·
Robert Hudson Westover, “Conservation versus
Preservation?”, U.S. Forest Service, March 22nd, 2016, https://www.fs.fed.us/features/conservation-versus-preservation
·
“Revisiting Leopold: Resource Stewardship in the
National Parks,” A Report of the National Park System Advisory Board Science
Committee, August 25, 2012, http://npshistory.com/publications/npsab/revisiting-leopold-2012.pdf
3.
The “mountain party: Mather’s mountain
party was a lobbying effort held far from the halls of Congress. How did this venue exploit his strengths (and
manage his weaknesses)? What made it
successful? What lessons can you learn
from it?
·
Rob Jordan, “Study Finds That Walking in Nature
Yields Measurable Mental Benefits and May Reduce Risk of Depression, Stanford
News, June 30, 2015, https://news.stanford.edu/2015/06/30/hiking-mental-health-063015/
·
Steve Tobak, “Should You Focus on Strengths or
Weaknesses?”, Moneywatch, October 17, 2011, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/should-you-focus-on-strengths-or-weaknesses/
4.
Machine in the garden: Thanks to Mather’s
efforts, the automobile became essential to the National Park experience. In retrospect, was this a good or bad
idea? What, if anything, would you have
done differently?
·
Christopher Ketchan, “The Future Is the Car-Free
National Park,” The New Republic, April 10, 2018, https://newrepublic.com/article/147920/future-car-free-national-park
14: Emily Rochon
1.
Giving voice: Rochon says, “It was really
just a matter for me of finding who I could give my voice to, and I chose the
environment.” Does this decision
resonant with you? Have you found your
calling, passion, or career by providing a voice to the voiceless? Can you think of other examples where an
entrepreneur has “given voice” in an effective way?
2.
Finding a place: When Rochon walked into
the Capitol in Rhode Island to lobby on behalf of Earth Justice, she thought,
“This is the work I need to do for the rest of my life.” This moment of clarity is not uncommon in the
stories of entrepreneurs. Have you had
such an experience, where you instantly felt at home in a new place, or a new
situation?
3.
Storytelling: Rochon says that one of her
strengths is the ability to provide the “framing, story, and arguments” that
result in new, environmentally sound business models. What role does storytelling play in
successful entrepreneurship?
·
Robin Bruce, “On the Importance of
Entrepreneurial Storytelling, Forbes, February 21, 2017, https://www.forbes.com/sites/robinbruce/2017/02/21/entrepreneurial-storytelling-1/#60591eea21f1
·
Rebecca Gill, Ph.D, “Is Storytelling the
Answer?”, Wake Forest Center for Entrepreneurship, http://entrepreneurship.wfu.edu/blog/is-storytelling-the-answer/
·
Kyle Harper, “How Tom’s of Maine Has Organically
Grown Its Brand Storytelling,” DISQUS, June 24, 2016, https://www.skyword.com/contentstandard/creativity/how-toms-of-maine-has-organically-grown-its-brand-storytelling/
15: Kate Cincotta
1.
Having impact: Cincotta found that the
disadvantages of working for a large organization outweighed her contributions
to the organization’s positive impact.
She departed to found her own company, though many of her colleagues were
content and chose to stay. Have you ever
been in this position of weighing large vs. small company? What factors were relevant to your
decision? What are the trade-offs of
such a career move?
2.
Low tech: Cincotta and her partner,
Vanessa Green, settled on a solution to produce clean water that was low
tech. Why? What advantages did this low-tech solution
create? What are modern examples where
simplicity in technology or a business model has proven more powerful than
complexity?
·
Clayton M. Christensen, Michael E. Raynor, Rory
McDonald, “What Is Disruptive Innovation?,” Harvard Business Review, December
2015, https://hbr.org/2015/12/what-is-disruptive-innovation
·
Jared Vineyard, “How a Box Changed History: The
Shipping Container Story,” Universal Cargo, June 18, 2013, https://www.universalcargo.com/how-a-box-changed-history-the-shipping-container-story/
3.
