"An entrepreneur is someone who is starting an endeavor to bring about the change they envision in the world."
Radhika Dutt is the author of Radical Product Thinking: The New Mindset for Innovating Smarter. She is an entrepreneur and product leader who has participated in four acquisitions, two of which were companies that she founded. She advises organizations from high-tech startups to government agencies on building radical products that create a fundamental change. She is currently an Advisor on Product Thinking to the Monetary Authority of Singapore, Singapore’s financial regulator and central bank. She also teaches entrepreneurship and innovation at Northeastern’s D’Amore McKim School of Business. She serves on the board of the Association of Product Professionals and the independent publisher, Berrett Koehler. She graduated from MIT with an SB and M.Eng in Electrical Engineering, and speaks nine languages, currently learning her tenth.
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Table of Contents
Thank you so much for giving us your time! Before we begin, could you introduce yourself to our readers and take us through what exactly your company does and what your vision is for its future?
Radhika Dutt: I’ve been an entrepreneur and have participated in several acquisitions. My experience has ranged across a wide range of industries including telecommunications, advertising technology, robotics, consumer apps, and even wine. Across these companies and industries, I found that it’s easy for good products to go bad. I repeatedly saw a pattern of “product diseases” such as Pivotitis, Hero Syndrome, and Obsessive Sales Disorder, that were getting in the way of innovation. In fact, as an entrepreneur, I have caught many of these diseases myself. I realized the shortcomings of how we build products today and the need for a new, radical approach.
In my book Radical Product Thinking, I talk about how we can build world-changing products while avoiding the 7 common product diseases that kill innovation. My vision for the future is that we don’t need to be visionaries like Steve Jobs or Henry Ford to create game-changing products. Radical Product Thinking gives organizations a repeatable methodology for building visionary products.
NO child ever says I want to be a CEO/entrepreneur when I grow up. What did you want to be and how did you get where you are today?
Radhika Dutt: As a child, my ideas of what I wanted to be when I grew up have ranged from being an airline pilot to a scientist. Being a girl didn’t shape what I aspired to.
For me, the key to where I’m at today has been persistence. I went to high school in South Africa while the country was transitioning from apartheid to democracy. I remember always feeling different and also experiencing discrimination to the point that I came home one day and told my parents “I wish I were white.” But I was fortunate that the discrimination I faced didn’t break my spirit and that I had the support from my family so it fueled a drive in me.
These formative years gave me the drive to never give up and to keep trying until I had achieved what I set out to. This was really the formation of my entrepreneurial spirit.
Tell us something about yourself that others in your organization might be surprised to know.
Radhika Dutt: I have lived on 4 continents, traveled to all except Antarctica, and speak 9 languages.
Marine Corps Leadership Principles: The Qualities Every Leader Must Honor
Many readers may wonder how to become an entrepreneur but what is an entrepreneur? How would you define it?
Radhika Dutt: An entrepreneur is someone who is starting an endeavor to bring about the change they envision in the world. Your product is your mechanism to create that change. This means anything can be your product, whether you’re working on a high-tech startup, a nonprofit, research, or freelancing.
What is the importance of having a supportive and inclusive culture?
Radhika Dutt: A good culture lets people do their best work together. When you have a supportive and inclusive culture, EVERYONE on the team can contribute their best work and it raises the group IQ. Innovation isn’t the result of a single person’s genius (although this is how media often portrays it). A study from MIT shows that teams with more women and that are diverse have a higher group IQ and innovate better. We need an inclusive culture to solve problems better.
How can a leader be disruptive in the post covid world?
Radhika Dutt: We shouldn’t disrupt for the sake of disrupting. We need to have a clear vision for the change we want to bring about and systematically translate that vision for change into reality. When we disrupt without a clear vision for change, we create collateral damage to society in the form of digital pollution.
The Radical Product Thinking approach helps you envision the change you want to see and translate it step-by-step into your daily activities so you can avoid product diseases and digital pollution.
If a 5-year-old asked you to describe your job, what would you tell them?
Radhika Dutt: I am an author and I help companies, from startups to governments, to build products that change the world.
Leaders are usually asked about their most useful qualities but let’s change things up a bit. What is your most useless talent?
Radhika Dutt: Salsa dancing.
Thank you so much for your time but before we finish things off, we do have one more question. If you wrote a book about your life until today, what would the title be?
Radhika Dutt: Radical Product Thinking was exactly the book I wanted to write. While it’s not about my life, it does include elements from my life experiences. From the dedication until the last word in acknowledgments, this book is a window into my soul. The book, like products I build, is vision-driven.
Mike Weiss, VIP Contributor to ValiantCEO and the host of this interview would like to thank Radhika Dutt for taking the time to do this interview and share her knowledge and experience with our readers.
If you would like to get in touch with Radhika Dutt or her company, you can do it through her – Linkedin Page
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