“Carla shares practical tools, models, and facilitation exercises to apply innovation as a discipline.”
AI Adoption is an Organizational Design Problem. Most CEOs Treat it Like a Culture Problem.
The gap in most AI transformation efforts isn't employee resistance It's the lack of a companywide strategy that tells people what to do, in their specific role, with this specific technology. When PwC's US CEO Paul Griggs announced that any...
Why Your Team Keeps Thinking Small (And the Curiosity Fix That Sends Ideas to Space)
When was the last time your boss told you to think big, and you actually did? Nearly everyone has been in that room. The one where the CEO sets up cross-functional teams, brings in a facilitator, and challenges the organization to completely...
Why Great Ideas Start with Curiosity
I'm sitting at the long conference room table absolutely doubled over. This ever so proper group of Japanese and Swiss executives is staring at me. Incredulous.My sides heave, hot tears stream down my cheeks, and I can barely breathe."Is this...
How the Goldilocks Effect Drives Innovation
I'm sitting in at my gate in Terminal C at Newark airport. I walked off stage this morning feeling uneasy, and my thoughts are still swirling around in my head. Not because it went badly. It didn’t. The audience had leaned in. The feedback was...
Does Curiosity Have an Expiration Date?
I was talking to a group of executives last week in a workshop about the beauty of going down the rabbit hole.You know, you get going on an idea and the moment (or caffeine or lack of sleep) just lets you run with the absurdity of it.Inevitably...
Are All Ideas Equal?
I'm in Brussels maneuvering between people as I meander down the aisles of booths at the conference tradeshow. I'd just had coffee with someone who caught me as I stepped off stage. That's when I bumped up against the Tony's Chocoloney's woman....
How to Define Success with AI
Late last fall I was in a a leadership conversation that had gone long. Not because anyone was arguing, but because no one could quite articulate what they were aiming for. Eventually, someone asked a simple question. It wasn’t confrontational...
What People Really Need from Leaders. And Why This Matters for Innovation Performance
Recent global research from Gallup’s Global Leadership Report reveals something refreshingly human about leadership: people don’t follow authority — they follow what gives them hope, trust, compassion, and stability. Across surveys in 52...
How to Build Critical Thinking Skills in the AI Era
"But, what does this mean to all of our critical thinking skills?" The woman's voice wavered with hesitation, but she clearly spoke for the room of nearly a thousand people. It was during a Q&A section I have during my Muse & the Machine...
Are You Asking Enough? McDonald’s Can Teach You How
Back in the 1970s, McDonald’s faced a simple problem: people ordered burgers, but not much else. Sales had plateaued, and the company needed a way to boost revenue without changing the menu or raising prices. So they tried something new. They...
The Real Secret Behind Every Breakthrough? Trust.
I'm sitting in the conference room side-eyeing everyone else on my team. We had the right ingredients for an amazing project—smart people, a great idea, bold vision. But we couldn't seem to make progress. Every brainstorm session ended with our...
What’s Your MVI?
How to test ideas before they’re “ready”, and why waiting kills creativity I'm sitting across the table in our old farm house listening to my brother reminiscing about his engineering internship. At the John Deere assembly plant in Iowa, the...