Got a great book the other day called The Medici Effect: What Elephants & Epidemics Can Teach Us About Innovation by Frans Johansson. It about what happens when you step into that area called The Intersection...

Contents:
Part 1 - The Intersection: The Intersection - Your Best Chance To Innovate; The Rise of Intersections
Part 2 - Creating the Medici Effect: Break Down the Barriers Between Fields; How to Make the Barriers Fall; Randomly Combine Concepts; How to Find the Combinations; Ignite an Explosion of Ideas; How to Capture the Explosion
Part 3 - Making Intersectional Ideas Happen: Execute Past Your Failures; How to Succeed in the Face of Failure; Break Out of Your Network; How to Leave the Network Behind; Take Risks and Overcome Fear; How to Adopt a Balanced View of Risk; Step into the Intersection
Notes; Index; About the Author

The Medici Effect is all about the intersection of ideas, cultures, disciplines, and strategies in new and previously unexplored ways. The term comes from the Medici family in Florence Italy in the 15th century. A convergence of thinkers and doers all converged on Florence, which became ground zero for the Renaissance period. New concepts thrived in that environment where people were learning and listening to each other, breaking out of their own fields to combine ideas into revolutionary new areas of study. Johansson asserts (and correctly so, in my opinion) that innovation thrives in these "intersections" that are missed by many, but offer the best chance for breaking away from the "same old thing".

The book is extremely practical, in that all the chapters are driven by real-life examples of these intersectional thinkers. You'll see how Richard Garfield combined the idea of collectables and gaming to come up with the mega-hit card game Magic: The Gathering. The singer Shakira takes musical styles from widely different cultures and combines them into a sound that is all her own (and very popular to boot). Eric Bonabeau studied the activities of ants searching for food and applied the observations to network routing and scheduling. These and many other examples show how being a generalist (or at least open to other fields) can lead to connections not possible for highly specialized thinkers. Johansson lays out steps you can take to place yourself in that constant flow of ideas, so that you can start seeing new possibilities in rather mundane unrelated things.

I was very impressed with this book, and have already started to look at events and ideas in a different light. I'd recommend this read for anyone looking to spur their creativity beyond the norm...

MESSAGE / CONCEPT

Johansson has produced an interesting story here. It's interesting because it is provides a thesis (perhaps the wrong word) on how (or perhaps why) innovation occurs or why some people are able to gain breakthrough insights and others not. It's not an academic text, but it does have a "folksy" type of appeal with its stories and approach, which kind of makes me feel that it doesn't have that "robustness" to make it a real solid contribution, although I suspect many will find it useful.

What Johansson proposes is that people who have breakthrough insights are for example well rounded, have experienced different cultures, different thought processes, perhaps well travelled, and so on. If they are a team, then it is the multi-disciplinary team that will more often succeed. It kind of flies in the face of that "study hard" and "work hard" ethic, although I don't think he denies this is required. The followers of TRIZ ([...]) would also disagree!

This "intersection" is a conceptual "point" at which "breakthrough insights" occur. It is a sort of "zen" that when the conditions are right, the problem/issue exists, then the right people can get to the right idea. I guess if one was to regularly get outside one's comfort zone, intellectually and culturally, then the ability to look at a problem or issue from a different perspective would probably grow.

WHAT WE LEARNT

There is a quote on the back of the book that probably illustrates the "potential" impact this might have on someone:

"As I look at the exploration of Mars through the lens "The Medici Effect" offer, I see pathways ahead that were previously invisible, and possibilities that we must consider. Any book that has this effect on anyone is far more than a good read. Let the sleeper awake!"
[Dr James Garvin, Lead Scientist, NASA's Mars Exploration Program]

I am not sure it inspired us all that much, but I think it opened our eyes to the possibilities. Perhaps it is more about a reminder to think laterally more often.

Medici Effect is a good read that leads you into a journey of how innovation really occurs. It is the intersection of different fields, cultures, discplines, activities, people, etc. that leads you to a new direction for whatever problem that you are trying to solve. It strives to tie it all together in the end with the idea that you have to know what the problem is that you are trying to solve, seek out different experiences, people, etc. to give you new ideas to put together with the ideas that you already have in your head and voila - in 1 month to 8 years or more - an answer to the problem that you are trying to solve may happen. It is not a book about process - it is a book about the journey that may lead you to the solution that you are seeking.

Where can you borrow ideas from others to apply them to your situation? Although this is not an original question by any means, this excellent, well-written book explores this question by looking at how innovation comes together at the "Intersection" of cultures, industries, and differing streams of thought.

Amazon.com, for example, could be looked at as an intersection of diverse authors, readers, thoughts, backgrounds, and disparate sub-cultures that can lead to innovations in thought. If you understand what I mean by this, than you've basically gotten the gist of what the book is about.

If you like books from authors like Clayton Christensen, Michael Michalko, Roger Von Oech, etc. you should enjoy this immensely.

The Medici Effect presents the idea that significant breakthrough ideas are often discovered at the intersection of typically unrelated disciplines.

The author identifies many important innovations that are the result of inter-disciplinary thinking and argues that the sharing of ideas across disciplines, cultures, etc. is often responsible for these innovations. Companies such as IDEO and McKinsey & Co. are practical examples of the theoretical concepts presented in this book and their businesses are highly dependent on the interaction of individuals from a diverse range of educational and experiential backgrounds.

Also discussed in the book is the importance of luck and prolific creation. For example, the author cites the musician Prince, stating that while Prince has produced many legendary songs, he has produced a vault of thousands of other songs that have never been released. The point is that the more output one produces the more likely they are to produce output of great value.

The ideas in the book, while interesting, could benefit from further development and discussion. In particular, more discussion on how to implement interdisciplinary culture in a professional workplace, as well as how to manage teams of interdisciplinary people would be of value.