Our lives are defined by innovation, and since you’re reading this on a computer, connected to the internet, you know what I mean.

GE was founded on new ideas and continues to drive innovation to solve the world’s toughest problems. As part of that, we are proud to announce the winners of the GE ecomagination Challenge, an exciting new way of finding and funding the most promising technological breakthroughs for our power grid. Please take a moment to look at the winning ideas and explore the site to learn more about how GE and these winners are collaborating to accelerate development of power grid technology.

We have been excited to host this hunt for innovation. But where does innovation come from? How does it happen? A lone inventor and a lightning strike of insight? More often, ideas take time and many hands. The seed of an idea is planted, nurtured, tended and eventually bears fruit. Teams of scientists, researchers and others sharing their results move an idea steadily forward until it reaches maturity.

While every start-up dreams of ruling its industry, there are unique challenges that come with achieving that goal. The biggest challenge for Amazon has been to not appear arrogant, says Diego Piacentini, the company’s senior VP of international retail in this Entrepreneur Thought Leader Lecture given at Stanford University.

Technology is all around us, expanding the limits of what is possible. but every once in a while, some invention or insight has an outsize effect; it creates a large dis­continuity, dividing history into “before” and “after.” The steam engine, the transistor, the World Wide Web—each of these ideas seemed to emerge from nowhere to change our world in fundamental ways. Which key technology will arise fromtoday’s vast cauldron of innovation to become tomorrow’s world changing idea? It’s impossible to know, of course, but we know it will come.

The Wall Street Journal ran an article yesterday about the best places to start a business. The results indicate that more and more countries are reducing the barriers to starting a business.

Here are some of the key figures:

• The USA ranks 3rd as the best place to start a business, after Denmark and Canada.
• It takes 694 days to get through the red tap of starting your business in Suriname. It takes just 6 days in the USA and 1 day in New Zealand.
• Peru has more women entrepreneurs than men. Peru also has one of the highest rates of entrepreneurship in the world. Japan also has a higher percentage of women entrepreneurs.

As co-founder of NY Tech Meetup, a group of 15,000-plus techies, investors, and entrepreneurs who gather every month in Manhattan for technology demonstrations, Dawn Barber has plenty of A-list contacts. Yet she hasn't invested in any of the people who've made presentations over the past six years. "I'm poor," says Barber, who supports herself through consulting gigs and other freelance work. "My [husband and I] are just not those people. If we were, I'd try to invest … in companies led by women."

Barber may soon get her chance. She's applying to the Pipeline Fund Fellowship, a new program for women who want to learn the ins and outs of angel investing (giving cash to a fledgling company in exchange for an equity stake). The fellowship was conceived by Natalia Oberti Noguera (above), a 27-year-old Yale University graduate who this summer launched Pipeline Fund, a New York venture capital firm that aims to back so-called socially responsible companies. Her goal with the fellowship is to increase the ranks of female angels and steer more cash toward such businesses. "There's a lack of gender diversity in the VC investment world," says Oberti Noguera. "And there's a lack of funding for profit-seeking social ventures."

The question came up during a recent Brainzooming innovation training session on “Taking the NO Out of Business InNOvation” about how to deal with the fear of change which can cripple efforts to introduce innovative business ideas into an organization.

One of the best ways to conquer this innovation roadblock is the widespread understanding and belief that an organization’s current path will be much worse without innovation. Think an organization’s impending financial collapse. As I paraquoted Butthead in a recent tweet, “For creating change, financial crises kick ass.”

If you don’t have a financial crisis to throw into the change mix, however, coupling an emotional appeal with legitimate customer and marketplace insights is a next best option to counteract the fear of change.

Section 407 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act requires the Securities and Exchange Commission to issue rules defining “venture capital fund”. As discussed in this earlier post, the definition is needed to implement the Dodd-Frank Act’s new Investment Advisers Act exemption for investment advisers solely to one or more venture capital funds. Doug Cornelius at Compliance Building writes that the SEC is planning to consider the question at Friday’s meeting. Here is the SEC’s agenda for the meeting.

I submitted this comment during the SEC’s pre-comment period. Readers may also be interested in my prior post about the SEC’s last attempt to define “venture capital fund”.

One of the toughest things about starting a business is the feeling of loneliness and isolation. You are on your own and nobody supports you because it’s hard for them to see what you see and feel the excitement that you feel in the early stages. This is especially true if you start your business from home.

The leadership position alone can cause loneliness and disconnectedness, and that sometimes results in self-defeating behaviors. If your personality already leans toward narcissism, being the boss will likely bring out the worst in you, leading to intimidation, deception, and the use of coercive power. Of course, that leads to further isolation.

All this heavy talk about angels, VCs, bubbles lately.  I thought I’d go for a more tactical & practical post today.  The art of the quick phone call.

I had breakfast with David Tisch the other morning in NYC.  If you don’t know David he’s the guy who will be running TechStars New York starting in January.  And that’s a great thing because I was really impressed with him.  Surprisingly so.

He had a ton of great ideas about what he wanted to do with TechStars NY.  I’ve agreed to come out in the new year and spend a few days with the entrepreneurs who join TechStars NYC (as well as Boulder).  I love this program.

