How to Spark a Snowcrash & What the Web Really Does

by Venessa Miemis

It's been an interesting week, to say the least.

In a lot of ways, we all just pulled each other up to a new frequency, I think. We've been sharing our ideas and perspectives of our personal discoveries for a while now, and all of a sudden all these perspectives assembled into an insight that helped me understand why the human network is so important, and why building a personal 'trust network' is critical for moving forward in society. (For anyone new here, check out An Idea Worth Spreading post and comment thread as an orientation to this site and the thinking going on here.)

So the past few days have been spent thinking about what just happened, and how we can keep doing it.

I have realized what's happening here is that this blog has become a public learning community, where we are all literally learning how to learn. We are learning how to think in this new way. This new way of thinking, this 'network thinking', by default requires a network. We can't learn how to think in the new way alone. We can only figure it out through experimentation and collaboration. This is the "shift" everyone is talking about, the big thing that individuals and organizations "need" to operate in the 21st Century. We're revealing it, unfolding it, right now, together.

My takeaway of what this means and how to do it:


1. Create a personal 'trust network' for yourself first.

In order to understand the implications of the shift and to internalize it, you need to experience it firsthand. You can't tell your organization that you're going to be implementing "social media" and everyone is going to start "collaborating," and assume that waving a magic wand is going to make this happen. My experience has been that I had to learn what trusting and sharing means on my own.

That really sounds bizarre, and I feel a bit sub-human that it took me so long to re-learn how to trust someone and share resources. It's what we're taught as children, but apparently society does a good job beating it out of us.

All of us have a trust network already 'in real life'. It's your family and your close friends and colleagues, all those strong ties, and also your extended family, community, and coworkers, your weak ties. These people are crucial, they are your companions day to day. But what about people beyond your real life connections? Is there a way to extend our connections and build trust with strangers who have a diversity of backgrounds, skills, strengths, resources, and knowledge? People who could help us if we needed help? Could we establish a global trust network?

What I discovered through Twitter was that there are people out there who know what community means. Who really, truly know. These people have already internalized what a society could look like based on a cooperative model, and it seems that this is what's really going on on the web. Beyond all the superficial stuff out there, all the mindless entertainment and porn, at the core (or maybe at the periphery) is a community of...thousands?...millions?...of people who have jobs and careers and passions that they carry out "in the real world," but have already embraced the vision of a much different way of life that is based in trust.


And they are modeling it online.


What is actually happening on the web is an epic experiment in creating a new society.

When you hear people talk about this online "gift economy," and "building value and trust," and "sharing" - this is WAY beyond a new gimmick for your business. Please don't underestimate what's going on. This is actually people laying down the foundation and infrastructure for a new global economy. There is a movement that is slowly gaining steam as people are "waking up," and it has the potential to change the world.

That thing you think about before you go to sleep at night, when you say "sigh, if only the world was a little more like ________" - that thing is actually going on right now. It's terrifying and magical, because it means that there is hope. It means that we don't have to stand by and let the economy and education and government all erode and crumble around us as we watch from the sidelines. There's the opportunity to actually get involved, take charge of our own lives, and join in the experiment and see how to make it a reality. How to make it THE reality.

The beauty of the complexity of it is that in order to really reap the benefits of it, you have to participate in it genuinely, and in order to participate genuinely, you have to do it intentionally, and in order to do it intentionally, you have to understand it, and in order to understand it, you have to understand yourself, and in order to understand yourself, you have to learn how to give, and in order to learn how to give, you have to establish a network to give to.

It's a complex interrelated web, but it seems that establishing the network is a first step.


2. Share yourself.

This is the part where mindfulness comes in, and where you really have to start exploring the depths of personal Identity.

That's a lot to ask, and you may not have even asked yourself that question in a while. That's the point. If you were really going to live in a trust-based society - what would that look like? Who would you be?

There's a big path of self-discovery and self-reflection that goes on, there's a lot of confronting your beliefs and your ego, and it's painful sometimes.

For me, that is kind of the beauty of the web. It can help you to help yourself, if you choose to use it to that end.

And the way that 'it' helps you, is that PEOPLE help you. It's the people. It has always been about the people.

Why has our society become so jaded, so selfish, so afraid, so arrogant, so egotistical, and so greedy?

I think it's because our society doesn't give us many chances to share ourselves with each other. To really let our guards down and just be authentic, good people, who are not out for gain, who are not out to exploit each other in order to get ahead, but who just want to be able to freely exchange gifts and collaborate because it makes us feel good.

Society doesn't want this. You want to know why?


Because these things are free.


What does society reward? Cheating. Stealing. Exploitation. Fame. Big houses. Fancy cars. Executive titles. Material stuff. All these things are attached to something else. Something has to be sacrificed to get these things. And they often don't make you happy in the end. They're not who you really are, or what you really care about, but you do them because that's how it's set up, and we're just operating within the framework that exists.

But, there's this other way.

In this experimental society in which you can participate, if you want - people are a little more 'real'. People will give you advice, pass along a link they think might interest you, offer to collaborate on a real project, or exchange some information with you, for no other reason besides that it's "how THIS system works."

The precondition is trust. You can't buy trust. You can't force trust.

You earn trust.

You earn it by sharing your gifts. I don't know how to tell you what yours is. It took me years of exploration to find mine, but I can say from my firsthand experience on the web, that my trust network pulled me forward into the realm where I made the discovery. The search for self-identity that I've been on my life was actually aided by real people around the planet who I've never actually met.

The process of self-discovery is of course completely personal. I can only tell you that for me, starting my blog was one of my greatest tools. Writing my thoughts was a powerful way for me to practice thinking about what I think, and critically evaluate myself. The even better part is when other people started leaving comments on my posts, challenging the way I think, offering their perspectives, and making me rethink what I thought I knew. These conversations have been evolving for months, but each blog post resulted in people leaving comments that challenged my thinking further and further. Sometimes people disagreed with me, and sometimes I wanted to lash out and defend my thinking.

But instead, I tried to understand that other person's perspective, see where they're coming from, and imagine why they might think what they think. I tried to learn empathy. I think empathy is a critical emotion to develop in a trust society, and also a necessary one to help bring about 'the shift'.

The learning process that takes place during this self-discovery isn't just a discovery of self, but the discovery of self in relation to others. The thinking process becomes one that can encompass the idea of interdependence. I don't know how to explain this, but I can only say this "new way of thinking" involves a transcendence of ego. It is a mental model that assumes that problems cannot be solved alone, and that collaboration is not just desirable, but is actually a display of higher intelligence.

When you are able to put your ego aside, and realize that problems can only be solved by many, your mentality shifts from "I know the answer" to one of "How can I contribute to the solution?"

For me, when this started, it felt like a video game. I would send people links, or retweet people's stuff that seemed useful, and when I got a "thank you," it caused a little high. People were appreciating my contributions. When people would comment on my blog posts or retweet my posts to their networks, it caused a little high again, because again I was being appreciated.

As you start sharing more of yourself and your ideas, your art, your gifts, your insights, people will start to notice. You don't have to try to 'sell yourself'. You have to try to BE yourself.

There's a difference. And the difference gets noticed.

And the shift starts to creep into your brain, as this behavior becomes reinforced over and over and over again.

Every time someone shows you some appreciation for being you, even something as small as a retweet, a different kind of synapse starts firing in the brain.

We start getting rewarded for giving and for sharing.

