“You Don’t Flip a Switch and Say, ‘OK, Let’s Innovate Together, Let’s Collaborate.' You Gotta Have the Right Culture in Place.”

The Resonance Test 51: Andy Boynton

Want to get schooled on innovation and higher education? Talk with Andy Boynton. Boynton is the John and Linda Powers Family Dean at the Boston College Carroll School of Management. He’s also a long-term friend of ours (we helped BC redesign their core curriculum). As we’ve been lately thinking about the higher-ed experience, we decided to invite him onto The Resonance Test. In this informal-and-informed conversation, our Toby Bottorf, who knows a thing or two about college administrators, chatted with Boynton about the fundamental nature of design thinking, in and out of the classroom. Boynton talked about ideas and competitive advantage and the importance of the “connective tissue” of innovation. He spoke of time (“Spending time up front makes it faster in the long run. And by the way, it’s gonna bring success faster”) and cost (“Throwing a lot of products and services out and seeing which ones stick sounds very expensive to me”). As for BC’s own innovations, he says things have been “incredibly collaborative all summer across the university” and that they’ve prepared for this by, um, working with us. “You don’t flip a switch and say, ‘OK, let’s innovate together, let’s collaborate. You gotta have the right culture in place.”

Host: Kyle Wing
Editor: Kip Pilalas
Producer: Ken Gordon