eBags. Like Jon, I experienced eBags as a 20+ year continuous and relentless innovation factory. We truly were "ahead of our time" on so many initiatives, and developed the world's best and biggest drop-ship bag marketplace, one of the first great e-retail brands, an amazing private label bag brand, an amazing shoe site that Zappos bought (6pm.com), and a highly trusted frictionless technology platform. All of this, and so much more, drove the success of shipping over 35 Million bags to Millions of happy Customers, all the while reinventing an industry that drove the leader, Samsonite, to acquire us for over $100 Million in cash.

I tried to start my own Internet company way back in 1998. While I had a great idea, I didn't succeed with it. The two most important things I learned is how important it is to have a great team, and to have a laser focus on shipping a minimum viable product (MVP) that you can rapidly improve and iterate on.

I had the priviledge of being part of a team that developed an award winning AI product (software and hardware) for detecting and responding to human falls - to help save lives and bring peace of mind to the elderly and those who care for and love them. You can read more about this project here: https://medium.com/berkeleyischool/project-soundflux-aims-to-save-lives-with-sound-based-fall-detection-system-e4b52fd2aa4a

• Relentless understanding and focus on the customer.
• A "missionary" like mindset that finds a higher purpose in their work (vs. a mercenary).
• Someone who can attain the paradoxical state of domain expertise with "beginners mind."

• Retail Information Systems News Tech Leader of the Year, Strategic Impact.
• UC Berkeley School of Information, Hal R. Varian MIDS Capstone Award for Spring 2019.

Innovation and Digital Transformations can make huge impacts and drive great outcomes. I love working with Iterate and rapidly bringing these capabilities to forward thinking enterprises.

I like to swim, both for exercise and for its meditative and sensory deprivation qualities to provide balance in our modern sensory overloaded world, and have "escaped Alcatraz" by sea four times now.

Jon Nordmark

I like to spend time with my family, travel, read, swim, hike, and enjoy the outdoors.

The Innovators Dilemma

by Clayton Christensen

Mike's thoughts: This is an amazing book that introduces the different types of innovation with "big I" disruptive innovation, and "little i" sustaining innovation, and outlines why it is so challenging for established companies to innovate. Companies need help and need to take different approaches to achieve a disruptive or sustaining technology and innovations. I have always loved this book but love it even more as an Iterator because Iterate was built to solve the Innovators Dilemma.

Built to Last

by Jim Collins

Mike's thoughts: This hugely influential book reveals what makes long-lasting and visionary companies consistently excel. Mr. Collins and his research team took a data-driven approach over six years to uncover some key traits and behaviors that drive industry leading companies. My favorite is experimentation - try a lot of stuff and keep what works - which is key principle of programmatic innovation, and something Iterate is great at helping companies achieve.

Where Good Ideas Come From

by Where Good Ideas Come From

Mike's thoughts: Steven Johnson studied many great ideas like the World Wide Web, GPS, YouTube, the pacemaker, air conditioning, the printing press, the nature of neural connections, the understanding of how cholera is transmitted, and the triode, among others. He distills the process of good "ideation" into some key lessons. Iterate has built a platform for ideation within The Iterate Evaluation Cloud, and it incorporates many of the learnings Steven Johnson outlines such as providing a system and a network where good ideas can collide, mingle, swap, simmer, and cook to become even greater ideas.

Good to Great

by Jim Collins

Crossing the Chasm

by Geoffrey A. Moore

Data Smart

by John Foreman

“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”

~ Henry Ford

“If you do something and it turns out pretty good, then you should go do something else wonderful, not dwell on it for too long. Just figure out what's next.”

~ Steve Jobs

I could listen to Rick Astley sing "Never Gonna Give You Up" all day - Just Kidding. I can't stand that song but do love all types of music. If you forced me to pick 3 favorites it would be The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, and SRV.