These days, every established company is at risk of having itsindustry–and its own business–disrupted by a startup. Cognizant of this,companies devote a lot of time to talking about how important it isto innovate. But here's the truth: most companies can't innovatebecause everyone is paid to maintain the status quo.

This is the single biggest reason companies fail to do anythingnew or exciting. You and everyone else are maxed out making sureyour company is doing what it's supposed to do; innovation is whatthe weekends are for.

Despite the real risk involved, this actually makes sense.Companies are set up to do one thing very well. That's the businessthey're in. All of the roles in the company are defined andstructured to create the best environment for doing that one thingas efficiently as possible. The number of people employed by thecompany fluctuates with the workload. More work, more people. Toomany people and too little work means layoffs or mismanagement.Success is doing the same thing you've always done, just a littlebit better, achieving just a few more sales or shaving a hair offof costs. Change is discouraged by time constraints and thestifling number of approvals needed. Failure is punishable by pinkslip. Every day is the same.