Larry Popelka received his undergraduate degree from Northwestern University and his MBA from the University of Chicago. He was formerly the Vice President of Marketing, Global Development, and New Ventures at Clorox, where he led corporate innovation, strategy, and acquisitions, and was involved in developing Green Works Cleaners, Clorox Toilet Wand, Armor All, and the acquisition of Glad for $2 billion. He writes a regular innovation column for Bloomberg BusinessWeek. He does innovation consulting for consumer products companies interested in producing new products.

On the show, Mr. Popelka discussed issues facing companies seeking to optimize their innovation processes today. In particular, he spoke about how many corporations over-prepare and over-pay for their innovation efforts. In the past, large companies dominated the landscape of innovation, but today, it is startups and small companies leading the way. In part, this is attributable to their nimbleness in the global marketplace, but it is also because they approach innovation in a different way. These companies do, and larger companies can, quickly push out minimum viable products to consumers, gain deep insight into what consumers want, and they improve and iterate until they have an outstanding product, and they then gradually grow the scale of the operation. Specifically, Popelka discussed how he cautions companies to avoid “big bang launches,” nationwide, including huge marketing efforts. These all too often are far more expensive than their high risk would justify, and it is more reasonable to gradually grow a product as you move it through iterations with customers, improving it each time. To all companies, big and small, Mr. Popelka advised leaders to iterate not just as a strategy for growth, but as a barrier against competitors. The best such defense, he said, is a deep knowledge of consumer needs and desires that is reflected in your product.