Disruptive Innovation vs Sustaining Innovation

Developers should understand disruptive innovation to anticipate industry shifts, identify opportunities for creating new products, and adapt their skills to emerging technologies that may disrupt existing markets meets developers should understand sustaining innovation when working on mature products or in competitive industries where continuous improvement is key to retaining customers. Here's our take.

Disruptive Innovation

Nice Pick

Developers should understand disruptive innovation to anticipate industry shifts, identify opportunities for creating new products, and adapt their skills to emerging technologies that may disrupt existing markets

Pros

• It's particularly relevant when working in startups, product management, or innovation roles, as it helps in designing solutions that can scale from niche applications to mainstream adoption
• Related to: business-strategy, product-management

Cons

• Specific tradeoffs depend on your use case

Sustaining Innovation

Developers should understand sustaining innovation when working on mature products or in competitive industries where continuous improvement is key to retaining customers

Pros

• It's crucial for roles involving legacy system maintenance, feature enhancements, or performance optimization, such as in software-as-a-service (SaaS) platforms or enterprise applications
• Related to: product-management, agile-methodology

Cons

• Specific tradeoffs depend on your use case

The Verdict

These tools serve different purposes. Disruptive Innovation is a concept while Sustaining Innovation is a methodology. We picked Disruptive Innovation based on overall popularity, but your choice depends on what you're building.

The Bottom Line

Disruptive Innovation wins

Based on overall popularity. Disruptive Innovation is more widely used, but Sustaining Innovation excels in its own space.