The answer could be sitting in front of you. Literally.

Growing businesses have to innovate at a speed and scale that outpaces the competition. So why do so many organizations have only a small number of innovators? A recent HBR article has some interesting conclusions. If your hunch is that your organization is grossly underperforming, well…you are likely correct.

The DDI is a county-level index score (from 0 to 100) measuring the digital divide. The higher the number, the larger the digital divide. The objective of the DDI is to serve as a descriptive and pragmatic tool for policymakers, community leaders, and residents. The DDI consists of two components: infrastructure/adoption and socioeconomic characteristics.

WASHINGTON, Nov. 22, 2016 – The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) today released results of investments in scientific research including 222 new inventions, 94 patents awarded and 125 new patent applications filed in 2015. The USDA Annual Report on Technology Transfer includes new agriculture-related discoveries, inventions and processes made by USDA researchers, universities and small businesses with the potential for commercial application.

Scientists from the University of Central Florida (UCF) have created a supercapacitor battery prototype that works like new even after being recharged 30,000 times. The research could yield high-capacity, ultra-fast-charging batteries that last over 20 times longer than a conventional lithium-ion cell. "You could charge your mobile phone in a few seconds and you wouldn't need to charge it again for over a week," says UCF postdoctoral associate Nitin Choudhary.

Image: University of Central Florida 

The Australian House of Parliament has re-introduced legislation to improve the environment for investment crowdfunding. The bill, or Corporations Amendment (“Crowd-Sourced Funding”) Bill 2016, has been widely anticipated to begin the legislative process this year.  The bill was introduced by the Treasurer, Scott Morrison, MP.

The Aussie bill recognizing “crowd-sourced funding (CSF)” as an “emerging form of funding that allows entrepreneurs to raise funds from a large number of investors. It has the potential to provide finance for innovative business ideas and additional investment opportunities for retail investors, while ensuring investors continue to have sufficient information to make informed investment decisions”.

Are you happy at work? If you live in Hawaii, West Virginia or Maine, you probably answered "yes!" Pulling together data from more than 250,000 workers across the U.S., career discovery platform Sokanu uncovered the happiest and unhappiest states.

Related: 3 Strategies for Hacking Happiness

The happiest people were found all across the country -- Hawaii, West Virginia, Maine, Nevada and Kansas take the cake for highest employee satisfaction states.

Image: https://www.entrepreneur.com

After just a few seconds of charging, a new battery technology could offer days or even weeks of phone life. New Battery Tech Scientists at the University of Central Florida (UCF) recently have developed a new process for creating a supercapacitor battery concept. According to The Age, this new technology provides great advantages over previous battery tech, because supercapacitors can store more power and can be recharged more times. The new method can be used in various applications ranging from electronic gadgets to mobile phones and even electric vehicles.

Fifty executives at an executive-education program at a major business school. One mentioned that a competitor had deliberately tried to damage his company.

The facilitator asked, “How many of you think a competitor has tried to hurt your business?” Fifty hands extended. The facilitator asked, “How many of you have worked for a company that has tried to hurt a competitor’s business?” Fifty hands retracted.

Theresa May should overhaul the visa system to make London a “global  innovation powerhouse” in the wake of the Brexit vote, the head of one of the capital’s top  universities said today.

Alice Gast, President of Imperial College, said reforms that would make it easier to bring in more of the world’s top scientists would allow Britain to capitalise on leaving the EU.

Though newspaper reporter and broadcaster were considered the worst jobs of 2016, according to a study by CareerCast, new research suggests that media and communications majors can expect more rapid salary progression than those who graduate with degrees in engineering, law, and business.

According to a recent small study by Expert Market—which followed the salary growth of 200 college majors over 10 years following graduation from a bachelor’s program—those in media and communications as well as mathematics can expect to earn nearly 80% more after their first decade on the job, compared to their salary on day one.

The phrase “world changing” is overused. Yet how else do you capture the full world-historical influence of an invention like the transistor, or the World Wide Web, or the cellular phone? Some ideas really do bend history. It's too early to know whether carbon-breathing batteries, ingestible robots, quantum satellites, and the seven other ideas described in these pages will have a similar effect. Most plans fail, and the biggest ideas tend to carry the greatest risk. But it doesn't take long for an idea to go from laughable to inevitable. And a few of those, of course, go on to become transformative.

