Clay Christensen, Our Secret Godfather

European Straits #57

Dear all,

Since our founding The Family in 2013, one of the internal battles that I have yet to win concerns the use of the word “disruption”.

Many in the entrepreneurial world, including members of our team, frequently use that word because it best conveys the idea of how startups radically redesign their industry’s value chain. Furthermore, this upheaval often comes as a surprise, if not a veritable shock, for established market participants.

On the other hand, the word has become a cliché, especially since it has made its way onto the cover of mainstream newspapers and magazines. And Harvard University’s Clayton Christensen, the very father of the theory of disruptive innovation, has repeatedly warned against using it to describe anything that is new, startup-like or entrepreneurial in any way.

That’s because disruptive innovation has a very precise meaning, which Christensen himself reminded us of in the following article: What Is Disruptive Innovation? For him, disruption is not abou…