Key Takeaways

Discover why some of the world’s most famous innovations didn’t come from the boardroom.

Learn how everyday employees can spark breakthroughs you might be overlooking.

What do Post-it notes, Gmail and Slack have in common? It’s not just their stickiness. They were all born from employees solving their own problems — innovating at the edge of their organizations with minimal oversight but huge creativity.

In 1974, Art Fry was frustrated when his bookmarks kept falling out of his hymnal during choir practice. He remembered a “failed” adhesive his 3M colleague had created during their “permitted bootlegging” time ( now known as 15% time ). Fry applied the adhesive to his bookmark, and it never fell out again. That simple idea eventually became the billion-dollar Post-it®

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