This is a lively book. As befits its central image, the "Zero-Gravity Thinker," it moves lightly, traveling without friction through the challenging thicket of innovation. Cynthia Barton Rabe defines innovation simply and focuses on its human side. While her book does not provide specific guidance about what processes to use, or tell you how to innovate in your industry, it is an immediately applicable, solid introduction you can use to promote innovation. Rabe's creative successes (she was part of the team that introduced the Energizer Bunny) illustrate her points well. Her stories about skilled leaders who failed to innovate though they had the right training and personnel go a long way toward proving her central claim: Organizational attitudes blocking innovation are the main reason people don't innovate more often. We recommend this book to all those who are eager to innovate, and ready and willing to shake up their organizational structures to do so.

The author, an innovation and strategy consultant, promoted in this book her concept of bringing in Zero Gravity Thinkers (outsiders with "psychological distance" from the team, "renaissance tendencies" (broad interests and capabilities) and "related expertise") to stimulate innovation

Insanity in individuals is something rare - but in groups, parties, nations, and epochs, it is the rule. Friedrich Nietzsche pg 23

Alfred Sloan, who ran GM from 1923 to 1956, was onto something when he said at a meeting, "Gentlemen, I take it that we are all in complete agreement on the decision here. Then I propose that we postpone further discussion...to give ourselves time to develop disagreement and perhaps gain some understanding of what the decision is all about." pg 39

The world hates change, yet it is the only thing that has brought progress. - C.F. Kettering pg 143

The first and greatest victory is to conquer yourself; to be conquered Plato pg 157

Rabe defines innovation as "an application of an idea that results in a valuable improvement." Her definition emphasizes that the ability to think innovatively should be a goal for every function in an organization - not just the new product or technology team. As she correctly observes, there is a process tuning typically follows (this can be very short or, in the case of some product or technology innovations, very long) in order to apply the idea. The final result? An innovation." One of her most interesting - and most valuable - concepts is of what she calls "Zero-Gravity Thinkers." The title of her book refers to the most common barriers to innovation: practicioners of GroupThink ("the strongest force on earth") and ExpertThink ("GroupThink on steroids"). They establish and then vigorously defend all manner of "filters" to diminish if not "kill" any perceived threats to the status quo. Rabe concedes that Zero-Gravity Thinkers aren't a "magic solution" to such barriers because "there is no cure-all for a stuck-in-the mud organization." However, they are a high-value tool when recognizing and then responding effectively to the aforementioned "filters."

Of special interest to many readers is what Rabe has to say about the leadership required when "going where no one has gone before." She does not limit her attention to leadership at the senior-management level. On the contrary, she convincingly explains why innovation leadership must be present at all levels and throughout all areas of an organization. Moreover, given the well-entrenched and highly-efficient "filters," the nature of the leadership required must itself be innovative. It must take into full account, for example, the perils of challenging traditional chains of authority and channels of communication. This is precisely what Jim O'Toole has in mind when discussing (in Leading Change) what he characterizes as "the ideology of comfort and the tyranny of custom." The power of GroupThink and ExpertThink must never be under-estimated. When necessary, effective leaders of innovation initiatives are courageous enough to ignore convention and act on their own intuition and rational arguments of those outside the given organization. Also, they are prudent but not risk-adverse. They never state or even imply that innovative thinking is acceptable only without the possibility of failure. What Rabe offers in this volume is a rigorous and thorough examination of who and what can "kill" innovation...and offers practical advice as to how to respond effectively and productively when opposed by them.