World Innovation

David Rowan travels the globe in search of the most exciting and pioneering start-ups building the future. He’s got to know the founders of WhatsApp, LinkedIn, Google, Spotify, Xiaomi, Didi, Nest, Twitter and countless other ambitious entrepreneurs disrupting businesses in almost every sector. And yet too often the companies they’re disrupting don’t get it. They think they can innovate through jargon: with talk of change agents and co-creation gurus, ideas portals and webinars, make-a-thons and hackfests, paradigm shifts and pilgrimages to Silicon Valley. 

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable, audiobook edition of How We Got To Now by Steven Johnson, read by George Newbern. From Steven Johnson, the best-selling author of Where Good Ideas Come From, comes How We Got to Now, which tracks the surprising inspirations and unexpected...

From the cofounder of Square, an inspiring and entertaining account of what it means to be a true entrepreneur and what it takes to build a resilient, world-changing company In 2009, a St. Louis glassblowing artist and recovering computer scientist named Jim McKelvey lost a sale because he...

Longlisted for the Porchlight Business Book Award for Current Events & Public Affairs Longlisted for the Non-Obvious Book Award 2025 A Next Big Idea Book Club March 2025 Must-Read An urgent and illuminating perspective that offers a window into how the most pernicious aspects of the venture...

Best Books of 2024, The Economist From the codebreakers and problem solvers, to the engineers, mathematicians and other problem-solvers – what the secret world can teach us about performance and creativity How do you hire smart people who can work together to prevent terrorist attacks and...

Chaos looms over the beloved realm of Zemia. As Darkness and Light confront their greatest challenge, the Chosen – Aiden, Anthony, and Julia – wield newfound powers to combat the encroaching forces. With a blend of magic, cultivation, and strategic brilliance, the trio must revolutionize armor designs and unlock ancient enchantments.

From gunpowder to generative AI, the forces of disruption are repeatedly rewriting the rules of business, society, and human possibility. But what drives these revolutionary changes? In Epic Disruptions, innovation expert Scott Anthony weaves together the stories behind history's most transformative disruptions.

Enjoy figuring out creative solutions to real-world problems that have led to important inventions, discoveries, and innovations throughout history! The problems in this audiobook are related to erudition in fundamental areas - nature, technology, business, science, how things work, or why things are made in a certain way. But, unlike in trivia or jeopardy, you most probably do not know the answer. Instead, logic, out-of-the-box thinking, or intuition leap should be added to your knowledge to puzzle out the correct solution.

Why are some organizations more innovative than others? How can we tap in to, empower, and leverage the natural innovation within our organizations that is so vital to our future success? Now more than ever, companies and institutions of all types and sizes are determined to create more innovative organizations. In study after study, leaders say that fostering innovation and the need for transformational change are among their top priorities.

What if I told you the public sector, so often derided as sluggish and stuffy, was full of innovators waiting to be unleashed? That we don’t need to invent a new solution to every problem, but to scale and spread all the proven innovation 90% of us don’t know about, or see? This book is about how to innovate in the public sector, what has been stopping us so far, and why we must do so. It draws on expert interviews, case studies, and frontline public service experience.

In The World Is Your Office, Harvard Business School professor Prithwiraj Choudhury, who has been studying this phenomenon for over a decade, takes listeners inside the trailblazing companies that are going all-in on work-from-anywhere (WFA) policies. From startups and nonprofits to government agencies and large corporations, Choudhury's research shows why and how these organizations are benefiting.

Ignorance may or may not be bliss. But the right kind of ignorance can be genius. Expertise in any field is ultimately important to success. But it usually comes with a problem—a tendency toward incremental change and to become limited by what we know and what has worked in the past. As a result, the most innovative thinking that has driven upstart companies and allowed old brands to stay relevant in a fast-changing world often comes when we leave behind what we know best and what’s considered “possible.”

Many weapons and inventions were credited with winning World War II, most famously in the assertion that the atomic bomb "ended the war, but radar won the war." What is less well known is that both airborne radar and the atomic bomb were invented in British laboratories, but built by Americans. The same holds true for many other American weapons credited with the Allied victory: the P-51 Mustang fighter, the Liberty ship, the proximity fuze, the Sherman tank, and even penicillin all began with British scientists and planners.

Through interviews with successful product designers and inventors from around the world, and case studies of products from their local inception to their global success, The Future of Design will answer these important questions and provide a robust framework for activating innovative thinking that goes beyond Western approaches to creativity and innovation. 

Studies in neuroscience reveal that the way we learn doesn't always match up with the way we are taught. To stay competitive - academically, economically, and technologically - we need to apply the proven principles of disruptive innovation to our educational system. Disrupting Class will make you rethink your understanding of intelligence, reevaluate your current school program, and reinvigorate your commitment to learning.   

Most of us take for granted the features of our modern society, from air travel and telecommunications to literacy and obesity. Yet for nearly all of its six million years of existence, human society had none of these things. While the gulf that divides us from our primitive ancestors may seem...

Leading in a Non-Linear World leads listeners through a groundbreaking set of science-based strategies to help them face rising demand, uncertainty and change posed by disruptive technologies and seismic shifts in globalization. The book shows how our mindset, more than our knowledge and expertise, has the potential to be our greatest asset in facing the future. Jean Gomes reviews the latest brain research revealing that our mindset is the interplay of feeling, thinking, and seeing, and how we can build it to significantly increase our wellbeing and performance.

In today’s changing world, where business leaders must navigate industry disruption, entrepreneurs struggle to push beyond initial success, and activists tackle hard challenges like climate change, there is a need for a more powerful way to do innovation. Too many innovators are trapped by the limits of common innovation practices. The way we’ve been taught to create and innovate for the past two decades is failing us. It’s time for a paradigm shift. To unlock the secrets to doing bigger things, this book introduces the pioneering concept of ecosystem innovation.

The dropping of two atom bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and their shocking aftermath finally ended World War II in the eastern theatre. But they weren't the only experimental weaponry at the time. In this fascinating account, Chris McNab examines the development of a range of hitherto unknown and at times shockingly effective weapons that were developed and unleashed on an unsuspecting world over the course of the war.

In clear language, The Innovation Mandate shows leaders a step-by-step process to continually generate great ideas, implement them, and maximize their value to benefit both customers and investors. In today’s ultracompetitive marketplace, the difference between success and failure is...