Counter-Intelligence: Lessons from Whirlpool’s WLabs

Brett Dibkey knows what he shouldn’t be doing at Whirlpool’s WLabs: delivering incremental improvements to the refrigerator. Instead, his 4-year-old incubator, located in Benton Harbor, Mich., is tasked with something a whole lot harder: creating new kinds of appliances in categories that aren’t yet well-established.