Why do smart leaders consistently make terrible choices about breakthrough ideas?
After 30 years making high-stakes innovation decisions—from co-founding and taking a company public to serving as HP's CTO and now leading CableLabs as CEO—I've decoded the decision-making patterns that separate breakthrough choices from costly mistakes.
Now I share what I've learned through Studio Notes (weekly essays) and Studio Sessions (video and audio)—real frameworks for innovation decision-making that actually work under uncertainty.
I believe every leader can make better innovation decisions. You just need frameworks that account for how strategic choices actually get made, not how they should get made.
Subscribe to Studio Notes — weekly insights on why smart leaders make terrible decisions about breakthrough ideas, and how to avoid the same mistakes.
Mental Models — Your Thinking Toolkit
NASA engineers and management had the same data. Their conclusions were 1000x apart. The difference? The mental tools they used to think.
The Million-Dollar Decision I Got Wrong (And Why I'm Grateful)
I built 3COM's largest network. Then I turned down the job offer.
The Military Ignored His Brain Injury. So He Built What Could Have Saved His Brothers.
A Navy SEAL's fight against the invisible wounds killing America's elite warriors.
They Accused Me of Fraud. It Made $20 Billion.
What happens when numbers stop making sense and the government needs a scapegoat?
What I'm Actually Thankful For (After My Body Failed Three Times This Year)
Five cardiac surgeries taught me the difference between Thanksgiving platitudes and what you're grateful for when the clock is screaming.
From Teligent Disaster to HP Success: A Second-Order Thinking Story
Kevin Allodi thought three moves ahead when I wasn't thinking past the first. His decision saved my family—and taught me the framework I use for billion-dollar calls.
I'm Thinking About Writing a Book. Here's Why—And I Need Your Help.
I'm turning two years of essays into a book on thinking independently. Read the concept and tell me what you think.
I Wore a Red Badge Inside the NSA. Here's What Happened.
I mastered probabilistic thinking in my algorithm. Then made every wrong bet with my business.
The Six Words That Killed Quibi
Same Skill, Opposite Outcomes: How Jeffrey Katzenberg Built an Empire and Lost a Billion
HP Won Innovation Awards. Then Killed What Made It True.
Three years on the Most Innovative list. Thirteen years absent. Here's what changed—and what it proves about causation.
