The Innovators Studio
Phil McKinney's working studio, where he takes on real innovation decisions and shows you exactly how those calls get made.
The idea was never the hard part. It never is. The call is.
I've spent 40 years in rooms where those calls get made. As HP's CTO. As a co-founder who took a company public. As CEO of CableLabs. Across thousands of decisions. Some that worked. Some I'd rather forget.
This is where I share what that actually looks like.
You're not missing data. You're missing recognition.
You've sat in the meeting. The team is excited. The business case is solid. The market analysis checks out. And something feels off, but you can't name it.
So you approve it. Or you kill it. Either way, you're guessing.
Six months later, you see what you missed. It was right there. You just didn't know what you were looking at.
That's not a failure of intelligence. It's the absence of pattern recognition, the ability to see what's actually happening in an innovation decision before it fully reveals itself.
The best decision-makers don't gather more data than everyone else. They recognize what they're looking at faster. The patterns in innovation decisions are predictable, cataloged across four decades, and learnable, if someone shows you what to look for.
Three ways into the studio
The Studio comes in three depths. Start where you are.
Studio Notes // Every Monday morning
The real stories behind innovation decisions, the ones I couldn't tell while they were still happening. Like how I convinced HP's board to spend $1.2 billion on Palm, then watched a new CEO destroy it in 49 days while I was recovering from surgery. Or why I evaluated over 30,000 innovation ideas at HP and learned that the best ones weren't losing to bad ideas. They were losing to exhaustion.
Short. Specific. Something you can use before your 10am meeting. Free to subscribe. Paid members get the full archive, community, and comments.
Subscribe to Studio Notes and Studio Sessions — Free →
Studio Sessions // Every Wednesday
Twenty years running. Tens of millions of downloads. Now sharper than ever.
Each episode is a thinking tool. Not theory you nod along to, but a pattern or question you'll start noticing in your own decisions. Video and audio. New every Wednesday.
Go deeper // For members
When the free teaching isn't enough, membership opens the full archive, the community, and the Founder Circle, where a smaller group gets time with Phil directly. The way to go from reading the Studio to being part of it.
What pattern recognition looks like in practice
Three VPs sent me the same proposal: HP should implement 20% time like Google. The logic was seductive, the precedent was proven, and I was ready to approve it. Then a retired engineer (HP employee number nine) told me something that changed everything. It had nothing to do with time allocation. It had to do with a padlock on a tool room door.
That story led to the Innovation Program Office. Three consecutive years on Fast Company's Most Innovative Companies list. After I retired, HP killed the program. They haven't made the list since. Thirteen years and counting.
That's what Studio Notes reads like. Not theory. Not motivation. A specific pattern, from a real decision, that you can use.
For senior leaders with a specific decision
Most of what happens in the Studio is public and free. If you hold the seat and you're carrying a decision that needs Phil's judgment directly, that work happens privately, through Techtrend Group. A small, retained advisory roster. Truth, not validation.
Monday and Wednesday mornings. Your inbox. Free.
Studio Notes every Monday. Studio Sessions every Wednesday. A pattern you didn't see, a question worth asking, a thinking tool you can use before your next meeting.
Most readers tell me it's the thing they actually read on Monday morning, and the episode they listen to on the way in Wednesday. Some of them run divisions. A few of them run companies.
Studio Notes and Studio Sessions — weekly innovation decision insights, free to your inbox.
Free. Unsubscribe anytime. Paid upgrade available at $60/year.
Go deeper when you're ready
Studio Notes Mondays. Studio Sessions Wednesdays. 90 days of archive. No card required.
Subscribe →Full archive, not just 90 days. Comments and community. Plus a free digital copy of every new book Phil publishes.
Go Paid →A seat at the table. Everything in Paid, plus quarterly 1:1 calls with Phil, Founders-only Live sessions, signed book, and your name on philmckinney.com.
Join the Circle →20 years. New name. Sharper focus.
This started as Killer Innovations in 2005, one of the first innovation podcasts, eventually nationally syndicated across 30+ radio stations. Tens of millions of downloads later, the content evolved past the name. Less about innovation tips. More about how to see what others miss in the decisions that matter.
The Innovators Studio is the next chapter: sharper focus, better integration, same commitment to substance. The full archive is still available here under Studio Sessions →.
See the pattern. Make the call.
Studio Notes // Mondays | Studio Sessions // Wednesdays | Work With Phil // Privately, through Techtrend