Business Quote by Clayton Christensen
“Breaking an old business model is always going to require leaders to follow their instinct. There will always be persuasive reasons not to take a risk. But if you only do what worked in the past, you will wake up one day and find that you’ve been passed by.”
About This Quote
Source Book: The Innovator's Dilemma, Clayton Christensen, 1997
Leaders must trust intuition to break outdated models despite persuasive risk‑averse arguments.
In simple terms: Instinct guides innovation over past success.
Key Takeaway
Follow gut to innovate.
Themes
innovation
leadership
risk
Mood
inspirational
cautious
Type
strategic
motivational
When to use this quote
- product development
- strategic planning
- organizational change
Key Concepts
disruption
intuition
Questions to Reflect On
- When to trust intuition?
- How to balance data and instinct?
A Different Perspective
Risk‑aversion can protect stability; gut may fail.
![“[S]ometimes, when you are a food person, the possible irrelevance of what you are doing doesn’t cross your mind until it’s too late. (Once, for example, when I was just starting out in the food business, I was hired by the caper people to develop a lot of recipes using capers, and it was weeks of…” quote by Nora Ephron](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/d79/nora-ephron-1217_business_s-ometimes-when-you-are-a-food-person-th_980.jpg)
![“If the State does not acquire supremacy over [vast private] enterprises, it becomes their puppet, and they become the real State.” quote by Bertrand Russell](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/bad/bertrand-russell-69_acquire_if-the-state-does-not-acquire-supremacy_1379.jpg)