This is the story of the creation of the Post-it Note. You might think, given its commercial success, that researchers were burning the midnight oil to find a way to leave clingy notes in books and on memos. But that is not what happened

In 1968, Dr. Spencer Silver, a senior chemist in 3Ms central research lab, developed a high-quality adhesive that could be easily peeled off the surfaces to which it was adhered. This particular discovery was actually considered a failure, since the real goal of Silvers project was to develop a super-strong adhesive, but instead he had found a very weak one. So, Silver moved on to look at other materials for use as a powerful adhesive.

Five years later, Arthur Fry, an avid collaborator in 3Ms research lab and a singer in his local church choir, was frustrated by how his bookmarks always slipped out when opening the hymnals. He suddenly remembered an old presentation by Silver in which Silver mentioned trying to find a promising commercial use for his removable adhesive. The next morning, Fry made some prototype sticky bookmarks that worked wonderfully for his problem. Fry then wrote up a proposal to develop a reusable, reliable, and adhesive bookmark and presented it to his supervisors. Frys managers were hesitant at first, but 3Ms culture of innovation led his supervisor to give Fry a chance to develop his idea. Fry created more samples, giving them to colleagues at work and fellow singers in the choir. Almost everyone kept asking Fry for more samples! Even then, it took several more years of design and manufacturing work to bring the Post-it Note to fruition. By 1977, the product was fully developed and functional, but it still took another two years to gain broader acceptance. In 1979, after implementing a massive consumer sampling, the product became widely available in the United States. Within two years, it had become so indispensable that no office supply list was complete without Post-it Notes. For Drs. Silver and Fry, it was a wonderful addition to their long and productive careers with 3M. Both have been awarded 3Ms highest honors in research, as well as a number of prestigious engineering awards across the globe.

It should be noted that 3M is well-known for fostering innovation. It lets its employees dedicate 15 percent of their time to pursuing projects that might be good potential innovations for the firm. In great part, this culture is what led to the Post-it Notes success. A less-open firm would simply have shut the project down. There were certainly many times during the 10 years of development where the idea could have been abandoned. One interesting point to consider from this story is not just about how firms allow serendipitous moments to grow into successful innovations, but how firms should promote such serendipity to begin with.

As demonstrated in the 3M example, senior managers have a vital role in the planned emergence process. Which of the following best describes that role?

A. Top managers need to provide financial rewards to emergent creators.

B. Senior leaders must add the emergent idea to the list of scenarios.

C. Executives provide a mission that fosters conformity and cohesiveness.

D. Executives decide which projects to shut down and which to continue.

E. Top executives decide who to assign to specific projects.