Creating new entrepreneurs: Cincotta’s
original goal was provide clean drinking water to rural communities in
Ghana. Not only was she able to do
that, but she also created opportunities and nurtured new entrepreneurs. How did this act of creation occur? How might
this emphasis on new entrepreneurs have changed the dynamic of her
organization? Where else globally is the creation of new entrepreneurs
happening?
16: Viraj Puri
1.
Choosing a financing strategy: By 2011,
Viraj Puri and his team had launched their first successful greenhouse. Venture capitalists began approaching Gotham
Greens to provide financing, but Puri resisted.
Why? Later, Puri accepted venture
funding. What had changed? What lessons do you take from this
experience?
2.
Choosing partners: Puri and his two
partners complement each other in terms of skills, but also in terms of what he
calls “risk tolerance.” What does this term
mean? Why might risk tolerance be as important
as skill?
3.
A nuanced business model: Rooftop gardens
gave Gotham Greens a “wow” factor, but Puri says the company is really a
“vertically integrated real estate developer, agribusiness, ag-technology,
marketing, and distribution company.” What advantages does such a broad
business definition provide? What
disadvantages?
·
Amy Gallo, “A Refresher on Marketing Myopia,” Harvard
Business Review, August 22, 2016, https://hbr.org/2016/08/a-refresher-on-marketing-myopia
·
Suppose you are the brand manager for Life
Savers (http://www.life-savers.com/). One of your colleagues wants to define the
market for Life Savers as “hard candy with holes.” Another wants to define the market as
“candy.” A third wants to define the
market as “snack foods, a fourth as “breath mints,” and a fifth as “nostalgia.” What implications do each of these
definitions have for how you set strategy?
17: Brenna Berman
1.
Big company experience: Brenna Berman
worked for IBM for 12 years. How did
this influence her values and leadership style as CIO of Chicago?
·
Harvey Deutschendorf, “5 Reasons Your
Organization Needs a Strong ‘Why’,” Fast Company, January 17, 2019, https://www.fastcompany.com/90292848/why-are-core-values-important-to-an-organization
2.
Framing solutions: Berman says, in
Chicago, “you’d never walk into the mayor’s office and ask to see his ‘smart
city strategy.’” Why is this way of
approaching smart-city initiatives important?
What other innovations have been reframed, or could be, in ways that
make solutions more comprehensible and powerful?
·
Thomas Wedell-Wedellsborg, “Are You Solving the
Right Problems?”, Harvard Business Review, January-February 2017, https://hbr.org/2017/01/are-you-solving-the-right-problems
3.
What’s an entrepreneur? Berman argues that she is not an entrepreneur. Lin-Manuel Miranda says he doesn’t think of
himself as an entrepreneur, either. Innovation
on Tap argues that both are. What do you think? What would Joseph
Schumpeter say?
19: Brent Grinna
1.
The power of community: Grinna is another
example of an entrepreneur who uses community effectively, in part because of
his willingness to volunteer and help others.
Describe this trait. Why is it so
powerful?
·
Pamela, Laughland, “10 Ways Helping Others Will
Improve Your Life,” August 7, 2019, https://www.lifehack.org/articles/lifestyle/10-ways-helping-others-will-improve-your-life.html
·
Lindsay Nahmiache, “Now to Network Like a Pro,” Forbes,
May 10, 2018, https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesagencycouncil/2018/05/10/how-to-network-like-a-pro/#759a9bb22994
20: Jason Jacobs
1.
The value of an MBA: Jason Jacobs had a
specific goal in mind when he decided to attend business school. Was he successful in meeting this goal? What value, if any, did Jacobs’s MBA
contribute to his future success? (Compare this to Eli Whitney’s experience at
Yale.)
2.
Laying it out there: Jacobs pivoted his
app from a tightly knit community of happy runners to a broad,
partner-oriented, “Health Graph” platform.
Describe how and why this pivot happened. He says, “If you take some narcissistic
twenty-something with a megaphone, all hopped-up on energy drinks, with a big
audience, and the press talking about him all day long, in this emergent field
that nobody knows anything about, but everyone thinks is the next big wave, and
he just lays it out there with fervor—in that moment of heat maybe you
can make a lot of things happen that couldn’t otherwise.” What does he mean? What are other instances where this scenario has
happened, either successfully or unsuccessfully? What lessons can you learn from Jacobs’s
experience?