We get rewarded for being our authentic self.

It starts to build self-confidence and self-esteem in a strangely gratifying way, because all you're doing is kind of having a good time, and just being yourself.

Just keep doing this.


3. Rewire your brain

In order to function in this new society, what it comes down to is that you need to kickstart your brain.

Beyond all the fun and giving and sharing is an actual restructuring of the way the brain works. We have to teach our brains how to process the type of information that now needs to be processed. Digital information. Information that has a place it needs to go in order to be useful. We are problem solvers, but we are also transmitters. We need to build a new brain.

This new brain is intuition based.

I actually think it's not a new brain at all, but the 'real' brain. I think what happens is that we start to unlearn some things, and then rediscover how the optimal brain actually functions.

I have read quite a bit of research on complexity science, evolutionary theory, neuroscience, and really so much more, so this isn't coming from a place of being uninformed, but there's something different about this brain.

Because it's intuition based, it defies description. It doesn't think hierarchically or in a linear way, instead it operates in patterns. It happens seemingly instantaneously. It happens through intention.

Someone gave me the example of reaching out for a glass. Do you think about all the muscles and movements involved in moving your arm, or do you simply have an intention for your hand to grasp the glass?

It's complex beyond reason, and blows away our current models of description.

It happens because we just 'know'.

I think what's happened to us is we have trained our brains to operate like machines for 100 years. We have been working in jobs that have set descriptions, with specific tasks and roles, and they box in our mind. I think our minds have actually struggled to form the linear paths to think in the linear way that typical organizations want us to operate in; following directions, following rules, doing repetitive tasks, regurgitating information.

But the brain doesn't want to work like that. It wants to work like a network. It wants to send ideas and information all over the place, jumping from synapse to synapse on multiple pathways. It wants to be contextual, relational, adaptive, and non-linear. It wants to imagine things, map new models, and revise itself constantly. I think it WANTS to be a learning machine. As we pick up on new ways of thinking about things and assembling information, new synapses form, helping information reach its destination faster and more effectively.

I started to think about the brain this way by watching the way information travels on Twitter. This was a huge help in shifting my thinking. I imagined each person as a node in a network, even imagining the people out there who I wasn't following. I tried to imagine EVERYONE who's on Twitter. All the humans around the world. I imagined we each operated as a switch and a filter.

As a switch, we each can decide where to allow information to spread into our network. (Keep toggling this example between how Twitter works and how the brain's neural nets work)

When we retweet, we expose our entire network of relationships to this particular piece of information. That's like flipping the switch 'on'. It fires the synapse. Or we can take no action, and the tweet just passes through the stream. The switch stayed 'off'.

In addition, we can also be a filter. We can add extra data to a tweet, leaving a short comment about it, or cc'ing specific people on it, or just sending it directly to people.

As we become more familiar with who we're following and who's within our human network, we individually get better at being a switch and a filter.

We become more discriminatory about what to tweet, what to retweet, and where to send information.

Like the brain that forms new pathways for effectiveness, we also learn to more effectively move information.

I think that the act of doing this in itself trains the brain. It teaches the brain to recognize itself. It's like you giving your brain permission to operate the way you're modeling the movement of information in Twitter. Your tweets don't get seen by the same people after every tweet, and you never know who is going to pick up your tweet and send it to their network. If the person is influential, they can cause a huge number of people to see your tweet, sending along all kinds of new and unexpected pathways. But the travel of a tweet is kind of random - you can't predict exactly where it will go or who will combine it with some other novel piece of information, it's just this organic process.

Now the interesting thing is when you stop thinking about tweets, and stop thinking about the screennames that are retweeting tweets.

Instead, think that you are sending an important piece of information. And think that your network isn't Twitter, it's human beings who need certain information in order for them to be able to solve problems. And then assume that you've got a pretty good read on the human beings within your personal network, and you have a pretty good intuition about who you should send that information to in order for it to get to where you think it needs to go and be seen and processed in order for it to have the most impact.

Now you're operating intelligently.

My little snowcrash was understanding this process of information travel. It's non-hierarchical, fluid, organic, and unpredictable. But it's a lot closer to how the brain wants to function than the way we usually use it.

I think that by observing how information moves in Twitter, by literally SEEING it, watching it, observing, we can teach the brain to recognize itself, and jumpstart this shift process.

It's said that "two neurons that fire together, wire together."

This is the snowcrash. It's the moment that a new connection, a new pathway, is forged in the brain. Or maybe many pathways. Maybe a whole new network of pathways. Maybe that 'lightning bolt' feeling is really what it looks like, just a ton of new pathways blazing across your brain.

At any rate, once your brain locks in this new set of pathways, you're in.

Now you're ready to start doing some reeaaalllllly interesting things.

I think this might be the way innovation works. It might be the way idea generation works. It might be the way creativity works. It's allowing the hierarchical thinking to loosen its grip on your brain, and let it do what it wants to do. I think it will start jumping in these non-lateral patterns and joining up ideas that you would have never thought to join before, because you have a whole new set of pathways to connect them.

And if your individual brain starts acting like that, and then you tune up your whole organization to that frequency and have a network of minds operating in this non-lateral way... well... the combined intelligence of a network like that seems pretty radical.


Conclusion

I wanted this to be an abridged version of the last post, but it seems like it has gotten pretty lengthy as well. I'm looking forward to your perspectives on the way I'm interpreting what happened, and for those that have had a similar experience, please share your version of how it happened and how you think the process can be accelerated.

I think our capacity to learn and grow is going to skyrocket once we start experimenting with building these new paths in the brain.

So, what I've covered here is three (3) concepts for boosting our intelligence:

1. Build a web of relationships, of alliances, with people who will help us to grow and learn


2. Initiate the process of self-discovery and self-awareness / mindfulness, and learn to share, trust and empathize


3. Intentionally rewire the brain through watching its behavior modeled in the way information travels on Twitter

The other component that I'm going to cover in the next post is dialogue.

I've thought a lot on this, and the thing that's missing from this formula is the spoken word.

I'll get into the concept of orality and generative dialogue, but I think this is the other critical component for us to learn and challenge our minds. We have to engage in spoken 'debate', in a mutually respectful way, to share the way we understand things with others, and then get their perspectives and insights. Some of my greatest growth has happened during conversations that go late into the night, where my mind is stretched to new levels.

I generated what seems like a potentially powerful way to do this publicly online so many can learn at once, which evolved out of my thoughts for starting a Junto.

Sneak preview: Intelligent dialogue -> Chat Roulette format + livestream + Twitter backchannel

I'll explain more about it soon!


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Venessa Miemis is a Media Studies graduate student at the New School in NYC, exploring what happens at the intersection of technology, culture, and communication. Connect with her at www.emergentbydesign.com and on Twitter @venessamiemis.

The Art and Science of Innovation

by Jeffrey Phillips

I'm a bit troubled by the fact that many people in corporate America seem to believe that innovation is a mystical art, rather than a set of skills and capabilities that many people can learn and implement. I suppose around every complex problem solving process there seems to be a bit of magic, but at the core of all magic there's a simple set of rules. It may take an Einstein to figure out the rules to relativity, but they are knowable, demonstrable and proveable. So, too, are the processes, capabilities and skills behind innovation.

