Innovating and disrupting existing industries isn’t just about lucking into the next big thing. As it turns out, doing so in a reliable way requires a specific mindset. Dr. Dr. Samuel H. Liggero, Professor at the Tufts Gordon Institute has a long history of finding the next cool thing, and one of those cool things was definitely his daughter, CalvinAyre.com’s own Becky Liggero Fontana. They spoke about the ever-evolving world of technology for this week’s episode of The Long Con.

Dr. Liggero shared how he got started in Research and Development (R&D) for a seriously innovative company back in the day. “I started at Polaroid in 1970 and I remained there until 2002, so I had a wonderful 32-year career there,” he said. “I joined right after finishing my education, I had postdoc’d at Princeton and went right to Polaroid. My first assignment there was Senior Laboratory Supervisor where I supervised half a dozen people. My last assignment, for the last seven years at Polaroid, i was a Corporate Vice President and Program Fellow, Where I was responsible for R&D with a group of several hundred scientists, engineers and technicians. And in-between those bookcases if you will, those bookends, I had many, many assignments that ranged from research group leader, to plant manager, to technical marketing director, to education and training director, to applications director and so on.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cW8N9UOaZn0?feature=oembed]

Polaroid wasn’t just a company that lucked into new technology; they drove toward it. “What attracted me to Polaroid was something called PP101, Personnel Policy 101, it really resonated with me there were two features to it,” he said. “The first is for the company to make products of genuine usefulness to society, and add a profit to the company. And the second, so very important, was to create a working environment where people could realize their full potential, oh did that resonate with me then and it still does today.”