Executive Summary
Disruptive innovation failures in established companies rarely stem from lack of information or resources. Scott Anthony—recently named the world’s 5th most influential business thinker—reveals that organisations facing disruption are haunted by three types of ghosts that block innovation and prevent change management success even when survival depends on transformation.
Core insights:
- Epic Disruption transforms complicated and expensive into simple and affordable, driving explosive growth
- We’re experiencing unprecedented disruption: Francis Bacon identified three world-changing innovations in 2,000 years; today we have four just starting with the letter A
- Bethlehem Steel saw Nucor’s mini mills coming but couldn’t respond—organisational ghosts prevented action
- Ghosts of the past are traumas your organisation hasn’t processed; mentioning them triggers flight responses
- Ghosts of the present are invisible patterns hardwired since founding that insiders can’t see but outsiders spot immediately
- Ghosts of the future are identity fears—disrupting yourself means invalidating who you’ve been
- Anyone can be a disruptive innovator: in 1948, the joke about Julia Child was she couldn’t boil water; she failed her Le Cordon Bleu test in 1951, yet through persistence published Mastering the Art of French Cooking in 1961
- Five innovation behaviours anyone can develop: curiosity, customer obsession, collaboration, creative experimentation, and persistence
- Successful innovation requires treating ideas like scientific experiments with clear hypotheses, predictions, and learning loops
- Three questions for leaders navigating business transformation: What ghosts inhibit your innovation? What’s the upside in today’s uncertainty? How do you approach this with a smile?
The World Is Drowning in Disruption
In 1620, Sir Francis Bacon wrote that three things had changed “the state and appearance of the entire world”: the printing press, gunpowder, and the compass. Those three innovations span 2,000 years of human history.
Today? “We could talk about artificial intelligence, augmented reality, additive manufacturing, autonomous vehicles,” Scott explains. “I’ve gotten to four and I have not left the letter A. This is the world that we live in.”
This acceleration makes understanding disruption not just interesting but essential. Scott’s definition is brilliantly clear: “You take something that once was complicated and expensive. You make it simple and affordable. You change market dynamics. You drive explosive growth.”
Consider the computer. Scott’s father was born in 1947 when there was one computer in the world weighing 20 tons. Scott was born in 1975 when there were tens of thousands of computers, still big and expensive, tucked away in large organisations. His daughter Holly was born in 2007—the year of the first iPhone—when hundreds of millions of computers sat on desktops and laptops. Today, billions of computers sit in our pockets weighing 20 ounces instead of 20 tons.
“This is an Epic Disruption,” Scott says. And the past—properly understood—can be “an indispensable guide to help us make sense of a very confusing moment we’re in right now.”
Anyone Can Do This: The Julia Child Story
When people think of disruptive innovation, they picture technology companies and entrepreneurs. They don’t think of a 49-year-old American woman about whom friends joked she couldn’t successfully boil water.
Yet Julia Child’s story illustrates disruptive innovation more completely than perhaps any other case in Scott’s book.
Before Mastering the Art of French Cooking appeared in 1961, if you lived in America and wanted to enjoy great French cuisine, you had one option: get on a plane or boat and travel to France. “Through the book and the other books that she wrote and her television show, she took what once was complicated and expensive and made it simple and affordable,” Scott explains. “It is disruptive innovation.”
Julia Child wasn’t born a great chef. Nobody is. When she moved to France in 1948, the joke among friends was that she couldn’t successfully boil water. Her first meal for her husband Paul was brains simmered in red wine sauce. When she first took the test at Le Cordon Bleu in 1951, she failed.
“It reminds us that anyone has the capacity to do great things and it can show up later in life,” Scott notes.
What allowed Julia Child to succeed? Five behaviours that anyone can develop through careful practice:
Intense curiosity — constantly trying to understand things at a deeper level
Customer obsession — putting herself in the shoes of the home chef, understanding their constraints and capabilities
Great collaboration — working with co-authors and other chefs to combine insights
Creative experimentation — trying different approaches, testing recipes hundreds of times
Incredible persistence — in 1951 she met Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle to co-author a French cookbook. It took ten years before a publisher would accept it. “Ten years. Who does that?” Scott asks.
The Pampers Revolution: Innovation as Experimentation
In 1954, Procter & Gamble tapped 58-year-old Vic Mills—an already decorated scientist—to lead a new division pioneering entry into new markets. Two years later, Mills had become a new grandfather. He identified a real pain point: disposable diapers existed in 90% of US households, but they only made up 1% of diaper changes because the product quality was abysmal.
P&G had an idea: create an affordable but high-quality solution in the disposable diaper space.