Another barrier to broader innovation deployment is the sense that innovation is an art - an intrinsic skill that you are either "born with" or not. I, for one, am terrible at drawing. I simply didn't receive an innate ability to depict people or landscapes from my parents. I believe, though, if I tried to, I could become better at drawing using programs like Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. This program has radically improved the drawing ability for thousands of people, and demonstrates that even art can be learned through the careful application of basic principles. I may never be a Van Gogh, but I can improve my drawing capabilities to a significant extent. Why, then, do so many people believe they aren't "creative" or aren't "innovative" as if this is a binary decision?

I'm not going to argue that "anyone" can master innovation skills, any more than I'd care to argue that "anyone" can master relativity or will become a Van Gogh. But it is also clearly the case that innovation is based on a number of tools and processes which can be learned, and is enabled through looking at a problem through a number of different perspectives, or imagining new perspectives, which is all that artists try to do. Furthermore, everyone is creative. Think back to your childhood when a cardboard box was a rocketship and a stick was a sword. We are all creative, we simply allow corporate cultures and society's expectations to force our creativity into hiding. One of the most instructive training activities we do at OVO is a prototyping exercise in which we ask our participants to prototype and defend to others an idea using nothing more than pipe cleaners, Play-Doh, paper, crayons and found objects. You'd be amazed at the creativity demonstrated when people know they'll be evaluated on their creativity!

So, the title of this post is really a set-up. Innovation is a science with rules, processes and established tools that requires the participant to think like an artist. The thinking requires new perspectives and the ability to imagine something new. Therefore, innovation combines the tools and methods of both scientists and artists, but all of those skills can be learned. If your organization wants or needs innovation to compete successfully, perhaps your team should start by examining the staff and its proclivities. Most organizations are full of people who are steeped in orderly process and science, and they need the perspectives and imagination an artist can introduce. Others have never been introduced to the tools and techniques that innovation has to offer, and need to learn those skills. Simply starting an innovation effort with no training is almost certainly doomed to failure.


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Jeffrey Phillips is a senior leader at OVO Innovation. OVO works with large distributed organizations to build innovation teams, processes and capabilities. Jeffrey is the author of "Make us more Innovative", and innovateonpurpose.blogspot.com.

11 Steps to Fight the 'God Complex'

Photo Credit: Sebastian Bergmann

by Glen Stansberry

We're all awesome, right? Well, I mean we didn't create the world or anything like that, but I think most of us pretty much have it going on. However, there can be some negative aspects of being creative. Creative people can sometimes struggle with mild cases of the God Complex.

The God complex is defined as a psychological state of mind in which a person believes that they have supernatural powers or god-like abilities. The person generally believes they are above the rules of society and should be given special consideration.

Do we honestly think we're a deity, or even better than everyone? No. But some creative people are quite susceptible to picking up at least a few of the aspects of the God complex.

And who wouldn't?

Creatives spend all day creating. It's only natural that on occasion we become a bit too wrapped up in what we're developing and don't spend enough time thinking about our surroundings. Here are a few ways we might fall into thinking more like a God and less like the mere mortals we are.

[I should note that I based this article off of my own experience. You may not struggle with any of these traits of the God complex, and I applaud you. You're a better human than me.]


1. We get lost in our own little worlds

The ability to create something very unique and imaginative requires a special set of talents. However, these talents sometimes have negative side affects, and one of them being tunnel vision. More often than not, we're only focused on the project(s) we're working on, and nothing else.

Have you ever seen a kid playing with building blocks, totally consumed with what he's building? It's a lot like that. The outside world doesn't affect us when we're in "building" mode.

How to fix it:

The easiest way to fix this aspect of the God Complex is to make sure we're thinking about the 'bigger picture'. In the scope of life, what we're creating isn't as important as our families, friends, or our health for that matter. Focusing on the fact that there are other important things in life help with our perspective. Staying up-to-date with world new and politics helps as well.

Also, it's a great idea to think about things in this world (the one where everyone else lives) that are bigger than us. I find it very humbling to reflect on the size of planets, stars and galaxies. In the scope of creation, I'm a tiny speck of dust. If that.

Does the trick every time.


2. We sometimes think our idea is better than everyone else's

It's hard for creative people to believe there might be two solutions two a problem. Our ideas have to be the best because, well... we thought of them! Our ideas are like our babies. We couldn't imagine having anyone else's. Wrapping our minds around another, completely different solution can be quite hard.

How to fix it:

Having an open mind is the easiest possible solution, but it's also the hardest. Putting ourselves outside the situation and looking at another idea objectively is an almost impossible task. Instead, try thinking about how your solution could benefit from the other proposed idea. That way you're not giving up on your idea, the other idea is assisting yours.


3. We become frustrated because "people don't understand us"

Nearly every time I try to explain my ideas to other people, I get a blank stare. It's quite easy to take the negative attitude that "nobody understands me, so why should I try to understand them?" It can be a vicious cycle of bitterness between you and everyone involved.

How to fix it:

If nobody understands my ideas, is it because I'm bad at explaining them? Probably. But it's also because the other person didn't have the idea. That's what comes with the territory of being a creative person. Don't sweat it Jack! Sometimes it's just best to show someone a prototype of your idea to get the point across.


4. We have a constant desire to be enlightened

Sometimes creative folk tend to go a bit overboard with needing to know about everything. Constantly learning (and sometimes flaunting this new-found knowledge), is a way for us to feel more competent and secure in our abilities. It's more about feeding an insecurity than anything.

How to fix it:

Sometimes, ignorance is bliss. There's absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to constantly learn. Learning is a wonderful thing, and we should always be striving to learn and improve. That's what life is. However, becoming obsessed with knowledge can be damaging. We'll never be fully enlightened about anything, so why obsess? It's just a waste of time, and I'd rather spend it enjoying my friends and family.


5. We can be a bit too competitive.

In Greek mythology, the gods were always comparing themselves to each other and bickering amongst themselves (with the help of unlucky individuals on the earth). In this same respect, creative people might be a tad on the competitive side. Let's be honest: we compare ourselves to each other, either subconsciously or intentionally. It's kind of human nature. We want to be the best.

How to fix it:

Showing a little spunk and wanting to be competitive isn't necessarily a bad thing. It's when we take it a little too far and it turns into an obsession. Being able to take a step back and show some self-control is a hard thing to do sometimes. In order to cool an overly-competitive nature, take a step back and think about the scope of things. Is it worth being competitive over? Odds are it isn't.


6. We might look down on others

This might be just my own personal experience, (and I hate to admit it), but if I'm honest I sometimes find myself looking down on others. It's not necessarily a conscious thing, but sometimes thoughts tend to creep into my head about how much better I am at something than Average Joe. If I can compare myself to someone else and point out their faults and superior I am to them, I'll feel better. It's awful, but it's true.

How to fix it:

The first step is to become aware that we're looking down on others. It really can be an automatic, subconscious thing. Stopping the comparison in it's tracks before it starts is the most effective fix. There isn't a hard-and-fast rule on how to fix it, other than starting to become aware of the problem. Once we're aware, then we can start thinking of ways to change how we think about other people.


7. We sometimes compare ourselves

Much like looking down on others, creative people can sometimes struggle with comparing ourselves to others. "I've got more hair than that dude. Oh, I'm skinnier than that girl. My designs are so much cooler than his." etc., etc., etc. Comparisons help prove that we are, in fact, superior to nearly everyone else in some way.

How to fix it:

This again falls into the "self-esteem" category. We're all different. We all have completely different strengths and weaknesses. Trying to point out our differences only helps pacify our insecurities. We just have to keep the mindset that we're all different, and we're all awesome. Period.


