One of the most interesting readings about the topic of innovation would be that of Tom Kelley, specifically the one entitled the Ten Faces of Innovation. In it, he discussed the different learning personas of innovation namely: the anthropologist, the experimenter, the cross pollinator, the organizing personas: the hurdler, the collaborator, the director, the building personas: the experience architect, the set designer, the storyteller, and the caregiver .
Among the ten faces of innovation, the author of this paper is most familiar with the collaborator. This choice is in relation to the current field he is working in. In the field of medicine, physicians are not the only ones who do the actual job of treating the patient and ensuring that their progress towards total recovery goes well. It is a team effort where the physician, just like all other members of the medical team, is expected to collaborate with each other, in order to come up with a workable and long term solution for the patient.
The collaborator plays an important role in extracting people out of their comfort zones in order to form multidisciplinary teams that really do the job. This face of innovation can therefore be used to solve complicated medical cases, especially ones that are so mixed up and convoluted that it would take the efforts and brains of an entire team to resolve.
Scott Berkun, in his book The Myths of Innovation, discussed various myths about innovation. In this case, the chosen face of innovation can be used to directly address the myth that good ideas are rare. This myth suggests that people are most likely to fail to find good ideas because they are simply rare . The principle of a collaborator goes directly against this myth because it supports the notion that all good ideas can be generated and implemented through team work.
References
Berkun, S. (2010). The Myths of Innovation. O'Reilly Media, 01-248.
Kelley, T. (2005). The Ten Faces of Innovation. Tom Kelley IDEO, http://tenfacesofinnovation.com/tenfaces/index.htm.
