Fast Company held its first-ever, week-long event, The Fast Company

Innovation Festival, from November 9-13, in New York City. Over the course of

five days, the festival brought together extraordinary personalities, leaders, and

entrepreneurs across the fields of business, technology, design, and innovation

to discuss today's most pressing challenges, trends, and creative ideas.

We took a step back to figure out what we took away from the experience, and

landed on five “truths” we felt were relevant to the dreamers and do-ers alike:

1. Content & Creation Reign

2. Authenticity is King

3. Design ≠ Inspiration

4. Pareto is Wrong

5. Strategy is Saying No

Have a flick through to gain insight into our observations and what they meant

to us and our clients.

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Photo Credit: Fast Company

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Across all industries, technology platforms are challenging the role of the

curator. Whether it be YouTube, Tumblr, Periscope, or the next "thing" of

tomorrow, the removal of content curators provides additional access for other

roles to push innovation, creativity, and ideas.

• "Twitter and social platforms are created by engineers - it's up to the artist to

leverage them", said Steve Aoki, musician and record producer, in

conversation to Bill Nye, American Scientist and Educator

• A day later, David Karp, Twitter CEO, would echo the same sentiment, "it's

technologists role to build the platform, but the artist role to create content".

The friction comes into play because businesses and creatives alike must

compete to capture the eyes of their followers. Garance Dore, Fashion Blogger,

commented "now we have an army of creators that must earn their audiences“,

which spoke to her own journey of balancing content, creation, and personal

voice.

The how is what keep us all excited and continues to redefine who the expert is

and what is important.

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Photo Credit: Fast Company

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In the age of content saturation, a key differentiator for business is found in

authenticity that is built into the fabric of company culture. Throughout the

conference, innovators, leaders, and entrepreneurs provided evidence that

signaled the strength of the differentiator:

• In under 10 years, TOMS CEO, Blake Mycoskie, who came up with his one-

for-one shoe business idea in 2006, has given away almost 50 million shoes

around the world. His explanation for success revolves around a belief and

value system that unites complicated issues. In the case of TOMS, his

model, "makes it easy to participate".

• According to Neil Blumenthal, Warby Parker founder, Warby Parker has kept

their mission simple. There are four rules that they have built their company

on, which has permeated their website and is now a part of their core values,

driving what they hire and fire by.

• Angela Ahrendts, Apple SVP, on one of the first things she decided to do

[when she joined Apple] was create a better way to communicate with her

60,000 Apple retail employees. "My kids were visiting from London and all

they were doing in the car was WhatsApp and Snapchat," she says. "It hit

me: That’s the way we should communicate." She now shares a video with

her employees every week—three thoughts in under three minutes, she

says—so her employees can feel more involved with Apple’s decision-

making.

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Photo Credit: Fast Company

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User-centered design is not a replacement for inspiration. Despite the science,

and advancement, of fields such as UX, service design, design thinking, etc., it

is clear that user-centered design is only one half of the recipe. The other half?

Inspiration.

Mark Parker, Nike CEO, comments on secrets of success, "you can't let

success breed a one-dimensional way of thinking". Sitting right next to him,

Serena Williams, Tennis Player, chimed in with her own anecdote, "if you're

always looking behind you, you'll never see what's in front of you".

So how do you create value? You are obsessed with every step of the journey.

Every piece should bring delight and after all is said and done, customers

should want to be friends with you, says Birchbox CEO Katia Beauchamp. She

also pointedly added, "the notion that you would spend a discretionary dollar in

any way that isn't delightful is absurd to me“, referencing her commitment to

unparalleled experience for every customer.

Tony Fadell, CEO of Nest Labs, added his spin to design, "finding the truth is

solving real problems…solving for pain, not vitamins" This speaks to seeing a

vision and sticking with it (Fadell is the inventor of the ipod, who was turned

down over 80 times before being approached by Apple).

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Photo Credit: Fast Company

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The “80/20” rule is not always right. We noticed that the several businesses who

have run in the opposite direction to solve a problem have been handsomely

rewarded with loyal and appreciative customers.