8. We can take our creations too seriously

I'm especially guilty of this one. Like we said earlier, our creations are like our children. We created them. There's a special bond, (even between something as seemingly insignificant as a bit of code), to something that you've personally created. When people criticize it or make fun of it, it cuts deep. Deep. Also, we sometimes find ourselves thinking that our creations are more important than they really are. Being a creator can make us very susceptible to the God complex.

How to fix it:

A great method is ask other close friends as to what they think of the idea or project. You need the input of someone you trust who's not emotionally attached to the project. Their opinion will really help you gauge how good the idea or concept really is. The more you practice this, the more it becomes less painful when someone doesn't like your idea. But ultimately, it's your idea. If you think it will work regardless, just do it. Sometimes people just won't understand your idea until you've put it into practice.


9. We can be bad at listening to others

This is generally because we get caught up in our own little worlds (#1) or we think our idea is better than the rest (#2). Regardless of the reason, sometimes creatives just plain suck at listening to other people (myself included). Talking to a creative person can sometimes seem like it's all about them.

How to fix it:

When we create things all day, it is usually all about us. It's about our abilities, talents, problem solving skills, and not anyone else. However, when we're around other people, we have to be extra careful of listening to others and including them in the conversation.


10. We feel unappreciated

Sometimes it feels that nobody understands or appreciates what I do on a daily basis. Being creative doesn't necessarily mean I have much to show for it either. So how do you explain to people the significance of what you do, if it's not pulling in a whole bunch of money?

How to fix it:

Creatives like me need to realize that people in our lives do appreciate us, they just don't always understand us or what we do. In fact, throughout history most people didn't understand anything creative people like Thomas Edison or Alexander Graham Bell did until years later.

I wouldn't do what I do if it was about making truck loads of money. We create because we love creating. That's where our affirmation really comes from.


11. We excuse our eccentricities

Yes, believe it or not, sometimes creative people are a tad eccentric. (I can already hear readers getting upset and ruffling their feathers.) Don't worry! It's not a bad thing! However, if we know about our eccentricities and don't try to correct them, it can be a negative thing. We can't think that we're above correction because of our creative minds. Sure, Einstein was extremely eccentric and brilliant, but he never made excuses for it.

How to fix it:

We have to take responsibilities for our shortcomings, and stop blaming them on things like creativity. A personal example: I used to claim that I "wasn't good with money because my brain doesn't think that way." I would say that to myself so I didn't have to take any accountability for my terrible bookkeeping. But I realized that I was just using it as a crutch. I've since gotten help and use financial advising to keep me on the right track.


Conclusions

A culmination of the above 11 points can turn a someone into a downright bitter person if they're not careful. Because we're mostly so focused on ourselves and our abilities while we're being creative, it's easy to start thinking inwardly and become consumed with our creations. Keeping ourselves in-check with reality is the best way to stay grounded and from adopting traits of the God complex.

It turns out we are but mere men.


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Glen Stansberry writes at LifeDev, a blog that helps people make their ideas happen. You can follow him on Twitter here.

It's OK if People Don't Understand Your Idea

by Glen Stansberry

When a new idea strikes me for a website, I typically try to run it by a close friend. And usually, I get a really blank look.

It's not that the ideas are bad, it's that the person I'm explaining it to doesn't really understand my idea. Unless he/she sees a prototype, it's incredibly difficult to follow what's inside my head. Why? Because it's inside my head. I'm the only one who can fully grasp the concept.

Truly innovative ideas take a while to get used to, or even understand. History is riddled with inventors who were mistaken for crazy, only later to have made some of the most groundbreaking discoveries. Yet had they listened to their friends, we probably wouldn't have many of the cool technologies that exist today.

• Alexander Graham Bell: "I'm going to try and make a machine that allows two people to hear each other's voices with a wire."


• Friend: "Riiiiiiggghhhht."

Fortunately, people like Edison, Bell and a slew of others didn't listen to their friends or critics. They forged ahead because they believed in their ideas. And they weren't afraid of failure.

It's your idea. Nobody understands it as well as you. You are officially the authoritative expert on your idea. I eventually stopped telling people my ideas until I could show them a prototype, but even then I take their opinions with a grain of salt.

A major obstacle in completing ideas is getting over the "is it good enough?" stage. Honestly, you won't truly know how innovative your idea is until you actually create it.

Instead of spending your time asking everyone around if they think your concept will work, spend that time developing the idea. Let it marinate and take shape. And develop the snot out of it. Once you've got a bangin' prototype, then see what people think.

An article was published recently chronicling Zappos and their successess in internet marketing. One of the main reasons for their success is that they stopped listening to consultants to tell them how to run their business.


"You have to avoid falling into the trap of a consultant telling you that, "If you spend a large amount of money with us, all of your problems will be solved, and you'll never have to worry about this again." In the end, they are outsiders and do not understand your business as well as you do."


As originator of the idea, it's your responsibility to see that the integrity of your idea is kept. Don't try and let outsiders tell you what they think of your idea, or how to implement it. Think of the idea as your baby. You wouldn't let somebody else raise your child, would you?


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Glen Stansberry writes at LifeDev, a blog that helps people make their ideas happen. You can follow him on Twitter here.

Innovation From the Inside Out

by Mitch Ditkoff

These days, almost all of my clients are talking about the need to establish a culture of innovation.

Some, I'm happy to report, are actually doing something about it. Hallelujah! They are taking bold steps forward to turn theory into action.

Still, the challenge remains the same for them as it does thousands of other forward-thinking companies - and that is, to find a simple, authentic way to address the challenge from the inside out - to water the root of the tree, not just the branches.

In today's process-driven, OD-centric, Six-Sigma savvy organization, the tendency is to focus on systems as opposed to people - as if systems were sufficient to guarantee change.

Guess what? Systems are not sufficient to guarantee change. In the words of Oliver Wendell Holmes, "Systems die. Instinct remains."

This is not to say that organizations should ignore systems and structures in their effort to establish a culture of innovation. They shouldn't.

But systems and structures all too often become the Holy Grail - much in the same way that Six Sigma has become the Holy Grail.

Unfortunately, when the addiction to systems and structures rules the day, an organization's quest for a culture of innovation degenerates into nothing much more than a cult of innovation.

Organizations do not innovate. People innovate. Inspired people. Fascinated people. Creative people. Committed people. That's where innovation begins. On the inside.

The organization's role - just like the individual manager's role - is to get out of the way. And while this "getting out of the way" will undoubtedly include the effort to formulate supportive systems, processes, and protocols, it is important to remember that systems, processes, and protocols are never the answer.

They are the context, not the content.

They are the husk, not kernel.

They are the menu, not the meal.

Ultimately, organizations are faced with the same challenge that religions are faced with. Religious leaders may speak passionately about the virtues their congregation needs to be living by, but sermons only name the challenge and remind people to experience something - they don't necessarily change behavior.

Change comes from within the heart and mind of each individual. It cannot be legislated or evangelized into reality.

What's needed in organizations who aspire to a culture of innovation, is an inner change. People need to experience something within themselves that will spark and sustain their effort to innovate - and when they experience this "something," they will be self-sustaining.

They will think about their projects in the shower, in their car, and in their dreams. They will need very little "management" from the outside. Inside out will rule the day - not outside in. Intrinsic motivation will flourish.

