philmckinney

Escape From Our Past
The problem that that many businesspeople, entrepreneurs, and would-be innovators suffer from is our inability escape from our past. Simply put, we…

Yesterday, I recorded two segments  for NBC’s Press:Here that will appear on Sunday, April 8th @ 9:00AM in SFO and then later on cable in New…

With the launch of the book yesterday, there seems to be a lot of interest in the history of how Beyond The Obvious came to…

I’m thrilled to say I’ve just wrapped up the manuscript to my first book, Beyond the Obvious: Killer Questions That Spark Game-Changing Innovation, published by…

This morning I gave a keynote at the Argyle Executive Forum event in NYC.  The title of the talk was “Ignore The Obvious” covering:

Doing…

Here is an opportunity for you to “pay it forward” by sharing your killer question story with the readers of the blog.  In the past,…

Last week, I gave a keynote speech at Edelman’s Leadership event in Chicago.  Once a year, the company brings together the top ~100 executives from…

I’ve been asked (more like challenged) to create a dozen or so killer questions that could be used by teachers, schools, districts, state education agencies,…

Last Friday, I sat down with Brian Caulfield (Senior Technical Writer at Forbes.com) to discuss the killer questions and the card deck.
Enjoy . .…

As a result of the twitter feed of killer questions, I’ve received a number of emails asking about the background on the killer questions.  Since…

Killer Question #38: What makes my product hard to use?
Have you ever wondered what life was like before battery powered power tools?  I’m a…

Subscribe to the podcast on iTunes
I’m amazed at the breadth of human ingenuity to solve social, economic, political and even technical challenges.  The one…

 Killer Question #7: Could you customize a mass product?
When things get tough, the common reaction is to scale back and standardize the processes.  The…

Killer Question #54: What are the unshakable beliefs in my industry about what customers want?  What if the opposite where true?
 
Its easy when…

Killer Question #8: Could you standardize a custom product?
Design quickly becomes one of the key differentiators in highly competitive markets.  Furniture, fashion, architecture and…

Killer Question #27: Who is passionate about your product or something it relates to? Why or why not?
It all started with an idea and…

 
Killer Question #35: What is inconvenient about assembling your product?
When you think of “ease of assembly”, you normally don’t think of furniture.  The…

Killer Question #17: Could I offer my product at 5 times the cost if it had greater feature/function?
In 1971, Frederick W. Smith raised $91…

I’m a firm believer that better questions result in better ideas which lead to better innovations.  Over the years, I’ve collected a list of +75…

 
When is the best time to innovate?

Innovation is 24×7 .. not something that you wait “until your in the mood”
Some of the…