A recent article compared Tesla, the innovative electric car company based here in Silicon Valley, with Kandi Technologies, the upstart electric vehicle company in China. It got me to thinking about frames – lateral and vertical. A case of two little guys: one innovating laterally and the other vertically.

Frames, or the act of “re-framing”, are fundamental to innovation leadership. For example, when you choose to design a better light-bulb, you will likely miss the opportunity to cast light in dark places with no electricity, using little more than a soft drink bottle filled with bleached water.

The frame is the box that we’re always trying to think outside of – no matter how creatively we think, how much we open our minds, all ideas ultimately live in boxes of their own – we’ve just reframed. [Read more…]