People will innovate not because they are told to, but because they want to. Open Space Technology is a good metaphor for this. When people are inspired, share a common, compelling goal and have the time and space to collaborate, the results become self-organizing.

You can create all the reward systems you want. You can reinvent your workspace until you're blue in the face. You can license the latest and greatest idea management tool, but unless each person in your organization OWNS the need to innovate and finds a way to tap into their own INNATE BRILLIANCE, all you'll end up with is a mixed bag of systems, processes, and protocols - the husk, not the kernel - the innovation flotsam and jetsam that the next administration or next CEO or next key stakeholder will mock, reject or change at the drop of a hat if the ROI doesn't show up in the next 20 minutes.

You want culture change? You want a culture of innovation?

Great. Then find a way to help each and every person in your organization come from the inside out. Deeply consider how you can awaken, nurture, and develop the primal need all people have to create something extraordinary.


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Mitch Ditkoff is the Co-Founder and President of Idea Champions and the author of "Awake at the Wheel", as well as the very popular Heart of Innovation blog.

Thinking Fearlessly

by Kevin Roberts

Sometimes in life - boardroom, living room or classroom - we get so scared of failure that we make it impossible for ourselves to succeed. In an economy in reset mode, the unreasonable power of creativity is what will set smart people and companies apart. But the thing about creativity is that it breeds failure as well as success.

That's the paradox. In a jittery economy, people suppress creativity to minimize the risk of failure, and companies often encourage that kind of insular thinking. But it's exactly the wrong approach - if allowed to set in, fear of failure will set an organization on auto-pilot, nose down.

Jonah Lehrer wrote on his blog in December about how psychologists are learning more about how the creative brain functions. He used the example of a simple but powerful experiment among college students. Two groups were told to list as many modes of transport as they could. The only difference was that one group was told the idea for the research came from exchange students in Greece, and the second group was told it came from classmates from down the hall.

Fascinating results. The 'down the hall' group came in with a predictable set of responses like car, bus and train. The 'Greece' group let their imagination run wild, generating far more answers, naming horses, ancient warships, spaceships and, yes, Segways.

The only difference was that one group was given the smallest permission to think fearlessly, and they jumped at it. Lehrer uses this research to argue in favor of the mind-opening possibilities of travel, and he's right. More importantly, it reveals the way the creative mind flourishes in the right conditions, and closes down in the wrong ones.

Fast Company magazine backed this up when they reported the findings of Harvard Business School research into the work habits of 238 creative professionals. The findings revealed that "creativity is positively associated with joy and love and negatively associated with anger, fear, and anxiety." The researchers argue that a fearful or negative workplace environment is an anathema to creativity and that "when people are doing work that they love and they're allowed to deeply engage in it - and when the work itself is valued and recognized - then creativity will flourish."

The lesson is obvious. We need to overwhelm tough times with our boundless and brazen creativity - not the other way around.


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Kevin Roberts is the CEO worldwide of The Lovemarks Company, Saatchi & Saatchi. For more information on Kevin, please go to www.saatchikevin.com. To see this blog at its original source, please go to www.krconnect.blogspot.com.

Innovators Welcome Ambiguity

by Paul Sloane

Brilliant thinkers and innovators are very comfortable with ambiguity - they welcome it. Routine thinkers like clarity and simplicity; they dislike ambiguity. There is a tendency in our society to reduce complex issues down to simple issues with obviously clear solutions. We see evidence of this in the tabloid press. There have been some terrible crimes committed in our cities. A violent offender received what is seen to be a lenient sentence. This shows that judges are out of touch with what is needed and that heavy punishment will stop the crime wave. The brilliant thinker is wary of simple nostrums like these. He or she knows that complex issues usually involve many causes and these may need many different and even conflicting solutions.

Routine thinkers are often dogmatic. They see a clear route forward and they want to follow it. The advantage of this is that they can make decisive and effective executives - up to a point. If the simple route happens to be a good one then they get on with the journey. The downside is that they will likely follow the most obvious idea and not consider creative, complex or controversial choices. The exceptional thinker can see many possibilities and relishes reviewing both sides of any argument. They are happy to discuss and explore multiple possibilities and are keen to challenge conventional wisdom. People around them and subordinates can sometimes consider this approach to be frustrating and indecisive.

Albert Einstein was able to conceive his theory of relativity because he thought that time and space might not be immutable. Neils Bohr made breakthroughs in physics because he was able to think of light as both a stream of particles and as a wave. Picasso could paint classical portraits and yet conceive cubist representations of people.

How can you welcome ambiguity? First by admitting that there are few absolute truths and that for most common beliefs the opposite view might also be true. If the general view is that you can either get high quality or low price the brilliant thinker will ask, 'Why can't we get both? How can we deliver great quality at really affordable prices?'

Cognitive dissonance is the concept of holding two very different ideas in your mind at the same time. This is something all the great composers do when they think of two melodic themes and how they can intertwine, adapt and combine them. We would find it very difficult to whistle one tune while thinking of an entirely different one but that is the sort of thing that Beethoven or Mozart would consider trifling.

When we mull over the interaction of two opposing ideas in our minds then the creative possibilities are legion. A wind-up clock and an electrically operated radio are two very different concepts but by imagining their combination Trevor Bayliss was able to conceive of the clockwork radio. Most of us would dismiss such an idea out of hand. It seems incongruous to have a large mechanical winding device inside a small radio. And we can immediately see the drawback that the programme we were listening to would stop when the winder ran down so that we would have to get up and wind the thing again. That appears a very tedious operation.

But Bayliss saw beyond these limitations and considered the needs of people in the developing world who did not have access to reliable mains electricity and who could not afford batteries. For them winding up a radio is a minor inconvenience. The clockwork radio has transformed their lives.

If we want creative solutions and real innovations then we should welcome ambiguity. We should explore the possibilities of two different things interacting together. We should let opposites play.


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Paul Sloane writes, speaks and leads workshops on creativity, innovation and leadership. He is the author of The Innovative Leader published by Kogan-Page.

Crowdsourcing Innovation vs. The Economics of Elitism

by Mark Prus

Which Is Better?

A recent article in The New York Times discussed the innovation process at Apple. Clearly the process begins and ends with Steve Jobs. And clearly Mr. Jobs is a creative genius. He also has a lot of help with top notch design engineers. As a result, Apple is perceived as one of the most innovative companies on the planet.

If you have visionary leadership at your company, this might be a good way to go. But companies like Procter & Gamble (P&G) also have strong leadership and they have taken a different route to innovation. P&G has been a leader in Open Innovation, and many of the new products they have launched in the past few years have come from outside the company.

Which approach is better? Some say that Crowdsourcing produces a lot of good ideas, while "home grown" innovation is capable of producing bigger breakthrough ideas.

I love Apple (full disclosure: I own Apple stock and am a big fan of their products). However, I am not sure that the "elitism model of innovation" is one that can be expanded to a lot of companies. I believe that Steve Jobs is a true visionary, and that people like him come along far too rarely for this to be a workable model of innovation. It does work for Apple... but how many other companies can implement it?

Your thoughts?


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Mark Prus is a marketing consultant who offers a name development service called NameFlash^SM.

Brainstorming Breakthroughs Require the Right Question!

by Mitch Ditkoff

There's a simple reason why so many brainstorm sessions are a waste of time. The problem statement being pitched to participants is the wrong one.

