America’s Greatest Innovator, Thomas Edison: 1847-1931

Miller/Edison Heritage

Robert Anderson Miller Mina Miller Edison

Lewis Miller

Edison Created New Markets

•  Pioneered 6 industries:

– Document duplication (1873)

– Telecommunicat’ns (1876) – Recorded sound (1877) – Electrical power (1879) – Motion pictures (1893) – Portable power (1905)

Edison’s Innovation Culture

•  Edison set the innovation “climate”

•  Employees owned the culture

•  Dynamic interaction between leaders, employees

Five Competencies of Innovation™

1.  Solution-centered Mindset

2.  Kaleidoscopic Thinking

3.  Full-spectrum Engagement

4.  Master-mind Collaboration

5.  Super-value Creation

Edison Innovation Literacy Blueprint™ ©2007 – 2011 Sarah M. Caldicott

Solution-Centered Mindset

Kaleidoscop-ic Thinking

Full Spectrum

Engagement

Master Mind

Collaboration Super-Value

Creation Align Your

Goals to Your Passions

Maintain a Notebook

Intensity & Relaxation

Recruit for Chemistry &

Results

Link Market Trends With Core

Strengths

Cultivate Charismatic

Optimism

Practice Ideaphoria

Seriousness & Playfulness

Design Multi-

Disciplinary Collaboration

Teams

Tune Into Your Target

Audience

Seek Knowledge Relentlessly

Discern Patterns

Sharing & Protecting

Inspire an Environment of Open Exchange

Apply the Right Business

Model

Experiment Persistently

Express Ideas Visually

Complexity & Simplicity

Reward Collaboration

Understand Scale-Up Effects

Pursue Rigorous Objectivity

Explore the Road Not

Taken

Solitude & Team

Become a Master

Networker

Create an Unforgettable

Market-Moving Brand

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Edison believed that nature expressed itself in precise mathematical patterns. His belief in the omnipresence of these patterns gave him unshakeable confidence that he could ultimately decipher Nature’s codes.

E4. Experiment persistently

E9. Express ideas visually

Edison used drawings as a

way to capture his

intellectual property, and

communicate in a diverse

environment.

E14. Complexity and simplicity

“Nothing is less productive than

to make more efficient that

which should not be done in the

first place.”

- Peter Drucker

E18. Inspire open exchange

“He conversed, argued and

disputed with us all as

though he were a colleague

on the same footing.” - Dyer and Martin

E23. Apply the right business model

“Until there’s a viable business

solution there is no opportunity.”

- Carlson and Wilmot

TEDxPeachtree Speech

•  November 4th, 2011

•  Atlanta, GA

•  On YouTube!

•  e-Book from Wiley Publishing

•  “What Would Thomas Edison Be Doing Today?”

Contact Information Sarah Miller Caldicott

The Power Patterns of Innovation 7115 North Ave, Suite 312

Oak Park, IL 60302 T: 708-445-9335 C: 954-328-0384

W: www.powerpatterns.com E: scaldicott@powerpatterns.com