• Birchbox, est.2010, saw that the ignored majority was not being served or

overlooked because competition was focused on the lucrative 20%, that was

crowded and hypercompetitive. The result? They made high-end cosmetics

accessible by lowering the price point of beauty products and 5 years after

being founded, are valued at +$500M.

• Walker & Co., est.2013, also recognized that a specific population was being

overlooked and created a hyper-focused company designed to serve that

population. The passion, and focus, comes across their mission for their

flagship brand, Bevel, "Bevel is the first and only end-to-end shaving system

for men with coarse and curly hair.”

• Etsy CEO, Chad Dickerson, recounted that during earlier days, when

seeking additional funding, an investor who was questioning Etsy's customer

base said, "isn't it all women?", to which Chad quickly replied, "yeah, 50% of

the population, who control the household income". It need not be said that

Etsy did not choose to work with that investor and has since expanded their

e-commerce platform and have annual revenues of +$200M.

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Photo Credit: Fast Company

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Strategy is saying, "No". We are all high-achievers and eager to succeed, but

just as important as nailing that next round of funding, hitting those targets, or

releasing that new product is the ability to say "no".

• "Focus on editing and what you can do really well," said Mark Parker, Nike

CEO, on recognizing that investment in Nike Fuel Band was an important

learning, but not a core product offering, which is why they stopped offering

the product.

• "Strategy is what you don't do", said David Gilboa, Warby Parker founder.

Warby Parker has a laser-focus on maintaining their brand proposition and

resist the urge to diversify too early.

• Jared Leto, actor and musician, consciously stopped acting to focus on

music and setting up VyRT, an on-demand streaming service which lets

musicians create live experiences and broadcast them on the Internet

It was made clear that amongst the tough decisions made by leaders, the ability

to actively manage precious resources and prioritize what comes next, and what

does NOT come next, makes or breaks the business.

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Photo Credit: Fast Company

Thanks for taking the time to read our take

on Fast Company’s Innovation Festival

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If you’d like to know more, or arrange a

session to dive into the content and

trends in more detail, please contact us:

Sarah Aitken

Chief Marketing Officer, iris NYC

sarah.aitken@iris-worldwide.com

Mike Navarrete

Concise Director, NYC

Mike.Navarrete@iris-worldwide.com

www.iris-concise.com

BUILDING A BUSINESS THAT MATTERS, PART I: WITH BIRCHBOX, WARBY PARKER, DONORSCHOOSE, WALKER & CO, AND ETSY. Hosted by Katia Beauchamp, Cofounder and CEO, Birchbox; Neil Blumenthal, Cofounder and co–CEO, Warby Parker; Dave Gilboa, Cofounder and co–CEO, Warby Parker; Charles Best, Cofounder and CEO, DonorsChoose; Tristan Walker, Founder and CEO, Walker & Company Brands, Chad Dicekrson, CEO, Etsy

FROM FIRST-GEN BLOGGING TO THE TUMBLR GENERATION WITH GARANCE DORÉ AND TUMBLR'S DAVID KARPHosted by David Karp, Tumblr Garance Dore, Blogger, Author, Love Style Life

LEADERSHIP AND CULTURE WITH APPLE'S ANGELA AHRENDTSHosted by Angela Ahrendts, Senior Vice President, Retail and Online Stores, Apple

HOW CREATIVITY FUELS SCIENCE WITH STEVE AOKI AND BILL NYEHosted by Steve Aoki, DJ and Producer and Bill Nye Scientist, Engineer, Comedian, Author, and Inventor

INSIDE NIKE’S PLAYBOOK WITH CEO MARK PARKER AND TENNIS STAR SERENA WILLIAMSHosted by Mark Parker, CEO, Nike and Serena Williams, Professional Tennis Player

THE CREATIVITY OF GIVING WITH TOMS AND EVERY MOTHER COUNTSHosted by Blake Mycoskie, Founder, TOMS and Christy Turlington Burns, Founder, Every Mother Counts

THE POWER OF DESIGN WITH TONY FADELL AND JARED LETOHosted by Tony Fadell, Founder and CEO, Nest and Jared Leto

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