Great topic.
My father was an exec at a major US company for over 30 years. He retired a while back and amazingly he kept all of his manager/director training materials and notes which he recently passed on to me. It’s a huge leather binder of random managerial notes, but the first page in there was very relevant.
It is a photocopy that reads:
“How To Kill Ideas”
(In seven words or less)
Don’t be ridiculous
It costs too much
That’s beyond our responsibility
We don’t have the time
We’re too small for it
We’ve never done it before
We’ll be the laughing stock
You’re two years ahead of your time
Can’t teach an old dog new tricks
We’re doing the best we can
Has anyone else ever tried it?
We tried that before
It can’t be done
It’s too radical a change
That’s not our problem
It isn’t in the budget
We did alright without it
We’re not ready for that
Too hard to sell
Let’s get back to reality
It won’t work in our industry
If it was good we’d already be doing
I have heard all of these used in meetings at one point or another, sometimes by the “innovators” themselves, but I usually take it as a challenge and look for a way to prove them wrong, it’s fun.