Business books are full of chess analogies and they’re frequently overextended. Thinking twenty moves ahead is nice and well in chess but rarely if ever translates into the real world. Instead, to think about innovation in particular, it helps to have played Scrabble.
Whereas in chess the only randomness comes from your single opponent’s moves, in Scrabble the additional randomness comes from the tile bag as well as the vastness of the dictionary. New words are also constantly added – Scrabble’s official lexicon is updated every four to eight years to match the latest words and slang.
That allows the set of playing words to grow over time, which brings more richness to the game. Similarly, the fields in which innovation can happen also grow over time. Examples include software, self-driving and biotechnology, which did not exist half a century before.
The first thing we realise as we start playing is that small words are relatively easy to think of but words that make a Bingo (a word using all of the tiles) require inspiration. In other words, small innovations are available via exhaustive permutations but really radical or big innovations are almost always born out of inspiration.
Looking at the tiles and the board in front of us, we begin to understand that the chances of success in the game rely on a few factors, mainly the selection of tiles on our rack, spaces available on the board, the existing words on the board, the opponent’s rack and responses and luck of the draw when we replenish our tiles at every turn.
Correspondingly, innovation is constrained by the availability of resources, smart allocation of these resources, opportunities to build something out of all of this, competitors and just like with everything else in this world, a generous share of fortuitous fate.
When it comes to employing resources, creativity is an important part of innovation. In Scrabble, this is achieved by permutations, active randomisation and plain guessing of what sounds like it could be an acceptable word. I’ve come up with many words that I’m convinced should be a word but nonetheless, not an accepted Scrabble word. For instance, how could there be no two-letter word containing the letter “V”?
Resources
Is innovation a mechanical, inorganic process where it’s just a matter of adding two and two together, or of producing one part oxygen to two parts hydrogen? No, innovation is an organic, creative activity and perhaps the most organic parts of an innovative process are the people.
Many people when given the right support and situation will easily shine as if they are talented, but that is not genuine talent. The letter “Q” has the highest score but the words we think of when it comes to “Q” usually have a “U”, such as “QUEEN”.
That would be alright if there are many “U”s but there are only 4 “U”s in the game. True talents are like “Q” word individuals that do not need a “U” to outperform, words such as “QABALA”, “QAT”, “TRANQ”, “QWERTY” and “SHEQEL”. Most of these words are unique and have foreign or diverse origins.
Thus, when it comes to employing human resource, innovators must recognise talent and have the ability to keep them. One rare genius is worth a lot more than ordinaries, but even a genius can’t do it alone. In addition, talent breathes dynamism into the process of innovation. Without talent, the path followed would be rote, uninspired and would probably bear an average outcome.
This paragraph describing Nigel Richards, a New Zealand–Malaysian Scrabble player who is among the most successful players of all time beautifully illustrates the type of creativity a talent should have:
“In a game in 1998, then-newcomer Richards had a rack of CDHLRN? (“?” denotes a blank tile). There was an E available on the board; Richards could have played CHILDREN for a bingo and a 50-point bonus. Instead, Richards played through two disconnected Os and an E. The word? The 10-letter CHLORODYNE.”
According to Carmine Garzia in her book, “Managing The Strategic Innovation Process”, “A unique positioning requires a unique set of resources. The first level concerns the concept of uniqueness. Positioning choices, possibly resulting from a combination of several strategic initiatives, are unique and this uniqueness is a source of competitive advantage. The uniqueness of the position must be supported by a unique set of resources.”
The more access an innovator has to unique resources, the greater the competitive advantage he or she holds. A successful innovator knows that eking out these advantages, large and small over time would bring greater rewards in the long run.
Allocation of resources
At times, it pays to sit out a round or swap our tiles rather than go for an easy play with low points. Tiles are limited, be they on the rack or in the bag. Judicious use of the tiles is the key to Scrabble success.
Similarly, innovators need to be clever resource allocators to see to the success of their projects. The most valid parallel here comes from the decision when to deploy tiles / resources – don’t waste them on low scores but don’t wait around for impossibly low odd combinations either (except for a few cases where the funders really are asking for moonshots). There is a wide spectrum between “minimum viable product” and “with all bells and whistles” and good innovators know how to make these trade-offs.
Opportunity
In Scrabble, the board can pose cruel limitations. We might have arranged a beautiful Bingo on the tile rack, pat ourselves on the back congratulating our genius and yet have nowhere to put it! Think of the frustration!
Christian Seelos and Johanna Mair in their article “When Innovation Goes Wrong” found that in examining less successful organizations, what holds them back is not an inability to innovate but a failure to embed their innovation efforts within a robust process for translating those efforts into impact.
Thus it is the same for that wonderful innovation, there must be a space and need for the innovation to be built, otherwise it is nothing but an expensive intellectual trophy.
Conversely, what is already on the board can be the root for a longer word. “REST” can be “RESTAURANT”, “FISH” can be “FISHING” or turn “HOST” into “GHOST”. Compounding previous innovations is a powerful engine of innovation growth. The phrase “standing on the shoulders of giants” means “Using the understanding gained by major thinkers who have gone before in order to make intellectual progress” and nowhere else is it more true than in innovation.