This is not surprising - especially when you consider how little time most facilitators put into preparing for a session.

Here's what happens: The person who calls the session is usually scrambling - overwhelmed, over-caffeinated, and running from one meeting to the next. Out of breath, they pitch the topic to the group, but the topic is either vague or secondary to a more essential challenge that remains unspoken.

G.K. Chesterton, one of the most influential English writers of the 20th century, distilled the phenomenon down to 13 words. "It's not that they can't see the solution," he said. "They can't see the problem."

Then, of course, there's also the phenomenon of perception bias.

Pitch a challenge to an IT person, and it will be seen as a technology problem. Pitch it to a CFO, and it will be seen as a financial problem. Pitch it to a marketing person and it will be seen as a branding problem.

Or as a wise man once said, "When a pickpocket meets a saint all he sees are pockets."

If you plan on running an ideation session any time soon, don't just stumble into the room and pitch a vague topic to the group. Do your homework. Make the effort to identify the REAL issue before asking for ideas. If it's the WRONG QUESTION you present, no amount of idea generation is going to make a difference.


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Mitch Ditkoff is the Co-Founder and President of Idea Champions and the author of "Awake at the Wheel", as well as the very popular Heart of Innovation blog.

Don't Demolish Your Own Innovation

by Paul Williams

Innovative ideas - the kind that can transform your company - are inadvertently being demolished. When first presented, many ideas meet wrecking-ball comments such as:

• "How's that going to work?"
  
• "Good luck getting that done!"
  
• "We don't have time for something like that." And the classic,
  
• "Doesn't work... Trust me... We tried that years ago."

We've all heard (or perhaps said) killer phrase comments like these. These are offered as a "public service" to the team to prevent us from going off track and wasting time.

But, what have we really accomplished?

• Yes... we've kept the meeting on schedule.

But we also,

• have made the suggester feel stupid,
  
• are causing people to hold back their creativity, and
  
• may have destroyed the next big idea.

Instead of immediately leveling them, what if we built on new ideas?

Ninety-nine percent of innovative ideas aren't simply blurted out in their final form. They need development to reveal their full potential.

Instead of destruction, try construction. Use the idea as a foundation and see how tall we can build the framework. If we want to be as innovative as possible, instead of saying "Yeah, but..." try "And, if..."

What's the worst that could happen?

We've wasted 120 seconds on a thought that, in the end, won't work?

But what's the best that could happen?

Perhaps we construct something that does solve the challenge. Even better, maybe it morphs into something completely different - something incredible!

As a bonus, we've made the suggester feel valued and perpetuate creative, open thinking - the stuff that leads to future innovative breakthroughs!

In these competitive times, when innovation is considered one of the single most important factors to the continued success of a company... Spare the "Yeah but..." wrecking ball, use "And if..." to construct your own innovation.


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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.

Brainstorming is More Than Ideation

by Mitch Ditkoff

Most people think brainstorming sessions are all about ideas - much in the same way that Wall Street bankers think life is all about money.

While ideas are certainly a big part of brainstorming, they are only a part. People who rush into a brainstorming session starving for new ideas will miss the boat (and the train, car, and unicycle) completely unless they tune into the some other mighty important dynamics:

1. INVESTIGATION: If you want your brainstorming sessions to be effective, you'll need to do some investigating before hand. Get curious. Ask questions. Dig deeper. The more you find out what the real issues are, the greater your chances of framing powerful questions to brainstorm and choosing the best techniques to use.

2. IMMERSION: While good ideas can surface at any time, their chances radically increase the more that brainstorm participants are immersed (i.e. focused). Translation? No coming and going during a session. No distractions. No interruptions. And don't forget to put a "do not disturb" sign on the door.

3. INTERACTION: Ideas come to people at all times of day and under all kinds of circumstances. But in a brainstorming session, it's the quality of interaction that makes the difference - how people connect with each other, how they listen, and build on ideas. Your job, as facilitator, is to increase the quality of interaction.

4. INSPIRATION: Creative output is often a function of mindset. Bored, disengaged people rarely originate good ideas. Inspired people do. This is one of your main tasks, as a brainstorm facilitator - to do everything in your power to keep participants inspired. The more you do, the less techniques you will need.

5. IDEATION: Look around. Everything you see began as an idea in someone's mind. Simply put, ideas are the seeds of innovation - the first shape a new possibility takes. As a facilitator of the creative process, your job is to foster the conditions that amplify the odds of new ideas being conceived, developed, and articulated.

6. ILLUMINATION: Ideas are great. Ideas are cool. But they are also a dime a dozen unless they lead to an insight or aha. Until then, ideas are only two dimensional. But when the light goes on inside the minds of the people in your session, the ideas are activated and the odds radically increase of them manifesting.

7. INTEGRATION: Well-run brainstorming sessions have a way of intoxicating people. Doors open. Energy soars. Possibilities emerge. But unless participants have a chance to make sense of what they've conceived, the ideas are less likely to manifest. Opening the doors of the imagination is a good thing, but so is closure.

8. IMPLEMENTATION: Perhaps the biggest reason why most brainstorming sessions fail is what happens after - or, shall I say, what doesn't happen after. Implementation is the name of the game. Before you let people go, clarify next steps, who's doing what (and by when), and what outside support is needed.


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Mitch Ditkoff is the Co-Founder and President of Idea Champions and the author of "Awake at the Wheel", as well as the very popular Heart of Innovation blog.

Saving Curiosity from the Guillotine

by Stefan Lindegaard

This great topic was raised by Arthur Lok in a discussion in the Innovation Management group on LinkedIn. It made me wonder and reflect on my own level of curiosity, what this term means to me and how it effects innovation.

I think we lose our sense of curiosity as we begin to build a power base that we feel we need to protect. We have something to lose and then we begin to focus on how to protect this rather than expand and build further on what we have.

So are we just defensively minded? Such a mindset definitely make incumbents more vulnerable to new innovation brought to market by companies and entrepreneurs having nothing to loose.

I think this goes for products, services and thus corporate revenues as well as the knowledge base we build as individuals. If what we know today provides a good living perhaps we are not that open to challenge this and develop new points of view. Unfortunately, this does not work in times where just standing still is the same as getting behind - at a very fast pace.

It is fairly easy to point out what kills curiosity. I gave an example above and you can find others in the LinkedIn discussion. The more interesting question is what we can do to avoid killing our curiosity. I hope we can start a discussion on this here. Let me start off with one of my suggestions;

Try out new technologies. It took me years to get the value of cell phone texting and I am still not that good at it. In retrospect, I see this as a sign of me getting older and losing my curiosity. This lesson taught me to be open towards new technologies and not write them off as fast as I might have done.

Twitter is good example. I was initially annoyed but I stayed in there and today it gives me much value. TweetDeck is a great source of new insights - just use the search function.

What do you do to stay curious?

Editor's note: Check out our Continuous Innovation group for more interesting innovation discussions

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Stefan Lindegaard is a speaker, network facilitator and strategic advisor who focus on the topics of open innovation, intrapreneurship and how to identify and develop the people who drive innovation.

Will Avatar Spark More Originality?

by Kevin Roberts

Avatar, opening in the US tomorrow, has Hollywood holding its breath. The $350 million spectacle by writer/director James Cameron seems destined to one of only two possible fates: spectacular blockbuster or massive bomb. The middle road never seems open to Cameron, who famously drives Tinsel-town bean-counters bonkers with his uncompromising vision and gargantuan budgets. Sigourney Weaver calls him an "idealistic perfectionist", which is a pretty good aspiration for all of us.