But creating the disposable diaper required solving multiple challenges simultaneously. The material had to be absorbent enough, the shape had to work, the fastening system had to be secure yet easy to use, and the price had to be affordable for mass adoption.
“Any innovation, any idea is going to start its life necessarily imperfect,” Scott explains. “Nothing springs from an innovator’s head fully formed. The trick for the successful innovator is separating what is right and what is wrong.”
The way you do that? Like a scientist.
“You say, what is my hypothesis? How do I design an experiment where I’ve got clear objectives about what I want to learn? How can I make predictions so I can test and measure that? And then how can I execute in a way where I can gather the data and then reflect on the learning?”
Scott offers an acronym: HOPE—Hypothesis, Objective, Prediction, Execution plan.
The Pampers story illustrates this experimental approach through persistent iteration:
- 1958: First test market fails for technological reasons. In hindsight, testing two-part diapers with plastic pants in Texas in August—”we subjected children to the equivalent of a Turkish bath”—was questionable.
- 1960: Second failure. The price point was wrong. P&G priced at a premium to establish products, but consumers wanted something cheaper than established alternatives.
- 1962: Third test market fails because the marketing wasn’t appropriate.
- 1964: Finally, success—though it still required fine-tuning before the full US launch.
Pampers ultimately became the largest brand in P&G’s history and the first to reach $10 billion in annual revenues. But it wasn’t an overnight success.
“We think the world is moving faster than ever before, and there’s a lot of truth to that, but still, success takes longer than people think,” Scott observes. He points to OpenAI: 2022 was the first year of commercial operations and the 66th year of work on artificial intelligence, which began in 1956 at a conference at Dartmouth College.
“We see the tail end and we think it happened in an instant, but that’s not the way innovation works. It requires patience, it requires persistence, it requires overcoming false steps, fumbles, and yes, failures on the way to success.”
This experimental approach—testing, learning, iterating—appears across every successful disruption in Scott’s book.
The Printing Press: Innovation Through Recombination
Why did Gutenberg’s printing press emerge in Strasbourg, Germany rather than somewhere else? The answer reveals a fundamental truth about innovation.
“Magic happens at intersections when different mindsets and backgrounds collide,” Scott explains. Strasbourg was a vibrant trade route with lots of people bringing different knowledge and capabilities. There was a robust bell engraving industry, so skilled craftspeople could work on the moulds. And because it was a wine-growing region, there were lots of presses already there.
“You had all these there, you had to put them together, you had to look at them in a different way. The printing press actually had very few novel innovations in it. It really was a combination of ink and paper and press and moulds that allowed the printing press to have the world-changing impact that it did.”
This connects to the biological concept of exaptation—how birds developed feathers for warmth, then later repurposed them for flight. Similarly, the printing press took existing elements designed for completely different purposes (wine presses, bell-engraving moulds) and combined them to solve a new problem.
The lesson? Organisations often wait for the “perfect” novel technology or breakthrough innovation. But disruption typically emerges from clever recombination of what already exists, applied to a problem in a new way that changes the trade-offs and opens new markets.
It also demolishes the myth of the lone inventor. “I wrote an article maybe 13 years ago called The New Corporate Garage. And I said Gutenberg is an example of the lone inventor. That was just wrong,” Scott admits. “It takes a village to go and do this. There is no thing that is done by an individual.”
Why Bethlehem Steel Couldn't Respond: The Three Ghosts
Clay Christensen’s favourite disruption story was Nucor and the steel mini mills. It’s the classic case: established incumbent (Bethlehem Steel) with superior technology and deep resources watches new entrant (Nucor) introduce inferior but cheaper alternative that eventually climbs upmarket and destroys the incumbent.
Christensen argued this was rational. You invest in your best opportunities, not your worst. You push margins up. You serve your most demanding customers.
But there’s also profound irrationality at work. And understanding this irrationality is essential for leaders trying to navigate disruption.
Scott learned about these forces through an academic programme focused on system psychodynamics—”basically business meets psychiatry.” Once you see these dynamics, “you can’t unsee it. Every organisation I would argue is haunted by ghosts.”
In homage to Charles Dickens, Scott calls them ghosts of past, present, and future.
Ghosts of the Past: Traumas Your Organisation Hasn’t Processed
“These are traumas your organisation has not gotten over, that when you’re reminded of them, all you want to do is run away.”
For Bethlehem Steel, Nucor relied on non-unionised labour. But Bethlehem Steel had experienced a series of violent strikes, some of which almost shut down the entire country. “You bring up the idea of non-unionised labour inside a place that had had a series of strikes, some of which turned very violent, some of which almost shut the entire country down. No way, you couldn’t even discuss it.”