·
Rick Tetzeli, “The Man Who Made Apple Famous: On
the Danger of Frothy Startup Narratives,” Fast Company, March 6,
2017, https://www.fastcompany.com/3068650/the-man-who-made-apple-famous-on-the-danger-of-frothy-startup-narrati
21: Guy Filippelli
1.
The impact of 9/11: The attacks of 9/11
play a role in the lives of several entrepreneurs featured in Innovation on
Tap. What changes did 9/11 mean on
the battlefield, and how did Guy Filippelli respond? In what other ways has 9/11 impacted
innovation and entrepreneurship?
·
Laura Santhanam and Larisa Epatko, “9/11 to Today:
Ways We Have Changed,” PBS Newshour, September 11, 2018, https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/9-11-to-today-ways-we-have-changed
·
Dean Takahashi, “9/11 And Its Impact on
Creativity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship,” VentureBeat, September
11, 2011, https://venturebeat.com/2011/09/11/911-and-its-impact-on-creativity-innovation-and-entrepreneurship/
2.
Establishing a base: Filippelli had a
successful career in the military and then a successful launch of Berico
Technologies and later RedOwl Analytics.
Despite these accomplishments, he says, “Now I feel like, for the first
time in my life, I have a base.” What
does he mean? How strong is your “base”?
What might be missing, and what actions
can you take to prepare yourself for success as an entrepreneur?
22: Meghan Winegrad
1.
The lessons of a big company: Meghan
Winegrad’s experience shows that a large company can successfully
innovate. What lessons did she learn
working for giant organizations that she was able to eventually apply to her
own start-up?
·
Andrew Corbett, “The Myth of the Intrapreneur,” Harvard
Business Review, June 26, 2018, https://hbr.org/2018/06/the-myth-of-the-intrapreneur?gclid=Cj0KCQjwvdXpBRCoARIsAMJSKqI7E_EC9DXhr4TAZiJ-CCnb1QzYKVdcCWRB4IaI9sjIIFthTn3EggAaAgqnEALw_wcB
2.
Who can innovate most successfully?
Describe the Schumpeterian hypothesis (see page 259). Do you agree with it? Why or why not? How important is
context? How important is the
availability of technology or financing? How do economic cycles impact innovation and
where it occurs?
23: Hamilton
1.
What’s an innovation? Innovation on Tap argues that Hamilton
is an innovation and Lin-Manuel Miranda is an entrepreneur. Do you agree?
2.
The power of community: How does Miranda
use community to leverage his own creativity and enhance his innovations? Describe the roles each member of his
community plays, and how it complements Miranda’s skill set.
3.
Management vs. entrepreneurship: Pitting
management against entrepreneurs, writes Peter Drucker, is “like saying that
the fingering hand and bow hand of the violinist are ‘adversaries’ or ‘mutually
exclusive.’ Both are always needed at
the same time, and both have to be coordinated and work together.”[20] Describe what he means. How does this dynamic work at Hamilton?
At McDonalds? At other organizations
that rely on being brilliant at innovation and repetition for their
success?
·
Michael Simkins, “An Actor’s Life,” The
Guardian, April 23, 2002, https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2002/apr/24/artsfeatures.theatre
·
Morgan Cutolo, “Here’s Why McDonald’s Almost
Didn’t Add the Egg McMuffin to Its Menu,” Reader’s Digest, Web July 22,
2019, https://www.rd.com/food/fun/mcdonalds-egg-mcmuffin-history/
and Renee Bailey, “How Has McDonald's Been So Successful for So Long?”, Franchise
Direct, April 12, 2017
[1] Frank Hobbs and Nicole Stoops,
“Demographic Trends in the 20th Century,” US Census Bureau, November
2002, https://www.census.gov/prod/2002pubs/censr-4.pdf, 71.
[2] William H. Frey, Diversity Explosion: How New Racial Demographics Are Remaking America,
Washington, D.C.: The Bookings Institution, 2015, loc. 139.
[3] Frank Hobbs and Nicole Stoops,
“Demographic Trends in the 20th Century,” US Census Bureau, November
2002, https://www.census.gov/prod/2002pubs/censr-4.pdf, 71.
