2008's best books on innovation

On businessweek.com i found a list of the 10 best books on innovation in 2008. I made a selection of three books, with a short introduction, that can be very inspiring for us Imagineers:


1. The Game-Changer: How You Can Drive Revenue and Profit Growth with Innovation
Authors: A.G. Lafley and Ram Charan
Publisher: Crown Business










Procter & Gamble (PG) CEO Lafley and management consultant Charan reveal how P&G and companies such as Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) and Nokia (NOK) have taken steps to create fresh products and new markets by making innovation a key corporate strategy. In addition, they look at such practical matters as how to best manage risk when pursuing goals that lack precedents inside a corporation.



2. Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies
Authors: Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff
Publisher: Harvard Business Press










Li and Bernoff, both analysts at Forrester Research, present a clearly written and refreshingly grown-up look at social media used by entire corporations, and not just Gen Y staff. They present real-world business narratives of how companies from Best Buy (BBY) to Ernst & Young use blogs, Wikis, and social networks to create, promote, and share new ideas, both within corporate walls and among consumers outside them.



3. Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations
Author: Clay Shirky
Publisher: Penguin Press










Author and New York University faculty member Clay Shirky describes the profound impact of social-technological tools on contemporary culture—from e-mail and blogs to Twitter and wikis. Shirky's book is an example-laden history of the development—and impact—of such tools. For instance, industries such as music and media writhe in a state of turmoil, with no clear strategies to deal with the rise of mass amateurization and cheap and easy distribution. In the author's view, we're living in the middle of a revolution as momentous as that which followed the invention of the printing press. Society and industry are being radically reshaped.

Also don't forget to look at the entire list which also includes 'the new age of innovation' by C.K. Prahalad and M.S. Krishnan.