Becoming an entrepreneur and starting your own business is the key to becoming independent and financially free. It’s that simple, isn’t it? Well, unfortunately, a lot of new entrepreneurs still quit their day jobs thinking that their new business will get off the ground the next day. The truth is, becoming an entrepreneur requires a lot of commitment and energy.

When you invest enough time and energy, however, financial freedom is really just a few steps away. To get there in a timely manner, here are the top three secrets every new entrepreneur needs to know.

This is the time of year when we focus on giving thanks, with many of us sharing our gratitude with friends and family. But when is the last time you thanked your employees? Coworkers? Or boss? If you haven’t recognized the members of your work team lately, you need to repair the oversight before your Thanksgiving Day leftovers are history.

Gratitude is absolutely vital in the workplace, says UC Davis psychology professor Robert Emmons, author of The Little Book of Gratitude: Creating a Life of Happiness and Wellbing by Giving Thanks, and a leading researcher on the subject.

“Great innovation occurs because people ought to make meaning to change the world. If you look at the great companies out of Silicon Valley or any part of the world, the great companies inevitably make people happier, more creative or more productive,” said Guy Kawasaki, Apple Fellow and Silicon-Valley based Author, Innovation Evangelist and Entrepreneur, in Dubai on Monday.

“The companies that truly make people have a better life, they make meaning and also make money. So I’ve come to the conclusion that if you make meaning, then you will probably also make money. The key there is to start with making meaning,” he said.

THE PENTAGON – The Navy continues to rely on its sailors at all levels for innovative ideas that will help the service operate better, faster, and for less money, the deputy under secretary of the Navy for management told USNI News.

The Department of the Navy is asking for submissions for the second annual Secretary of the Navy’s Innovation Awards, which recognizes and rewards individuals or teams that have created an innovation-friendly work environment or who have made achievements in specific areas, Thomas Hicks told USNI News in a Nov. 17 interview. Data analytics, automated process development and technology development are highlighted in this year’s awards contest, reflecting the needs of the Navy to counter increasingly technologically sophisticated potential adversaries.

Thanksgiving, we’ve heard, may be rough for many families around America this year. But don’t despair. Politics may divide the dinner table. But sports can unite you and uncle Freddie. Here are seven sporty reasons to give thanks this holiday season.

1. Neither The Cowboys Nor The Lions Stink. For once, you might want to fight off the tryptophan and stay awake for Thanksgiving football. The Detroit Lions and Minnesota Vikings kick off at 12:30: the teams are tied for first in the NFL North division, as both have 6-4 records.

No Thanksgiving is complete without a turkey at the table—and a nap right after it’s eaten. The meat has a bad reputation for making eaters sleepy, but is there really science to back that up?

Here’s the lowdown: turkey contains the amino acid L-tryptophan, which produces sleep-promoting serotonin and melatonin. But turkey has about the same amount of tryptophan as other meats. It may even have a built-in secret weapon against sleepiness: an abundance of protein, which can regulate insulin levels and actually combat fatigue.

The tryptophan-packed turkey wasn’t the star during the first Thanksgiving—and that’s not the only thing that’s changed in the nearly 400 years since the holiday began.

Much is unknown about the first recorded feast between the Pilgrims and Native Americans in the New World at Plymouth in 1621, as historians have heavily relied on only two primary eyewitness accounts. But while a good meal is a constant, it’s clear that the original festival doesn’t have all that much in common with the all-American holiday recognized today, with its focus on football and, more recently, shopping.

Just about everybody has a good business idea so why don’t they always happen? It is the fear of failure that stops us from following through with our ideas. More often than not, your peers will dissuade you by pointing out why it won’t fly or why you’re not cut out for it.

My advice? Ignore them! It’s Freudian really, what you’re highlighting is their own fear of failure. They can justify this fear by saying – I spent all that time at Uni getting a qualification so I’m not going to waste it, it’s a good idea but I have no idea about setting up or running a business or I have commitments if it fails, I lose the lot!

Becoming an entrepreneur after being an employee my whole career was a case of aging five years in five minutes. I’m the guy walking around the street with big bags under his eyes and more grey hair than when you last saw him. But I’ve also learnt more in the last year than the last five combined and it’s been one of the best things I’ve ever done.

It’s now been a year since I jumped ship and started running my own business and I’ve experienced some great highs and also the lows that come with the entrepreneur’s territory. It’s hard, harder than I could have ever imagined. But with the grind comes immense satisfaction that I never felt working for a multinational.