At one point, my Scrabble-playing, innovation-thinking friend observed that “the return structure is quite convex”. If we take into account the double word and triple word fields on the board it is worth trying to expand the number of letters employed to reach a certain square.
In the process of innovation, reaching a certain milestone in innovation is sometimes worth a lot more than if you had just stopped on a less ambitious rung. In other words, there are non-linear payoffs on the path of innovation. It’s fundamental for an innovator to think about scaling and where it is most profitable to do so.
Alex Lazarow, the author of “Out-Innovate: How Global Entrepreneurs – from Delhi to Detroit – Are Rewriting the Rules of Silicon Valley” writes that “…entrepreneurs must be creators who build industries rather than disruptors who change them because there are few existing businesses to disrupt. The companies they create must be global from birth because local markets are too small. They focus on resiliency and sustainability rather than unicorn-style growth at any cost.” In other words, scaling existing and proven models is often the more profitable path than pursuing only loosely connected greenfield ideas.
By the way, there are only 4 “S” tiles in the bag. It is prudent to keep the “S” tiles to attach to an existing word and pluralise it, while creating a whole new word using that very “S”. Do not though, waste the “S” on any play that scores less than 10.
At the other extreme, crowded space can restrict innovation. Towards the end of the game when the board gets filled up, the word length and the variation of words get limited. Two letter words become ever more important to know in the race to finish the leftover tiles on the rack.
Squeezing in one more slightly differentiated product may end up costing more in development than the gains in doing so. Several innovations suffer this fate of slow-death, saturated space, for example cramming yet another camera into a phone.
Negative space/Negative opportunity
Sometimes, what deters me from putting a combination on the board is knowing that it would open up opportunities for the other player. It is an even bigger threat if it involves the other player being able to reach a “Triple Word” square.
Innovation also sometimes appears to be carefully managed and sequenced. Companies with dominant market positions may sometimes delay the introduction of new features in order to provide reasons to upgrade and charge higher prices in the future. This is something that shareholders may like but something that hurts innovation overall.
Competitors and Specialists (Who else is in the game?)
A well contested game normally has a total of 700, so that is 350 for a 2 player game, around 230 for a 3 player game and so forth. Scrabble players usually prefer to play with someone that at least matches their average Scrabble score if not more. This is because having a good opponent bring out the best in your play. From the variety of words that are placed on the board, to just plain “I don’t want to lose out to this guy” mentality.
Innovating in a space where the incumbents are creative and motivated enhances the outcome. It also attracts equally vibrant minds to join the fray. There is a positive feedback on the firm level – an innovative firm will further attract valuable talents as its performance increases in excellence and achievements accumulate. More talents hopefully means more innovations and therefore, the virtuous cycle continues.
According to Professor Ricardo Hausmann, heterogeneity of know-how is key to development, not just the usual suspects of capital, education, or even institutions. In particular, his theory states that in order to move into new industries a country needs expertise in adjacent areas, just like tiles on the Scrabble board. In the end everything must be connected, nothing can develop on its own.
Luck
Annie Duke, the American professional poker player who used to be the leading money winner among women in ‘World Series of Poker’ history, connects hidden information with outcomes. In her book, “Thinking in Bets”, she writes, “Chess contains no hidden information and very little luck. The pieces are all there for both players to see. If you lose at a game of chess, it must be because there were better moves that you didn’t make or didn’t see.” In Scrabble, how well we play depends a lot on the tiles we draw from the bag.
On November 8, 1895, German physics professor Wilhelm Röntgen stumbled on X-rays while experimenting with Lenard tubes and Crookes tubes. Microwave ovens came as an idea when Percy Spencer accidentally melted a chocolate bar in his pocket in the 1940s. Velcro was thought of by George de Mestral who when walking his dog, found burdock seeds had stuck to his clothes.
The theoretical highest-scoring Scrabble word is “OXYPHENBUTAZONE”. The odds of this happening, especially in a tournament where the other player wouldn’t even allow you the opening to do so, is almost zero but nonetheless imagine the thrill of putting this down on the board. On the other hand, picture a woeful game where you’re unluckily withdrawing one vowel after another onto a rack already full of them.
In all endeavours there is an element of luck – especially in the process of innovation where so many factors, be they ideas, resources, people, events, etc. need to come together serendipitously. The innovator must always be conscious of his or her silent partner, the Lady Luck.
Becoming better innovators
How do we become good at Scrabble? The obvious answer is to study Scrabble words. This would also help in recognising potential words from the tile rack. Memorise all 2 and 3 letter words, “AZO” and “QI” being recent favourites of mine. Not all students are innovators but all innovators must make studying a life-long habit.
The other thing is learning how to persevere. In many games, I was behind by over 100 points but managed to claw myself back into winning. In this climate of despondent belief that all the low-hanging fruits are gone, it’s very easy for an innovator to get discouraged and throw in the towel when they could have made it had they persevered. For motivation, look at Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Edison!
Of course, issues such as the role of government policies and institutions, intellectual property rights and legal infrastructure, finance and a whole host of other factors that help nurture innovation are out of scope here. Nevertheless, many of the unique game features of Scrabble are mirrored in the challenges faced by innovators today.
EightAteEight 