I haven't seen the film yet, but I wish it well for three reasons.

One, Peter Jackson's Weta Workshop in New Zealand has been responsible for the special effects, which are said to take 3-D animation to a different plane. Another hit for Weta would be great for this awesome Wellington Lovemark - and for the city itself.

Second, I love James Cameron's gutsy approach. In an industry teeming with yes-men, corporate cronies and wannabes, Cameron stands apart as a maverick who rises and falls on the size of his talent, not his Rolodex. He put his philosophy this way:


"If you set your goals ridiculously high and it's a failure, you will fail above everyone else's success."


Most importantly, I hope that Avatar succeeds because it represents something that has all but disappeared from mainstream film - a truly original idea. It is not recycled from a TV show or old movie, nor is it based on a book, play, musical or comic book. James Cameron is the sole writing credit, and the story is woven entirely from his imagination.

The rise of innovation in Hollywood (and Wellywood and Bollywood) has been startling, but it has not been matched by the rise of great originality - in fact, the opposite has happened. The graphs below show how the number of films made from an original idea - as opposed to sequels, book or musical adaptations, comic books or earlier films - has declined dramatically in the past decade. Instead, we are saturated by sequels. 15 of the top 20 box office hits of the 2000s were sequels (and some of them were brilliant, but the point is valid).

The last decade will be remembered for awesome innovation we used to help tell stories on screen. Let's hope that the '10s is known more for the creativity and originality we bring to storytelling itself.





Image source: http://www.topnews.in/avatar-will-make-titanic-look-picnic-says-james-cameron-2244474

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Kevin Roberts is the CEO worldwide of The Lovemarks Company, Saatchi & Saatchi. For more information on Kevin, please go to www.saatchikevin.com. To see this blog at its original source, please go to www.krconnect.blogspot.com.

Sex and Creativity

Is there a connection? Study shows number of sexual partners corresponds to creative output.

by Idris Mootee

Creative people are fun. Creative people are likeable. But many creative minds are unorganized and sometimes deficient in handling complex logic. Some creative minds are highly analytical too, although the processing was sort of in the back and you don't see it.

Creative people are more social than others. Here's a case in point. Psychologists at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne and the Open University found that professional artists and poets have about twice as many sexual partners as other people. The study also shows that the average number of sexual partners increased as creative output went up. So the more creative you are, the more sexual partners you should have. You tell me if this true. Now I understand why so many people want to be a creative director.

More on creativity and sex drive. The desire to be creative or feel creative, whether expressed in music, industrial design, art, fashion or photography or film, coexists with the primal urge to commit the sex act, and other layers in between. It is like onions that we have many layers. What if your desire for sex is weak, does it mean you are less creative than others? If you buy the above argument, then this should the case. When sex is suppressed in some cultures, does this in effect force the libido up into "higher" forms, and thereby further enhance creativity? I don't know.

I believe our creative motivations are often based on some of our most primal passions, such as joy, fear, anger, love and lust. In an article "Creative Juice - A Dozen Key Lessons for Creative Dreamers", Suzanne Falter-Barns quotes Deepak Chopra:


"Creativity is ultimately sexual - I'm sorry - but it is!"


I am not a Chopra fan, but he may be right this time. Love and lust make us think differently in that they trigger global processing, which in turn promotes creative thinking. Love and lust are good for creativity.

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Idris Mootee is the CEO of idea couture, a strategic innovation and experience design firm. He is the author of four books, tens of published articles, and a frequent speaker at business conferences and executive retreats.

The Dream Catalog

by Drew Boyd

For many companies, the catalog of products is the strongest statement of brand positioning a company can make. It is your arsenal of commercialization. So imagine you could peek into the future and see a copy of your company's product catalog five years from now. What would it look like? What if you could design it now? What would you put into it? These are the questions that confront you when you use a clever innovation tool called the Dream Catalog.

The Dream Catalog is a hypothetical company catalog from the future...well into the future, beyond the next business cycle. It is far into the future so that it captures the innovative thinking and imagination of today's managers. It stretches a company's thinking about its future, and it provokes a healthy discussion about possible company direction. A good Dream Catalog causes tension.

A Dream Catalog helps a company in several ways. It sets direction. It suggests how the company is going to add and remove products from the line over time. It forces the marketing team to reconcile product line strategy. It provides placeholders for new discoveries, inventions, and even acquisitions. It provides a sense of prioritization of what should be developed and in what order. It can even help forecast revenues.

Best of all - it rewards and encourages innovation. The Dream Catalog serves as the focal point for company-wide innovation efforts. Employees strive to come up with product and service ideas that "make it" into the Dream Catalog. As the catalog takes shape, employees see how their future is taking shape. It guides their innovation efforts even more. Leaders can use the catalog as a motivational tool. "Let's turn this dream into reality...for our customers and our future." A good Dream Catalog creates excitement and a sense of purpose.

I teach MBA students how to create a Dream Catalog in a full credit course called "Applied Marketing Innovation." Here is a quick snapshot of how to do it. Create a slew of new product embodiments over your current product line as well as products in your industry you wish you had. Do this using an efficient method such as Systematic Inventive Thinking. Mix the ideas together with your current product line. Put yourself five or ten years out and envision what product offering would make your company the most amazing market leader in your industry. Using your "palette" of ideas, pull in those that, taken together, create that kind of company. Strive for product line coherence. Strive for differentiation. Strive for a customer centric solution. Then, make an actual catalog with product photos, prices, features, and benefits. Make it seem real.

Here is a neat trick. Take all of your company's catalogs as far back as you can and lay them side-by-side chronologically. Study the product offerings each year and note the changes over time. Note the new products, deleted products, and changed products. Do you see an evolutionary theme? Revolutionary? Stagnant? Now place your Dream Catalog five or ten spots ahead of the most recent catalog. Where will your Dream Catalog take you? How far, how fast, how cool?

Think about Fortune 100 companies that might have a Dream Catalog of sorts. Think about former Fortune 100 companies that have since perished. Did they have a Dream Catalog? Would you buy stock in a company if it did not have a Dream Catalog?

Dream on.

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Drew Boyd is Director of Marketing Mastery for Johnson & Johnson (Ethicon Endo-Surgery division). He is also Visiting Assistant Professor of Marketing and Innovation at the University of Cincinnati and Executive Director of the MS-Marketing program. Follow him at www.innovationinpractice.com and at http://twitter.com/drewboyd

Innovation Perspectives - Fixedness

This is the eighth of several 'Innovation Perspectives' articles we will publish this week from multiple authors to get different perspectives on 'What is the most dangerous current misconception in innovation?'. Now, here is Drew Boyd's perspective:


by Drew Boyd


"It's not what you don't know that will get you. It's what you know that ain't so." - Will Rogers


The most dangerous misconception about innovation today is not about innovation at all. It is about everything surrounding our innovation efforts that gives us trouble. It is rooted in a concept called fixedness. Fixedness is the inability to realize that something known to have a particular use may also be used to perform other functions. When one is faced with a new problem, fixedness blocks one's ability to use old tools in novel ways. Psychologist Karl Duncker coined the term functional fixedness for describing the difficulties in visual perception and problem solving that arise when one element of a whole situation has a (fixed) function which has to be changed for making the correct perception or for finding solutions. In his famous "candle problem" the situation was defined by the objects: a box of candles, a box of thumb-tacks and a book of matches. The task was to fix the candles on the wall without any additional elements. The difficulty of this problem arises from the functional fixedness of the candle box. It is a container in the problem situation but must be used as a shelf in the solution situation.