This is a great presentation on social analytics. It touches on the importance of moving beyond capturing data in nice charts and graphs to understanding meaning and generating real insight – requiring the application of semantics and sociology. Also interesting is the prediction that social analytics become a key plank in enterprise 2.0. That makes sense to me, as to get maximum value out of social applications businesses will analyse what is being done and said to identify opportunities for people to improve their work and avoid problems.

The car’s stopped! Within seconds you’re opening the passenger door of the vehicle.

A short conversation ensues about where both parties are headed. But in truth the verbal exchange simply masks the more important stuff, because the decision to accept a lift is never a small one. You’re checking out their appearance and the state of the vehicle; you hear their tone; you smell the air. And if they’ve got company, there’s many more judgements to make.

Sometimes the decision is easy and delightful. For example, whilst hitching north of Aberystwyth I opened the door of a large Mercedes only to set eyes on a world rugby legend sitting behind the wheel. Then there’s the bizarre, like the time I slung back a minibus door to be greeted by a group of singing builders (who had a curious passion for scaffolding) . And of course, the real challenges; this is when your sixth sense (which is only developed through experience) tells you something isn’t right.

DIGHTON, Kan., Nov. 18 (SEND2PRESS NEWSWIRE) — The Northwest Kansas Regional Energy Collaborative (NWKREC) is the first organization to choose Economic Gateway, an innovative Web site system featuring a site selector map, as its new online tool for retaining and attracting business and industry to its area. The first of its kind in the industry, Economic Gateway is a joint venture between Minnesota-based Web development firm Golden Shovel Agency and Applied Data Consultants, Inc. (ADC), an Eau Claire, Wis. geographic information systems (GIS) company.

The NWKREC is a regional economic development group with a focus on promoting wind and other renewable energy as a means of increasing economic development in its region.

According to Ron Kresha, president of Golden Shovel, the two companies came together to offer a comprehensive economic development solution at an affordable price.

With news reports often emphasizing the slow economic recovery with respect to jobs, it is possible that we lose some perspective about some legitimate success stories. National unemployment rates often overshadow the work of some communities in transforming their economic profiles. Cities like Raleigh NC have transformed their economy and others like Des Moines IA have significantly lowered their unemployment rates. Another below the radar screen example is Québec City, Canada.

Observe the latest unemployment statistics from October 2010: United States: 9.6 percent; Canada: 8.1 percent; Ontario province: 8.2 percent; Québec province: 7.9 percent; Québec City: 4.7 percent. Québec’s capital city, the so-called government town, has the lowest unemployment rate of any major city in Canada.

In itself, that is a story. But what is more significant are the facts. Québec City has had consistent growth due to its increasingly diverse economic base. When I worked in Québec City in the early 1990s, it was accurate to call it a haven of public service jobs. Now it is becoming a leader in information technology, biomedical research, defense research, applied optics and photonics research, food technology research, brain disease research, etc.

Remember a few years back, when big companies such as Nike kept getting immersed in sweatshop scandals? You hardly hear about that sort of stuff anymore. But the fact is, child labor and forced labor remain startlingly common throughout the developing world.

This superb interactive chart shows you everything you need to know, from the countries where child and forced labor are most prevalent, to what exactly is being made -- the point being to better inform people, so that they can avoid such goods.

We’ve created almost a dozen PDF downloads (eBooks) here at Small Business Trends over the past few years. Typically these are compilations of tips or advice from readers like you. One of the things we are learning is how to use images to make these PDFs more interesting and appealing.

Our first attempts had rudimentary formatting. They looked like Microsoft Word documents, with our logo dropped in. Basic — but not exactly scintillating to the eye. More recently we’ve tried to make these PDF downloads interesting by using one or a few carefully chosen images. We usually go for royalty-free stock photography and images that we purchase. We can get high-quality professional images in a wide range of subjects, styles and colors. We don’t have to worry about copyright issues, because we know when we purchase them that we will have the right to use them without the need to pay ongoing royalties.

California has a high share of venture capital. But in a recent article, Where’s The Beef? Can Venture Capital Save California?, Gino DiCaro, Vice President of Communications for the California Manufacturers & Technology Association, makes an interesting point: point: All of California’s venture capital hasn’t created much growth in manufacturing. While California accounts for over 40 percent of all U.S. venture capital activity, DiCaro says, it is home to only “1.3 percent of the new or expanded manufacturing facilities in the last five years.”

DiCaro’s article raises an interesting question: Does it matter that California’s dominant position in venture capital fails to translate into growth in manufacturing in the state?

Forbes Magazine recently released their list of America’s 100 Best Small Companies.

Right off the bat, I need to say that the phrase “small companies” is relative.  We’re not truly talking about “small businesses” with this list. The annual revenues of those on the Forbes list were in the 8 and 9 figures – from a low of $29 million for NV Energy to a high of $987 million for Skyworks Solutions.

But the list is instructive because it gives you an idea of the kinds of businesses that are growing, even in this economy.  And if you need inspiration for your own business or are looking to spot trends in businesses, look no further than this list.