There are more things outside of your entity than there are inside.
That means that if innovations are emerging at some constant rate, the vast, vast majority will be outside of you.
The main goal is to spot insights from successful external things and import them into the project.
Open source does that structurally.
This asymmetry is similar to how when you're waiting in line at the grocery store, you always feel like you're in the slower lane.
If there's your lane, and a lane to the left and right, the chance that your lane is fastest is 33%.