Disruption Vs. Innovation: What's The Difference?

Disruption Vs. Innovation: What's The Difference?

Disruption Vs. Innovation: What's The Difference?
Caroline Howard , Forbes Staff
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Disruptors 2013
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People are sometimes confused about the difference between innovation and disruption. It's not exactly black and white, but there are real distinctions, and it's not just splitting hairs. Think of it this way: Disruptors are innovators, but not all innovators are disruptors -- in the same way that a square is a rectangle but not all rectangles are squares. Still with me?

Innovation and disruption are similar in that they are both makers and builders. Disruption takes a left turn by literally uprooting and changing how we think, behave, do business, learn and go about our day-to-day. Harvard Business School professor and disruption guru Clayton Christensen says that a disruption displaces an existing market, industry, or technology and produces something new and more efficient and worthwhile. It is at once destructive and creative.

For the first time, FORBES has compiled a list of the Most Disruptive Names In Business. Looking at the world with the eyes of our disruptors, no one company is so essential that it can't be replaced and no single business model or sector are off-limits to a raw burst of change. This is a snapshot of today's most influential upstarts (the Davids, if you will) who are shaking up the Goliaths of a dozen of different industries, ranging from social media and computing to retail, tobacco and health care.

See Full List Of Disruptors Here

This inaugural list features 16 people who founded or run 12 companies: two publicly traded enterprises with $1.5 billion in 2012 revenues and 10 entrepreneurial types backed by $320 million in VC funding. Our disruptors share a common purpose: create businesses, products and services that are better -- less expensive and more creative, useful and impactful -- and scalable.