Diversity, Innovation and Modern Business Education

By Bill Woodson 

January 2010

Success in the new millennium, now more than ever, is associated with companies that find innovative solutions and new markets. The relationship between innovation and successful enterprise isn’t new and it isn’t confined to commerce. Innovative technologies, such as gunpowder and radar, revolutionized warfare. The printing press revolutionized not only education but what it meant to be educated.

But commerce seems to be the focal point of the most significant expressions of innovative thinking today. While history’s greatest innovations were typically attributed to a single, inventive mind, today’s breakthroughs are increasingly the product of collaboration. What’s more, these collaborations typically embody a meeting of minds that create new solutions and identify new opportunities through a melding of different disciplines, different cultures and subsequently very diverse perspectives. One could say that diversity is moving beyond its social and ethical framework to become a driver of business creativity and value creation.

Witness the collaboration between Michigan-born Larry Page and Moscow native and first generation American Sergey Brin. The meeting of these two Stanford Ph.D. students led to the founding of one of our era’s fastest-growing global organizations. What began as Page’s dissertation, an exploration of the mathematical properties of the Web, is now Google, an entity which some have called “the most powerful brand in the world.” Page and Brin combined their passion for computers and intellectual curiosity to create an enterprise with an estimated market capitalization in excess of $94 billion (source: Yahoo! Finance).

More than just a brand, in 2006 Google became an official part of the lexicon when both Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary and the Oxford English Dictionary defined the word “google” as a verb meaning “To use the Google search engine to obtain information on the Internet.”

Innovation has always had its roots in identifying solutions to problems and fulfilling unmet needs. Modern business innovation often springs from putting together old ideas in new ways or seeing opportunities for existing products, services and concepts in new markets. Today’s managers can be heard to observe that leading heterogeneous teams, representing multiple cultures and life experiences, is a greater challenge then managing yesterday’s more homogeneous work groups. Yet thought leaders like James O. Rodgers opine that “… the world is changing. It’s evident in the marketplace, the customer base and the pool of potential employees…organizations will increasingly look for managers who demonstrate competence in getting the best from all employees” (James O. Rodgers, Managing Differently). Diverse organizations and diverse work teams promise the greatest opportunity for unconventional thinking and innovation.