A Sherpa's Guide to Innovation

Ben & Jay have the unique pleasure of speaking with Karen Dillon , NYT best-selling author and former editor of the Harvard Business Review , about her being in “the front seat of the Clay Christensen experience” through years of collaboration with Clay and some of their incredible colleagues.  Karen may refer to herself as “semi-retired”, but she sounds pretty busy and is having great impact...

Yeehaw! The Sherpas of the southeast went to SXSW in Austin, TX and lived to tell the tale. Listen to Lindsay, Jay, Sally, and Ben recap the sessions they attended, their tried and true success strategies for navigating SXSW, some of the overarching conference themes, the piles of delicious food they sampled, and the applications to innovation and healthcare they uncovered. You’ll learn that SXSW...

Ben & Jay are honored to speak with Efosa Ojomo , Global Prosperity Lead at Clayton Christensen Institute and co-author of The Prosperity Paradox with Dr. Clayton Christensen and Karen Dillon .  Efosa talks about how he came to think that business might be the answer for developing countries, why not all innovations are created equal, and why “pull” strategies can work better than “push” strat...

"Ah, the HIMSS conference. . . If you don’t own it, it will own you.” Hear what else the Innovation Sherpas have to say about their recent trip down to the Sunshine State for the 2019 Health Information Management Systems Society (HIMSS) Conference in Orlando.  We have Dr. Jean Wright (Chief Innovation Officer), Emilie Pandullo (Investment Fund Director), and Michael Johnson (Director, Innova...

In this episode, we welcome Niyum Gandhi , Executive Vice President and Chief Population Health Officer at Mount Sinai , to discuss health system transformation, and how he tackles it in one of the most diverse cities in the world. Niyum shares the story behind his transition from Oliver Wyman to Mount Sinai, and the role key questions and visionary leaders took in making his leap. Hear Niyum talk...

In this episode we welcome Dr. Rasu Shrestha to the Atrium Health family as our new EVP and Chief Strategy Officer . Formerly, Dr. Shrestha was Chief Innovation Officer at UPMC and EVP of UPMC Enterprises . Get to know this dynamic healthcare leader as he reflects on experiences and influences that have shaped his approach to leadership and innovation, and his exuberance as he anticipates guiding...

Rebecca Fogg, Senior Research Fellow of the healthcare practice at the Christensen Institute, joins the Innovation Sherpas from across the pond to talk disruption , air ambulances, Jobs to Be Done , and why she switched from consumer financial services to research on healthcare business model innovation. Rebecca shares some of her finely tuned insights on why the healthcare industry is so difficul...

Our human-centered design Sherpas Elizabeth Benfield Watson and Sally Baek are joined by a special guest, John Tartt , AVP of Enterprise Risk Management at Atrium Health , to talk about the Innovation Engine’s Catalyst Program .  Risk management may sound out of place in the world of innovation, but John is a great friend of our team and he’s a terrific example of how the mindset of human-centered...

Ben & Jay do a short recap of the last year of A Sherpa’s Guide to Innovation, highlighting some memorable moments.  We hope current listeners enjoy reliving the memories, and new listeners get a taste of what they’ve been missing.  You’ll hear from previous awesome guests Dr. Zayna Khayat, Bob Moesta, Derek van Bever, and David Phillips – plus Innovation Engine Sherpas Michael Johnson, Lindsa...

There exists a hidden world of which the average consumer has no knowledge—the world of design and innovation that crafts nearly everything we see and use. Join Design Strategist Lee Fain as he takes us on a storytelling adventure using Joseph Campbell' s Hero’s Journey framework to a new world of creativity, design, prototyping, and customer discovery. Lee is co-head of design strategy at Id...

Your disruptive innovation Sherpas are back to discuss how the theory may be playing out in healthcare.  Will Behrmann, Jay Gerhart and Ann Somers Hogg cover a lot of ground on the complex and ever-changing healthcare landscape.  Is disruption truly occurring?  Why does it matter? Do we really want it to occur?  What will it look like?  Weighty questions indeed.  CVS/Aetna, primary care disruptors...

Two great conferences – two Innovation Engine Sherpas facing off to extol their virtues!  Ann Somers Hogg and Will Behrmann each recently attended a stellar innovation conference and share their experiences via a good-natured duel, making the case for why YOU should attend the conference they attended next year. Which conference wins our Sherpa Showdown? Will it be the Impact 2018 conference hoste...

