Each graduating class at Tuck bestows a parting gift on the school. The gifts range far and wide – I am (now less) secretly hoping that the Class of 2012 donates a tartan carpet for Stell Hall. Wouldn’t it just complete the look? (In case you haven’t been to Stell Hall, the answer is, “Yes!”) Anyway, the Class of 2011 endowed a teaching award, whereupon each year, students from the second year class will vote on their favorite teacher at Tuck. This was somewhat controversial, as there are so many great professors to choose from and they all CARE so much about their teaching. But, the election of Ron Adner as the first of many great Tuck professors to the newly endowed hall of fame is hard to argue against.
Here’s my bet: in 30 years, every MBA student at every top school in the world will know who Ron Adner is. He has an amazing mind – his groundbreaking work on ecosystems is world class – and, as shown by the Class of 2011 award, he is incredibly passionate about teaching. (If there is a school where a ‘best teacher’ award is most meaningful, and probably most difficult to win, this is it.) This term, I’m taking his Entrepreneurship & Innovation Strategy (EIS) class. What does that mean? It means that two afternoons each week, I get my backside kicked intellectually!
EIS is focused on thinking beyond the innovation. You have the greatest new product ever known to the world? That’s great, but there are many, many other things you have to get right if you’re going to have that product reach its potential and change the world. Every class, I swallow my pride, curse my flawed mind and push myself to think harder, to think differently. Each class, Prof. Adner pulls a rabbit from a hat and it all seems so obvious in the end.
But this is not simply a lesson in frustration. The beauty of the class is that I am now able to think about commercializing innovation in a practical and much more sophisticated way than I was before. As the classes go on, I find myself understanding the magic trick earlier. Through our group projects (one on Bose suspension systems – check those out if you don’t know about them – very cool; and one on Gore-Tex fabric) I work with super smart classmates to figure the magic tricks out for ourselves.
In winter term, a group of 14 students will do a research-to-practice seminar with Prof. Adner. The EIS class have been warned that there will be no magic shows – this will be a class of extensive reading, exhausting thinking, and lengthy debate with few, potentially no, tangible outcomes. It sounds fantastic!
Read the full article: Bring your brain; leave your ego