Rock My World Innovations – Stuff We Can Live With – Part I

Sign of the times.

When I began researching “rock my world” innovations and how it affects us and our workplace, the hardest part for me is I couldn’t stop. It’s because in the course of studying innovation, much of what you read and hear about today is already old news.

I found some rock my world innovations but more often than not, I found new stuff we can live with.  Stuff here today, possibly gone tomorrow…

I’m a big fan of the future and enjoy learning all I can about new innovations.  In studying innovation in my work I quickly discovered you can erase the past and create the future as quickly as you can erase chalk from a chalkboard.

One of my favorite recitations is that as a CEO in the technology business, we as a company must constantly reinvent ourselves.  We need new technology to keep up with the existing technology and the tsunami of information we have to deal with every day.

We live in a world of plentiful accurate data, and massive storage capacity and processing power.   So anything’s possible.

We live in a world where computers improve so quickly that their capabilities pass from the realm of science fiction into the everyday world!

Like Watson the IBM Computer who can beat the world’s finest chess players or champions at Jeopardy and we’re not talking about surpassing the realm of science fiction over the course of a human lifetime, or even within the span of a professional’s career, but instead in just a few years.

So What is Innovation?

3) There are Incremental Innovations that are Small but Significant improvements to our lives.

More people with cell phones in the world than with toothbrushes.

So let’s talk briefly today about one of the most obvious game changers.  Smartphones.  There are more people with cell phones in the world than with toothbrushes.  Seems impossible right?  Well believe it or not, this guy owns a smart phone!

This guy owns a smartphone

Let’s talk about THE FUTURE of the smart phone 2013… Below is a short video about a new app called Project Glass from Google.  I’ll tell you, I’m definitely going use this app!  I couldn’t find my way around a department store if I had to save my life.  Here’s the story.

I had taken my 2-year-old daughter shopping with me for my wife’s Christmas gift.  I chose the local mall which was a mistake!  There were too many stores, on too many levels and subsequently too many choices.  My two-year old decided she would decide when to leave for me and declared in a high octave it was time to leave.  When I tried to get her back into her snow suit she decided to take it up a few notches so I made my exit as quickly as possible.  I was plowing through drifts of snow with a screaming kid under my arm, like a football and I couldn’t find the car.  I thought it had been stolen.  I quickly dismissed the thought, thinking who would steal a yellow Ford Pinto with a black racing stripe, affectionately nicknamed, The Banana.  When I came to my senses I had realized there was an East and a West entrance to the mall.  It seems I had been rendered temporarily geographically dyslexic.  It is strictly a male trait brought on by the trauma from entering a shopping mall and likely departing with a lighter wallet.

Google Glass

Here’s the short video…the future of smartphones a.k.a. Google Glass.

What are some of the other game changing innovations? Hint: Laptops Are Doomed!