[4] William H. Frey, Diversity Explosion: How New Racial Demographics Are Remaking America,
Washington, D.C.: The Bookings Institution, 2015, loc. 92
[5] “Powering the Digital Revolution: State of Black
America 2018,” National Urban League, New York, 2018, Web June 20, 2018, http://www.ncbw-qcmc.org/uploads/1/0/2/9/102980742/nul-soba2018-executive_summary.pdf, pg. 4.
[6] Nitasha Tiku, “Why Tech Leadership Has a Bigger Race
Than Gender Problem,” Wired, October
3, 2017, Web June 7, 2018,
https://www.wired.com/story/tech-leadership-race-problem/.
[7] “Powering the Digital Revolution: State of
Black America 2018,” National Urban League, New York, 2018, Web June 20, 2018, http://www.ncbw-qcmc.org/uploads/1/0/2/9/102980742/nul-soba2018-executive_summary.pdf,
pg. 7.
[8] Lariena Yee et al., “Women in the
Workplace, 2016,” LeanIn.Org and McKinsey, Web PDF, July 13, 2017, file:///C:/Users/Eric%20B%20Schultz/Documents/A%20Nation%20of%20Entrepreneurs/Millennial%20Ent%20Material/Millennial%20Other%20Sources/Women_in_the_Workplace_2016.pdf, 8.
[9] “Powering the Digital Revolution: State
of Black America 2018,” National
Urban League, New York, 2018, Web June 20, 2018, http://www.ncbw-qcmc.org/uploads/1/0/2/9/102980742/nul-soba2018-executive_summary.pdf, pg. 7.
[10] James T. Patterson, Restless Giant: The United States from Watergate to Bush v. Gore,
Oxford: Oxford University Press, Kindle, 2005, 295.
[11] “Tu Casa Es Mi Casa,” The Economist, May 13, 2015,
http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2015/03/daily-chart-5.
[12] Tessa Berenson, “How Latinos Drive
America’s Economy,” Time, September
26, 2016, 34.
[13] Tessa Berenson, “How Latinos Drive
America’s Economy,” Time, September
26, 2016, 30.
[14] “Powering the Digital Revolution: State
of Black America 2018,” National Urban League, New York, 2018, Web June 20,
2018, http://www.ncbw-qcmc.org/uploads/1/0/2/9/102980742/nul-soba2018-executive_summary.pdf, pg. 12.
[15] Mark Muron, Alan Berube, and Jacob
Whiton, “Black and Hispanic Underrepresentation in Tech: It’s Time to change
the Equation,” Brookings, March 28, 2018, Web June 20, 2018,
https://www.brookings.edu/research/black-and-hispanic-underrepresentation-in-tech-its-time-to-change-the-equation/.
[16] David Rock and Heidi Grant, “Why Diverse
Teams are Smarter,” Harvard Business
Review, November 4, 2016, Web June 20, 2018,
https://hbr.org/2016/11/why-diverse-teams-are-smarter.
[17] Sahil Raina, “Research: The Gender Gap
in Startuup Success Disappears When Women Fund Women,” Harvard Business Review, July 19, 2016, Web June 21, 2018,
https://hbr.org/2016/07/research-the-gender-gap-in-startup-success-disappears-when-women-fund-women.
[18] Sander Hoogendoorn, Hessel Oosterbeek,
Mirjam van Praag, “The Impact of Gender Diversity on the Performance of
Business Teams: Evidence of a Field Experiment,” Harvard Kennedy School, July
2013, Web June 20, 2018, http://gap.hks.harvard.edu/impact-gender-diversity-performance-business-teams-evidence-field-experiment.
[19] Macy Bayern, “How Much is Diversity in
Technology Worth?,” August 3, 2017 Web June 20, 2018,
https://www.techrepublic.com/article/how-much-is-diversity-in-tech-worth-400b-says-comptia-ceo/.
[20] Peter Drucker, The
Essential Drucker: The Best of Sixty Years of Peter Drucker’s Essential
Writings on Management, (New York: HarperBusiness, 2001), 198.
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