if you show your prototype to two different people and the response you get is substantially different, your job is to try to figure out why.

That's also dangerous, because, if you are doing a lot of paradigm innovation, call it—which is not a good word—but if you are breaking boundaries elsewhere, maybe you need to be very within boundaries on other fronts.

Anyone who has ever worked with an editor on any type of project knows who is in charge—the final decisions still remain, however uncomfortably, with the creator—but in order to create something truly great, you must submit yourself and your work to this feedback process. Whether it’s with an investor, an executive with green-lighting power, or an

the firm that has a program of continuously soliciting, analyzing, and acting upon such input will be better positioned to capitalize on strategic opportunities than the firm that gets such input on an opportunistic, irregular basis.