Soapbox Round 2: ‘disruptive innovation’ debate disrupts ‘the chattering classes’

[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/img_5.jpg” thumb_width=”180″ /]It’s a Blackboard Jungle out there. Clayton Christensen rebuts Jill Lepore on most–but not all–of her views on his theory of disruptive innovation [TTA 24 June] aired in a New Yorker cover story. The forum is a follow up interview (20 June) with BusinessWeek. (Hat tip to Tom Boyle commenting on the original Soapbox. Also see a just-released HBR video interview, link below.)

Your Editor agrees with his point that his theories have been developed and updated far beyond his first (1997) book, ‘The Innovator’s Dilemma’, the only one she refers to.  (Similarly, I am most familiar with ‘The Innovator’s Prescription’ of 2008, but we’ve commented on his more recent relevant work, readily searchable here.) This is, unfortunately, her argument’s major flaw. It is akin to ceasing your review of WWII history with A.J.P. Taylor and Cornelius Ryan; as fine foundationally as they are, the scholarship and strategic debates will extend far beyond our lifetimes.

Mr Christensen in his rebuttal is appealingly modest in bringing up where he got it wrong (the iPhone), where his model has gone off (in 2002, a mathematician from Tuck demonstrating the causal mechanism as incorrect to that point) and that he still sees problems with the theory. Moreover, her strongest point is one he agrees with: (more…)