Thomas Edison: Success and Innovation through Failure

Thomas Edison: Success and Innovation through Failure
Author: Ian Wills
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 257
Release: 2020-01-01
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 3030299406

This book develops a systematic approach to the role of failure in innovation, using the laboratory notebooks of America's most successful inventor, Thomas Edison. It argues that Edison's active pursuit of failure and innovative uses of failure as a tool were crucial to his success. From this the author argues that not only should we expect innovations to fail but that there are good reasons to want them to fail. Using Edison's laboratory notebooks, written as he worked and before he knew the outcome we see the many false starts, wrong directions and failures that he worked through on his way to producing revolutionary inventions. While Edison's strengths in exploiting failure made him the icon of American inventors, they could also be liabilities when he moved from one field to another. Not only is this book of value to readers with an interest in the history of technology and American invention, its insights are important to those who seek to innovate and to those who employ and finance them.

Innovation: A Very Short Introduction

Innovation: A Very Short Introduction
Author: Mark Dodgson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 163
Release: 2010-03-25
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0199568901

This book demonstrates how innovation is used to create wealth, productivity growth, and improved quality of life

Innovate Like Edison

Innovate Like Edison
Author: Michael Gelb
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 328
Release: 2007
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780525950318

Provides a guide to the creative strategies used by Thomas Edison, counseling inventors and entrepreneurs on how to use these steps to find success in the modern business market.

Edison on Innovation

Edison on Innovation
Author: Alan Axelrod
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 192
Release: 2008-01-07
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780470231395

In this fascinating exploration of one of the most celebrated and innovative minds, best-selling author Alan Axelrod cuts through the myths and reverence surrounding Edison’s “genius” to show how the inventor was, in fact, an ordinary man who created extraordinary work. While many of us believe that creativity, like genius, is something that just happens by chance or destiny, Edison’s life demonstrates that creativity of the very highest order can indeed be summoned up at will, and even reduced to a reliable working method and set of principles.

Innovation Capital

Innovation Capital
Author: Jeff Dyer
Publisher: Harvard Business Press
Total Pages: 276
Release: 2019-05-14
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1633696537

Learn from the Best Great leaders of innovation know that creativity is not enough. They succeed not only on the basis of their ideas, but because they have the vision, reputation, and networks to win the backing needed to commercialize them. It turns out that this quality--called "innovation capital"--is measurably more important for innovation than just being creative. The authors have spent decades studying how people get great ideas (the subject of The Innovator's DNA) and how people test and develop those ideas (explored in The Innovator's Method). Now they share what they've learned from a multipronged research program designed to determine how people compete for, and obtain, resources to launch new ideas: How you can build a personal reputation for innovation What techniques you can use to amplify your innovation capital How you can garner attention for your ideas and projects and persuade audiences to support them What it means to provide visionary leadership and how you can achieve it Featuring interviews with the superstars of innovation--individuals like Jeff Bezos (Amazon), Elon Musk (Tesla), Marc Benioff (Salesforce), Indra Nooyi (PepsiCo), and Shantanu Narayen (Adobe)--this book will help you position yourself and your ideas to compete for attention and resources so that you can launch innovations with impact.

Inventing the Future

Inventing the Future
Author: Sarah Miller Caldicott
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 81
Release: 2011-10-14
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1118219864

Thomas Edison holds over a thousand patents in his name, including the electric light bulb, the phonograph, and motion picture camera. He is considered among the world's most prolific inventors, with a work ethic and vision for the future that helped change the modern world. And with all of the advances in current technology that he helped to invent, just imagine: What Would Thomas Edison Be Doing Today? Author Sarah Miller Caldicott, a great-grandniece of Edison and expert in his methods, sets out to answer just that. Inventing the Future is a well-researched, intriguing look at how Edison would innovate today using new technology, and how modern day thinkers can adapt his proven innovation methods to their advantage. It also includes 7 steps anyone can take to start thinking like an innovator, and offers a hands-on view of how creativity and risk-taking come together to design powerful concepts that create new markets. Learn the strategies needed to remove innovation barriers, begin driving the breakthroughs of the future, and change the way you do business. Stimulate your ability to imagine what's possible.

The Papers of Thomas A. Edison

The Papers of Thomas A. Edison
Author: Thomas A. Edison
Publisher: JHU Press
Total Pages: 862
Release: 1989
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1421400901

Gathers sketches, notebook entries, letters, articles, patent information, and financial papers from the beginning of Edison's career as an inventor

Thomas Edison: Lighting a Revolution

Thomas Edison: Lighting a Revolution
Author: Nick Cimarusti
Publisher: Teacher Created Materials
Total Pages: 35
Release: 2018-12-03
Genre: Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN: 1493867156

Not all of Thomas Edison's inventions were successful, but he didn't let this deter him from trying. He believed in using failure as a chance to learn and improve. Readers will be inspired by Thomas Edison's fascinating life and how he achieved success in this Informational Text created in collaboration with the Smithsonian Institution! Build reading skills while engaging students' curiosity about STEAM topics through real-world examples. Packed with factoids and informative sidebars, this book features a hands-on STEAM challenge that is perfect for use in a makerspace and teaches students every step of the engineering design process. Make STEAM career connections with career advice from actual Smithsonian employees working in STEAM fields. Discover engineering innovations that solve real-world problems with content that touches on all aspects of STEAM: Science, Technology, Engineering, the Arts, and Math!

Edison and the Business of Innovation

Edison and the Business of Innovation
Author: André Millard
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
Total Pages: 0
Release: 1993-08-01
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 9780801847301

This is the story of the "other" Thomas Edison—not the heroic lone inventor, but Edison the businessman, industrialist, and successful manager of one of the world's largest industrial research laboratories. Tracing his career from his boyhood to his death in 1931, Edison and the Business of Innovation reveals Edison to be an entrepreneur of extraordinary vision. From extensive research in the Edison archives at West Orange, New Jersey, Andre Millard presents new information about Edison the businessman and provides new interpretations of old issues.