Traditional business structures love stability and predictability. Yet, many organizations believe the “two essential ingredients for long-term success are creativity and innovation”. We call the relationship between these two opposing expectations the Proximity Paradox — the belief that those who are closest to a subject are best-qualified to innovate for it. In reality, intense proximity limits creativity. We need to create distance from challenges in order to see the best way forward.

In this book, Alex Varricchio and Kiirsten May unpack ten common Proximity Paradoxes that affect a company’s people, processes and industry. Then, we share some practical and impractical ideas to create the distance necessary for your next great idea.

An especially valuable book for creatives, but equally applicable to all businesses that depend on innovation. The Proximity Paradox encourages us to ask hard questions about how we work, how our businesses are structured and why we routinely find our creativity at odds with what’s asked of us as executors and stewards of the bottom line.