Jay takes the show on the road for the Innovation Learning Network’s InPerson Meeting (absolutely not a conference) in Sacramento, California, hosted by The Shop at VSP.  He first talks on-site with ILN Executive Director Chris McCarthy and Christine Folck, Manager & Leader of Operational Strategy at VSP Global to set the stage for the meeting.  Then he talks with Jay Sales, Co-Director, VSP G...

Join Innovation Sherpas Ann Somers Hogg and Elizabeth Watson in a continuation of their Twitter barrage sharing their experiences and highlights from their recent attendance at Mayo Clinic’s Transform 2018 Conference in Rochester, Minnesota. Learn about the industry’s focus to meet people where they really are, move from incremental to transformational change, and why moving care from the clinic t...

Join your Sherpas as Ben & Jay give you a play by play of a recent Design Sprint bootcamp taught by Sprint author Jake Knapp himself! Hosted by the team at Wily , the 2-day Design Sprint Bootcamp was a condensed, accelerated, and supercharged training to teach the attendees the Sprint framework for rapid product design and testing. You’ll hear from Jake Knapp about how Sprint came to be, as we...

Ben & Jay have a lively conversation with Coonoor Behal , founder of Mindhatch , a creative consultancy that blends design thinking, organizational improv and innovation facilitation. Coonoor has had a fascinating career arc that spans entertainment, an NGO, a major consulting firm and now her own firm. Oh, and along the way, she happened to become an accomplished improv comedian and teacher!...

Welcome to the Bobcast! We’re thrilled to have our Jobs to be Done sensei, Bob Moesta , sharing his innovation wisdom across a wide range of topics. Bob is President and CEO of The ReWired Group , and one of the pioneers and principal architects of Jobs to Be Done theory . This fascinating conversation ranges from the next steps in his life journey, focusing more on teaching a full range of innova...

Get your gear ready for this episode on digital innovation, courtesy of Skookum’s own Jason Rome and Michael Ifkovits , along with our summer intern and technophile Nkechi “NC” Nwoko . They share their stories as digital innovators about how to enable the experiences consumers want that nail the Job to Be Done through tech solutions. We cover a lot of ground—what a typical client engagement is lik...

Dr. Zayna Khayat , Future Strategist with SE Health , joins Ben & Ann Somers on a wide-ranging conversation about the future of health and how to drive innovation. Before recently joining SE Health (formerly Saint Elizabeth Health Care), Zayna served as “Innovation Sherpa in Chief” at the REshape Health Innovation Centre at Radboud University Medical Centre in Nijmegen, Netherlands. Yes, she i...

Your Sherpas enter unexpected territory when Jay has a transformative improv adventure at The Second City in Chicago – Improv & Innovation. Ben & Jay discuss how improv can help you be a better innovator and leader – and even bring it to life in the studio! Many, many thanks to The Second City Training Center, Second City Works & Kelly Leonard for mucho inspiration. @SecondCityWorks @K...

We again welcome Innovation Provocateur David Phillips of Faster Glass to join our own Sherpa Elizabeth Watson to hear their insights on learning, teaching and practicing Design Thinking. Of course, you’ll hear about empathy, empathy, empathy – but how about design thinking as a risk mitigation approach? How did David & Elizabeth come to drink the Kool-Aid? Where have they succeeded – and fail...

Your on-the-spot correspondent Ben Tingey captures live reflections and insights from a star-studded Innovation Learning Network roster. Your Innovation Engine Sherpas were proud to co-host the ILN Spring 2018 in-person meeting in Charlotte, North Carolina with the Business Innovation Factory . Hear from participants as they experience “Risky Business”! @ILNMuse @TheBIF @SherpaPod @TheBenReport @J...

Was your mind blown when you heard some of the news that came out of the inaugural HLTH conference in Las Vegas? Join Lindsay Deneault, Michael Johnson, and Emilie McKenna and get an insider perspective as they talk about their first-hand experience attending the conference, how and when their minds were blown, and the emergence of unlikely organizational pairings that may become the norm. You can...

Your Innovation Engine Sherpas welcome Dr. Derek van Bever, Senior Lecturer and Director of the Forum for Growth and Innovation at Harvard Business School to the studio. As a close colleague of Dr. Clayton Christensen and an entrepreneur, Derek shares his great insights and experiences across various innovation and management domains to build and sustain a successful enterprise. We deeply apprecia...

In a milestone episode, Ben brings our first two guests from outside Atrium Health into the Sherpa studio, Amy Chiou (former Executive Director of Queen City Forward) and David Phillps (founder of innovation consultancy Faster Glass). If you’re someone who’s not satisfied with the status quo, you’ll enjoy hearing about Amy and David’s extensive experience fostering innovation across a community. A...