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Use the following to answer Questions 3 & 4. There are no ad…

Use the following to answer Questions 3 & 4. There are no additional readings for these questions. A friend of yours is sharing about his recent experience at work – a large organization (Y Corp) considered a leader in its industry.  He is on a task force to bring new innovations to the executive team.  Your friend and the other participants are part-time on this task force; they all have their primary jobs as well.  The mission of this task force is to generate new ideas, help the executive team to prioritize the concepts, and support various business units to develop these concepts into new profitable growth opportunities.  In other words, the mission of this group is to help Y Corp “disrupt itself” before outsiders challenge its dominance in the industry.  The entire c-suite has been vocal in recent years about its need for disruptive innovation to avoid “stagnation.” However, your friend is frustrated because there seems to be little priority given (from the executive team) to the task force activities.  During the course of one year, your friend’s team has generated several interesting new business ideas, without much to show for it.  His task force has generated (PowerPoint) deck after deck with detailed analyses on their innovative ideas, but no decisions or actions about these ideas seem to be coming out of the executive committee.  Your friend is starting to believe that the leadership of Y Corp is not serious about disruptive innovation – “why start an innovation task force if they didn’t want to innovate?!”  He said that most of his colleagues on the task force are convinced that their company is being myopic by only prioritizing the perspectives of Wall Street analysts and quarterly earnings pressure.  You know that your friend is very capable, and is passionate about his company and the industry. He has had a very successful career so far at this organization and you are convinced he has the potential to become a senior leader at Y Corp in the next 5-10 years. You are contemplating how he has gotten so frustrated now. How did the circumstances turn your friend, who has typically been the professional optimist, into someone who is questioning the rationality of his own leadership team?  You are wondering if there is anything you could say to your friend to help him navigate this situation.  You know that you don’t have enough facts to come to definitive conclusions, but you know enough about strategy and innovation that pattern recognition is kicking in.