Zero to Hero: Disney and The Muppets.
As children there are a few companies that impact us for the rest of our lives and you would be hard pressed to find a person who didn't grow up with Disney or the Muppets (The Jim Henson Company) having that sort of life-altering impact. What do they have in common? They both exemplified an eternal optimism for the future, and that no dream is too big, shown by quotes such as "If your heart is in your dreams, no request is too extreme " said by Jiminy Cricket, the legendary Disney character; and "Just because you haven't found your talent yet, doesn't mean you don't have one " said by Kermit the Frog, the star of the Muppets. These mantras were prevalent in many of Walt Disney's works, the founder and creator of Disney, and Jim Henson, the creator of the Muppets, and Sesame Street. However these mantras are also common of innovator's in general whether it be Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Larry Page, or Richard Branson, to name a few. Mantras commonplace among the people who change our world and make it a better place, and change the future of an industry. Were Walt Disney and Jim Henson innovators? Were Walt Disney's and Jim Henson's innovations disruptive or sustained? How did they change their respective industries? These are the questions I will be answering.
Firstly, it's important to differentiate between different types of innovations. The two main one's being a sustained innovation and a disruptive innovation. It isn't exactly black and white but there are key differences, disruptors are innovators, but not all innovator's are disruptors. A sustained innovation is one that "first encroaches on the high end of the existing market and then diffuses downward " (Christensen. "The Innovator's Solution: Creating and Sustaining Successful Growth "). In simpler terms it is an innovation that can be integrated into existing practices including innovations that disrupt standard modes of practice but that can be incorporated into the already existing structures of major players.
