You Get to Choose: Which Innovation Decision Topic Should I Tackle First?

After decades making billion-dollar innovation decisions at HP and CableLabs, I've learned something crucial: the questions that keep executives awake at night are rarely the ones being answered in business schools or consulting frameworks.

Last week, I analyzed the most pressing challenges facing senior leaders this coming year. What emerged surprised even me - a list of 10 innovation decision topics that address the unspoken frustrations, hidden anxieties, and systemic problems that every executive faces but rarely admits publicly.

These aren't the usual "innovation best practices" topics.

These are the hard questions about why smart people make terrible innovation choices, why boardrooms kill breakthrough ideas, and why the innovation economy might not be as merit-based as we think.

But here's what I realized: I want to tackle the topic that's most urgent for YOU right now.

So I'm doing something I've never done before - giving my Studio Notes paid subscribers the power to choose my next deep-dive topic. Because you're the ones living these challenges daily.

Continue reading to see all 10 topics and vote for the ones that addresses your most pressing innovation decision challenge...

The 10 Innovation Decision Topics (Subscriber Vote Required)

After analyzing the patterns in innovation failures, board dynamics, and strategic decision-making across three decades, here are the 10 topics that address what's really happening behind closed doors:

1. The Boardroom Innovation Killer

"Why smart directors consistently kill breakthrough ideas (and the psychology-based presentation framework that changes their minds)"

Why directors think they're being prudent when they're actually being destructive, plus the specific language and metrics that make boards say 'yes' to uncertain bets. Based on real HP board meetings where billion-dollar innovation decisions were made.

2. The $50 Billion Decision Disaster

"How intelligent CEOs make catastrophically wrong innovation choices (and the thinking framework that prevents billion-dollar mistakes)"

An autopsy of major corporate innovation failures showing exactly where the decision-making process broke down, why intelligence doesn't predict decision quality, and the cognitive framework that could have saved billions.

3. The Big Tech Innovation Stranglehold

"How tech giants secretly kill startup disruption through strategic decision-making (not competition)"

The hidden playbook large corporations use to systematically prevent breakthrough innovation - revealing the 'innovation antibodies' that strangle new ideas before they can disrupt established markets.

4. Innovation Capitalism vs. Consumer Capitalism

"The economic battle reshaping how value gets created (and why it determines society's future)"

Why we're witnessing a fundamental shift from consumption-driven to innovation-driven economics, what this means for wealth creation, and how to position yourself for the new economic reality.

5. The Innovation Leadership Succession Crisis

"Why breakthrough thinkers can't build breakthrough thinkers (and how innovation capability dies with its leaders)"

Why traditional leadership development kills innovation capability, how to identify innovation leadership potential, and the succession framework that preserves breakthrough thinking across generations.

6. The Rigged Market for Ideas

"Is innovation really merit-based? (Milton Friedman's free market principles applied to breakthrough thinking)"

Applying economic principles to innovation reveals systematic market failures, idea monopolies, and barriers to entry that prevent the best innovations from winning - plus how to create freer internal markets for ideas.

7. The AI Executive Identity Crisis

"How artificial intelligence is rewiring leadership decision-making (and what it means for executive relevance)"

The hidden ways AI is changing strategic thinking, what decision-making capabilities leaders are losing to AI dependency, and the framework for human-AI decision partnership that preserves executive relevance.

8. The Innovation Debt Trap

"How yesterday's breakthroughs become tomorrow's biggest barriers to innovation"

Why successful innovations create cognitive and organizational debt that prevents future breakthroughs, the three types of innovation debt killing companies, and the framework for identifying and paying it down.

9. High-Resolution Thinking

"The cognitive operating system that separates consistent innovators from everyone else"

The thinking methodology used by breakthrough decision-makers to capture nuanced details, process complex information, and compress insights for influence - revealing why some people consistently make better choices.

10. The Underground Innovation Economy

"Where real breakthroughs actually happen (beyond the Silicon Valley hype machine)"

Mapping the hidden innovation ecosystem where breakthrough thinking thrives, the seven sectors accelerating under the radar, and how to identify emerging innovation clusters before they're mainstream.

How to Vote (Your Input Shapes My Content)

Here's what I need from you:

1. Choose Your Top 3 - Reply in the comments with your top 3 topics in order of priority

2. Share Your Specific Question - For your #1 choice, tell me the specific question you'd want answered about this topic

3. Context Matters - Mention where you'd apply these insights (board meetings, team decisions, strategic planning, etc.)

Example: "My top 3: #2, #7, #5. For #2 (Decision Disaster), my specific question is: 'How do you know when a CEO is making an emotional decision disguised as a rational one?' I'd use this in strategic planning sessions where we're evaluating major technology bets."

What Happens Next

This Week and next: I'll analyze all responses and announce the winner

Following Week … or maybe the week after: Monday deep-dive Studio Notes on the winning topic (with subscriber questions woven throughout). Mid-week, I’ll release a YouTube framework video + LinkedIn analysis of the insights

Bonus: I'll quote subscriber questions throughout the content (with permission) - your insights help shape the final analysis

Why This Matters

These topics represent the questions that don't get asked in polite business conversations but determine the fate of billion-dollar innovation decisions. Your vote tells me which challenge is most urgent for the leaders reading Studio Notes.

Plus, this is your chance to help shape content that addresses your real-world innovation decision challenges - not the theoretical frameworks that look good in presentations but fall apart under pressure.

Vote in the comments below. Let's tackle the innovation decision topic that matters most to you right now.