Most large organizations say they value innovation.
They invest in innovation teams, encourage new ideas, and talk openly about the importance of thinking differently. And yet, many genuinely good ideas never make it into the world.
They don’t fail in testing.
They aren’t rejected outright.
They simply fade away.
This page is an attempt to think out loud about why that happens.
Not to assign blame.
Not to offer solutions.
Just to notice patterns that seem to repeat.
In theory, good ideas should rise.
In practice, ideas need a home.
For an idea to survive inside a large organization, it usually needs:
an owner with authority
a budget
development capacity
a reporting line
and a reason to exist inside existing structures
When an idea can’t attach itself to these things, it can become weightless.
Not wrong.
Not unworkable.
Just unanchored.
What if many ideas don’t fail because they’re weak —
but because the organization simply has nowhere to put them?
Organizations operate within defined mandates.
Mandates protect focus, reduce risk, and clarify accountability. They also quietly shape which kinds of ideas are even possible.
When an idea:
stretches beyond the current business model
implies a new kind of customer
or challenges how value is currently created
it may be admired — and still set aside.
Not because it lacks promise,
but because it doesn’t fit the mandate.
What if alignment, rather than merit, is the real filter ideas pass through?
Behind most innovation decisions sits a simple constraint: finite resources.
Organizations rarely have a shortage of ideas.
They often have a shortage of development dollars, engineering time, and executive attention.
Product managers, business units, and innovation teams are frequently competing for the same pool of funding.
Ideas aren’t evaluated in isolation.
They’re evaluated against one another.
What gets built often depends on:
which initiative promises near-term return
which team can make the strongest case
which proposal feels safest to fund
Innovation becomes a kind of contest.
Not a hostile one —
but a constant one.
What if many ideas fade not because they’re bad, but because they can’t win a funding argument at the right moment?
From the outside, prioritization looks strategic.
From the inside, it can feel like negotiation layered on negotiation.
Product teams defend their roadmaps.
Innovation teams defend future possibilities.
Senior leaders weigh tradeoffs across the entire organization.
Everyone is often acting rationally within their role.
Still, the result is that ideas are filtered not only by vision or quality —
but by their ability to secure scarce development dollars.
What if innovation is shaped less by imagination,
and more by which ideas can survive budget conversations?
Innovation teams are often created to think beyond the core business.
At first, this can feel liberating.
But those teams usually depend on the core organization for:
funding
authority
legitimacy
and implementation
This creates a quiet paradox.
Innovation is encouraged —
as long as it doesn’t require the organization to change too much.
When innovation teams repeatedly surface ideas that exceed mandate or funding appetite, tension can build.
Not because the ideas are flawed,
but because they point toward futures the system isn’t prepared to invest in.
What if innovation teams don’t struggle because they imagine too little —
but because they imagine too far ahead?
Ideas that don’t fit are rarely rejected outright.
They are:
deferred
parked
labeled “ahead of their time”
quietly deprioritized
In the moment, shelving often feels responsible.
Resources are limited.
Timing matters.
Focus is necessary.
But shelves have a way of becoming endpoints.
What if many “paused” ideas are simply waiting for conditions that never arrive?
Not every shelved idea is ahead of its organization.
Sometimes, it’s ahead of the market.
I’ve seen examples where an innovation worked technically, tested well, and even generated excitement — but struggled to gain adoption because the surrounding ecosystem wasn’t ready.
Mobile payments are a useful example.
When they were first introduced in Canada, early pilots generated strong interest and a clear “cool factor.” But widespread adoption didn’t follow.
Not because the technology was flawed —
but because people weren’t yet using their phones that way.
At the time, phones were still primarily for calls and text messages. Smartphones existed, but habits hadn’t shifted. The idea required a broader behavioral change that couldn’t be rushed.
That shift took years, not months.
And when it finally happened, the earlier innovation wasn’t wasted. It had been waiting.
What if some ideas don’t fail because they’re wrong —
but because the world around them isn’t ready yet?
Good ideas can be unsettling.
They can:
expose inefficiencies
challenge existing assumptions
imply structural change
Even in healthy organizations, stability is often rewarded more than disruption.
Over time, innovation can become something to be managed, not followed.
What if innovation isn’t uncomfortable because it’s radical —
but because it asks the organization to evolve faster than it knows how?
This page isn’t a critique of organizations or the people inside them.
Most organizations behave rationally according to their incentives.
This is about noticing how those incentives shape outcomes.
Across industries, similar patterns tend to appear:
ideas need sponsorship to survive
mandates define possibility
funding determines feasibility
timing governs adoption
innovation is welcomed — until it becomes inconvenient
None of this requires bad actors.
It emerges naturally from how large systems preserve themselves.
What if understanding these patterns is the first step —
not toward fixing them, but toward naming them more clearly?
Ideas that fade inside organizations don’t simply disappear.
They leave traces:
in the people who created them
in the trust those people place in the system
in the future ideas that never get shared
Even when ideas aren’t taken or credited upward, they can still be lost.
What if the real cost of unused ideas isn’t missed opportunity —
but a quieter erosion of imagination and engagement?
Fiction allows these questions to exist without needing answers.
In stories, ideas can:
escape their original containers
collide with institutional limits
reveal consequences over time
Not to argue for change —
but to observe what systems do when imagination outpaces structure.
If these questions resonate, my novels explore them through story rather than argument.
You’re welcome to read them and think along with me.
👉 (Click here to check out my Books page)