The past trauma made certain strategic options literally undiscussable. The ghost prevented rational evaluation.
Ghosts of the Present: Invisible Patterns Insiders Can’t See
“Those are invisible patterns that an outsider can see, but an insider is oblivious to. It is hardwired into an organisation, often going back to its founding story.”
Two key figures—Charles Schwab (not the financial services person, a different Charles Schwab) and Eugene Grace—essentially ran Bethlehem Steel for 70 years. They had sayings drawn from Andrew Carnegie about how to succeed in steel.
“Pioneering doesn’t pay,” was the dominant view. “We are going to seek scale and volume above all else.”
Try to propose something different and people would say, “That’s not what Bethlehem Steel does.” The pattern was so deeply embedded that insiders couldn’t see it as a choice—it felt like reality itself.
Ghosts of the Future: Identity Fears
“To disrupt requires you to fundamentally change the essence of your organisation that can conceptually be exciting, but it also can be really scary. Individuals have identity that tie to yesterday, trying to go and create something different means that you are going to invalidate your own identity and that is a really deep fear.”
Bethlehem Steel was rooted to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. By all rational accounts, its main mill should have been shut down in the 1960s. But you keep pushing forward “because who are you? You are Bethlehem Steel.”
Disrupting yourself means confronting the fear that the identity you’ve built, the expertise you’ve developed, the reputation you’ve earned—all of it might become obsolete. That’s terrifying.
“The past traumas, the present patterns, the future fears, these are things that haunt every organisation,” Scott summarises. “If you are dealing with disruptive change, you got to spot the ghosts, you got to disarm the ghost, or they will swallow you up.”
Spotting Your Own Ghosts
When people hear about ghosts, Scott observes, they immediately recognise them: “Yep, I have seen those before.”
Even more sobering: “Look, I’ve helped to spawn my own ghosts. Back in the days when I was working at the consulting company, I look back and I say, if I knew then what I knew now, there’s a couple things I would do really differently. Because if you’re not aware of it, there are actions you can take that create things that make it really hard for the organisation to change.”
This matters because most discussions about why companies fail to disrupt themselves focus on incentives, capabilities, or strategic vision. Those factors matter. But the ghosts—the emotional, cultural, and identity dimensions—are equally powerful and far less visible.
Understanding ghosts “helps you understand some of the challenges in a different light. And of course, that it makes sure that you can overcome or not create them in the future.”
Three Questions Every Leader Should Ask
Rather than offering three takeaways, Scott poses three questions worth discussing with your team:
First: What’s the ghost in your organisation or your own life that is inhibiting your ability to innovate?
“If you look at it from the perspective of an individual, we all have the times in the past where things didn’t work. And that’s the sting. We have our present patterns to stop us from doing new things. And as humans, we don’t like change actually. We have the status quo bias. What is the future fear that you have to fight?”
Second: What is the upside in today’s uncertainty?
“It feels really scary right now to be in a world where everything is changing. It is legitimately scary. It also creates unique possibilities. So what is the upside in today’s uncertainty?”
Third: How do you approach all of this with a glint in your eye and a smile on your face?
“How do you have more fun?”
That final question matters more than it might seem. Disruption and transformation are genuinely difficult. Ghosts are real and powerful. But approaching these challenges with curiosity, playfulness, and genuine enjoyment increases your odds of success whilst making the journey worth taking.
Why This Matters Now
Organisations face an unprecedented pace of disruption. Technologies that once took decades to develop and deploy now transform industries in years. Business models that seemed permanent prove fragile. Competitive advantages erode faster than they can be built.
In this environment, understanding the ghosts haunting your organisation isn’t a luxury—it’s survival. Because the companies that fail won’t fail from lack of information about disruption. They’ll fail because they can’t act on what they know.
Julia Child, Victor Mills, the creators of the printing press—none of them had unique access to secret information. What they had was curiosity, persistence, willingness to experiment, and freedom from ghosts that would have told them “pioneering doesn’t pay” or “that’s not what we do here.”
The question isn’t whether your industry will face disruption. The question is whether you can spot your ghosts, disarm them, and create conditions where innovation—messy, uncertain, experimental innovation—can actually happen.
Listen to the Full Conversation
Scott Anthony and Mark Blackwell explore these themes in depth, including additional case studies, practical guidance for spotting organisational ghosts, and the behaviours that enable anyone to become a disruptive innovator.
Watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CigBnU8iET4
Listen with your favourite podcast provider: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2012667/episodes/18237533
About the Speakers
Scott Anthony is Clinical Professor of Strategy at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College and was recently named the world’s 5th most influential business thinker. He previously served as Senior Advisor and Managing Partner Emeritus at Innosight, the growth strategy consultancy founded by Clayton Christensen. Scott helps organisations rediscover their entrepreneurial spirit and build sustainable futures in the face of disruption.
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/scottdanthony/
Book: Epic Disruptions: 11 Innovations that Shaped Our Modern World
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Epic-Disruptions-Innovations-Shaped-Modern/dp/B0FRH69N96/
Book Website: https://epicdisruptions.com/
Mark Blackwell is founder of Arkaro, specialising in change management, innovation, and commercial excellence for the agriculture, food, and chemicals industries. Arkaro’s collaborative “do it with you” approach works through four steps: Understand, Co-create, Enable, Sustain. We don’t just coach—we get on the pitch with you.
Are Your Ghosts Blocking Innovation?
Your organisation knows disruption is coming. The technologies are visible. The competitive threats are clear. The need for change is obvious.
Yet nothing happens. Or worse, initiatives launch with fanfare and quietly die. Innovation programmes produce reports but not results. Transformation efforts stumble on “resistance” that’s really valuable feedback about ghosts you haven’t addressed.
The challenge isn’t lack of information or analysis. It’s the invisible forces—the past traumas, present patterns, and future fears—that make rational response feel impossible.
What if resistance to change isn’t blocking your success, but actually revealing where the real work needs to happen?
At Arkaro, we don’t just identify strategic opportunities. We help you spot the ghosts blocking execution and create conditions where innovation can actually happen. Our collaborative “do it with you” approach builds capability within your teams whilst addressing the cultural and emotional dimensions that determine whether change initiatives succeed or join the pile of abandoned slide decks.
Whether you’re navigating disruption, launching innovation initiatives, or building adaptive capabilities for an uncertain future, the question isn’t whether you need to change—it’s whether you can overcome the ghosts that keep you stuck.
Ready to spot your ghosts and disarm them?
Contact Mark Blackwell for a complimentary 30-minute conversation about the invisible forces in your organisation and practical approaches to overcome them.
Email: mark@arkaro.com
Connect on LinkedIn: Mark Blackwell
We work with organisations in agriculture, food, and chemicals to turn change initiatives from slide decks into sustainable capabilities. We don’t just coach—we get on the pitch with you.
Related Reading from Arkaro
On Innovation & Disruption:
Strategy in a VUCA World: Emergent Approach Guide – Adaptive strategy frameworks for volatile, uncertain, complex environments
Strategy Implementation Crisis: When Plans Fail in VUCA – Why 95% of employees don’t understand strategy and how rules-based frameworks solve implementation gaps
Exposing Bottlenecks: The Key to Building a Great Strategy – Root cause analysis for identifying what truly constrains growth
The 5 Disqualifiers of Strategy – Testing whether your strategy provides real guidance or just aspirational lists
On Change Management & Transformation:
Transforming Change Resistance: 4-Step Collaborative Approach – Why resistance reveals valuable insights and how to transform it into ownership
From Technical Fixes to Adaptive Solutions – Why technical excellence cultures need different change management approaches using Cynefin Framework
Strategy is an Adaptive Challenge not a Technical Problem – Understanding why expert-driven approaches fail and collaborative solutions succeed
Why ADKAR and the Arkaro Approach Are Essential Partners – Combining structured change management with collaborative “do it with you” methods
Arkaro’s Approach to Culture During Change Initiatives – Building change roadmaps that address cultural and behavioural dimensions
On Adaptive Organizations:
Why Traditional Management Fails and How Adaptive Organizations Succeed – Moving from control to flow in complex systems
Neuroscience of Collaboration: The SPACES Model Explained – How brains work in teams and creating conditions for high performance
Military Strategy: VUCA Lessons from the Parachute Regiment – Translating military adaptive principles into commercial success
On Strategy Implementation:
Make Strategy Work: The Power of Integrated Business Planning – Moving strategy from slides to sustainable execution
Strategy Implementation: Bridge the Corporate Gap – Translating high-level direction into practical decision rules
The Chronic Problems with Strategy – Why traditional strategy approaches fail and how adaptive methods fix them
External Resources & Further Reading
Epic Disruptions Book Website – Scott Anthony’s complete resource on the 11 innovations that shaped our world
Epic Disruptions on Amazon – Purchase Scott Anthony’s book
Innosight – Growth strategy consultancy founded by Clayton Christensen
The Innovator’s Dilemma – Clayton Christensen’s seminal work on disruptive innovation
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