206: How Innovation Really Happens | Martin Reeves and the Creation of the Like Button

Martin Reeves is chairman of the Boston Consulting Group’s Henderson Institute, a think tank dedicated to developing new insights from business, technology, economics, and science. He is a coauthor of several books, including his most recent book, Like, which describes the genesis of the Like button, which was created in part, by his co-author Bob Goodson.

In this episode we discuss the following:

• Though we often think of innovation is heroic, deliberate, and isolated, it’s often serendipitous, unpredictable, and social.
• The idea of inventions as private property, which reinforces the often incorrect notion that inventions are made by single inventors, is a relatively recent invention in human history.
• We never know the impact of innovation. The Like button blew up an industry and created a host of new challenges and problems to be solved.
• Whether in the field of academic papers, the creation of the Davy lamp, or a simple Like button, innovation is rarely an isolated, independent event.