Disrupting Ourselves to Death
It’s a word that has probably been uttered in every start-up pitch meeting in the last decade. Silicon Valley tech bros toss it around enthusiastically, and Wall Street investors react to it sceptically. Disruption . Or it's the buzzy adjective: disruptive . Originating in the 1990s with the “ disruptive innovation ” theory of Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen, the term has since become ubiquitous. The list of “disruptive” companies—game-changers who rewrote the rules of their respective industries—is long and growing: Uber disrupted the taxi industry, Airbnb the hotel industry, Crossfit the fitness industry, Spotify the music industry, Netflix the movie industry, and so forth. For the last 10 years, CNBC’s Disruptor 50 list has testified to the way “disruption” has basically become synonymous with tech-driven, innovative entrepreneurship. If there’s a recipe for entrepreneurial success in the 21st century, disruption seems to be a key ingredient. But the wor