Are you having enough random conversations and following up on them?

Increasing your surface area, and then acting on it is often the key to the most interesting innovations...

I was reviewing a launch recently that’s gone really well - a few weeks after launch, it’s blown through every expectation we had for it.

I then thought back to the origin of the idea, and the final form in which the product had shipped - it was an idea thrown out in a meeting; a couple of people were dogged in not letting the idea slip and pitched it to more people; some blocked it but a couple who were tangentially related to the project made suggestions that shaped it to it’s final form… and then a few months and a lot of grit from the team later… voila.

I reflected on how many products happen simply because of random conversations and chance, and then deep follow up. As more people I talk to gravitate towards top-down initiatiation of ideas and more focus, I worry we often end up missing out on some really great ideas.

Many years ago, one my favorite ever launches happened simply because I was hanging out in a Google microkitchen and struck up a conversation with an Engineering leader I knew of but hadn’t actually worked with or even talked to much then. We chatted about random ideas we were working on and suddenly realized he had a couple of people interested in space and I had an idea (and some PM staffing) that might make sense together. It was a little out there since our teams generally didn’t work together and the idea had a lot of hurdles, but I remembered to follow up that evening and it led to one of my most fun launches.

Innovation comes from everywhere, but your chances of finding something awesome increase dramatically (at least they do for me) when I talk to people and increase the surface of ideas and collaborators.

Remember to do that - linger a little longer, have that additional conversation and follow up if something feels right.