unNatural Selection: The PODCAST

Announcing My New Podcast on Organizational Innovation

I'm thrilled to announce the podcast launch of unNatural Selection! In this series, I'll be sitting down with pioneers across industries who are redefining what it means to innovate, compete, and lead in their respective domains. We all have a sense of what innovation looks like in our own domains, but how amazing would it be to hear about innovation strategy from the doers in areas as diverse as space exploration, MMA, Formula 1, and toilet paper? Think of this as “Dirty Jobs”, but for innovation! We’ll dive into their worlds to explore similarities, and to glean where differences give us a new perspective on our own competitiveness.

The Evolutionary Lens

Just as natural selection drives biological evolution, market forces and technological disruption create environments where only the most adaptable organizations thrive. On unNatural Selection, we'll explore how leaders navigate these dynamics, make strategic pivots, and foster cultures of continuous innovation.

Upcoming Episodes

I've been fortunate to record conversations with some remarkable innovators whose insights will challenge how you think about adaptation and growth. Over the coming weeks I will be releasing episodes with pioneers across:

Gaming Industry

Yohan Sengamalay with 3 decades as a leader in innovation in the gaming industry for some of the world's top companies, including Xbox, Amazon, Sony, and Activision. Yohan shares how companies navigated the highly competitive gaming landscape, where yesterday's innovation becomes today's standard and tomorrow's obsolete technology. He reveals the strategic thinking that has allowed these giants to evolve through multiple evolutionary transitions while building global communities, and gives us insights into where the field is going and what it takes to stay relevant and engaging.

Elite MMA Training

Dennis Amato is an elite mixed martial artist and foremost expert in Krav Maga. Dennis and I discuss how training methodologies have evolved in one of the world's fastest-evolving sports. Learn how they blend traditional wisdom with cutting-edge sports science to create survivors who can adapt to any opponent or situation. We’ll discuss the history of this close combat discipline, how it has evolved to adapt to today’s dangers, and how it transcends the physical aspects to build mentally fit competitors in any arena. Dennis’ insights into resilience, adaptation, and strategy are surprisingly relevant to boardrooms and startups alike. Learn about the survivor’s mindset and the perseverance to outlast your fiercest competitors.

The Digital Imaging Revolution

I cover the emergence of digital photography with Steven Sasson, the inventor of the portable digital camera, who forever changed how we capture the world—and whose innovation earned him the U.S. National Medal of Technology and Innovation, presented by President Obama. Steven’s invention in 1975 was revolutionary within a company (Kodak) that was the Apple of its time. Kodak had democratized consumer photography and made color photography available to the masses. The only problem was that the camera for Kodak was a loss-leader to promote printing consumable products and services! Kodak saw itself more as a company in the business of printing and chemicals—NOT in the business of photography and, more importantly, not in the business of capturing memories. We talk about the courage to challenge internal resistance, and the long arc of visionary thinking. We unpack how a single innovation disrupted an entire industry and forced established players to either adapt or perish. Although there were some internal supporters, Steven faced consistent resistance from a leadership that was terrified of releasing a product that would cannibalize their main source of revenue. There are many reports on this historical event, but here we will talk directly to the person who lived it and, even, catalyzed it.

NASA's Knowledge Management

Ed Hoffman, NASA's former Chief Knowledge Officer shares how an organization tasked with pushing the boundaries of human exploration manages, preserves, and builds upon its institutional knowledge across decades-long projects and generational transitions. We talk about what it means to innovate in an organization that has the international spotlight—where innovation literally means going into the unknown, often under the pressures of anticipating complex scenarios that could evolve over the course of decades, and where failure can be catastrophic. How does NASA balance the need to experiment with the knowledge that a single failure could, at best, ruin a multi-hundred million dollar mission and, at worst, set back space exploration for generations?

And that’s just the beginning…

Coming Soon

Soon, I’ll also be sitting down with the Chief Innovation Officer at MassGeneral Brigham, the largest and one of the most forward-thinking health systems in the U.S., to talk about what innovation looks like when human lives are at stake—and how to lead transformative change inside highly regulated, complex institutions.

And there are many more luminaries in the pipeline, each bringing their own evolutionary lessons from the front lines of transformation.

Join the Evolution

The first episodes of unNatural Selection will be released in the coming weeks. Subscribe now to ensure you don't miss these conversations that bridge the gap between evolutionary theory and organizational practice.

In a world of constant change, understanding the principles of adaptation isn't just interesting—it's essential. Together, we'll explore how the most successful organizations don't just respond to change, they anticipate it, embrace it, and harness it to fuel their growth.

Stay tuned for the evolution of innovation.