Roni Horiwitz of S.I.T. puts it this way: "It's almost impossible for the human brain to produce a really fresh and unique thought. Every thought, opinion or idea is somehow connected to previous concepts stored in the brain." Because of this, we are often unable to see the solution to a problem although it stares us in the face. We are too connected to what we knew previously. We not only can't let it go, but we try very hard to anchor around it to explain what is going on.

Fixedness is insidious. It affects how we think about and see virtually every part of our lives. At work, we have fixedness about our products and services, out customers and competitors, and our future opportunities. The most damaging form of fixedness is when we are stuck on our current business model. We cannot see past what is working today. We stop challenging our assumptions. We continue to believe what was once true is still true. In the end, it is this perpetual blind spot that is most dangerous to our innovation potential.

Customers have fixedness, too. Customers have a limited view of the future, they have well-entrenched notions of how the world works, and they suffer from the same blind spot we do. Yet we continue to seek the "Voice of the Customer" as though a divine intervention will break through this fixedness so they can spew new ideas.

Fortunately, there is a way to address it. The way to break fixedness is to use structured innovation tools and principles that make you see problems and opportunities in new ways.

I have witnessed the effects of fixedness in many teams across numerous companies and industries. That is usually the time I invoke the classic Will Rogers quote:


"It's not what you don't know that will get you. It's what you know that ain't so."


Or was it Mark Twain?


You can check out all of the 'Innovation Perspectives' articles from the different contributing authors on 'What is the most dangerous current misconception in innovation?' by clicking the link in this sentence.

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Drew Boyd is Director of Marketing Mastery for Johnson & Johnson (Ethicon Endo-Surgery division). He is also Visiting Assistant Professor of Marketing and Innovation at the University of Cincinnati and Executive Director of the MS-Marketing program. Follow him at www.innovationinpractice.com and at http://twitter.com/drewboyd

Create It and They Will Come

by Kevin Roberts

I've been amazed by the global enthusiasm for the iPhone apps that continue to proliferate around the world. Creating an app is as simple as thinking of something useful. It's the modern day inventor's route to riches, and the modern day consumer's lifestyle compressed onto a small device. The creativity just keeps on coming, and it has the consumer at the heart of every decision.

The Urban Spoon app lets you define the parameters of what you want to eat. Anything you'd like to leave to chance, just solve with a shake of the phone. Is That Gluten Free? will tell you what you're eating while you are at the restaurant. The World Factbook '09 can solve discussions over dinner. Then GymGoal can help you work it off. And on it goes.

These apps are the ultimate conversation starter. "Have you got this app?" The power of the idea is transmitted every minute through conversation. Phones have got the world talking, but few guessed it would be in this unique manner.

Where was all this creativity before the iPhone opened a space for it? Are we using the other screens in our Sisomo family with the same creative, open approach? Cinemas, TV's, billboards and bus stops are all waiting for the app magic. The future is wide open, and screens are everywhere. Let's bring the world's creativity to every screen, not just the little ones.


Image Source: http://www.walyou.com/blog/2008/11/28/free-iphone-apps-this-black-friday/

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Kevin Roberts is the CEO worldwide of The Lovemarks Company, Saatchi & Saatchi. For more information on Kevin, please go to www.saatchikevin.com. To see this blog at its original source, please go to www.krconnect.blogspot.com.

21 Great Innovation Methods

by Paul Sloane

How hard is it to innovate? Not once but over and over? How can you repeatedly implement great new products, processes or services? Continuous innovation is not easy and if you keep using the same method you will experience diminishing results. Try innovating how you innovate by employing some of these ideas.

1. Copy someone else's idea. One of the best ways to innovate is to pinch an idea that works elsewhere and apply it in your business. Henry Ford saw the production line working in a meat packing plant and then applied to the automobile industry thereby dramatically reducing assembly times and costs.


2. Ask customers. If you simply ask your customers how you could improve your product or service they will give you plenty of ideas for incremental innovations. Typically they will ask for new features or that you make your product cheaper, faster, easier to use, available in different styles and colours etc. Listen to these requests carefully and choose the ones that will really pay back.


3. Observe customers. Do not just ask them, watch them. Try to see how customers use your products. Do they use them in new ways? This was what Levi Strauss saw when they found that customers ripped the jeans - so they brought a line of pre-ripped jeans. Heinz noticed that people stored their sauce jars upside down so they designed an upside down bottle.


4. Use difficulties and complaints. If customers have difficulties with any aspect of using your product or if they register complaints then you have a strong starting point for innovations. Make your product easier to use, eliminate the current inconveniences and introduce improvements that overcome the complaints.


5. Combine. Combine your product with something else to make something new. It works at all levels. Think of a suitcase with wheels, or a mobile phone with a camera or a flight with a massage.


6. Eliminate. What could you take out of your product or service to make it better? Dell eliminated the computer store, Amazon eliminated the bookstore, the Sony Walkman eliminated speakers and record functions.


7. Ask your staff. Challenge the people who work in the business to find new and better ways to do things and new and better ways to please customers. They are close to the action and can see opportunities for innovation. Often they just need encouragement to bring forward great ideas.


8. Plan. Include targets for new products and services in your business plan. Put it onto the balanced scorecard. Write innovation into everyone's objectives. Measure it and it will happen.


9. Run brainstorms. Have regular brainstorm meetings where you generate a large quantity of new product ideas. Use diverse groups from different areas of the business and include a provocative outsider e.g. a customer or supplier.


10. Examine patents. Check through patents that apply in your field. Are there some that you could license? Are some expiring so that you can now use that method? Is there a different way of achieving the essential idea in a patent?


11. Collaborate. Work with another company who can take you to places you can't go. Choose a partner with a similar philosophy but different skills. That is what Mercedes did with Swatch when they came up with the Smart car.


12. Minimize or maximize. Take something that is standard in the industry and minimise or maximise it. Ryanair minimized price and customer service. Starbucks maximised price and customer experience. It is better to be different than to be better.


13. Run a contest. Ask members of the public to suggest great new product ideas. Offer a prize. Give people a clear focussed goal and they will surprise you with novel ideas. Good for innovation and PR.


14. Ask - what if? Do some lateral thinking by asking what if...? Challenge every boundary and assumption that applies in your field. You and your group will come up with amazing ideas once the normal constraints are lifted.


15. Watch the competition. Do not slavishly follow the competition but watch them intelligently. The small guys are often the most innovative so see if you can adapt or license one of their ideas - or even buy the company!


16. Outsource. Subcontract your new product development challenge to a design company, a University, a start-up or a crowdsourcing site like Innocentive or NineSigma.


17. Use open innovation. Big consumer products companies like Procter and Gamble or Reckitt Benckiser encourage developers to bring novel products to them. They are flexible on IP protection and give a clear focus on what they are looking for. A large proportion of their new products now start life outside the company.


18. Adapt a product to a new use. Find an entirely different application for an existing product. De Beers produced industrial diamonds but found a new use for diamonds when they introduced the concept of engagement rings. It opened up a large new market for them.


19. Try Triz. Triz is a systematic method for solving problems. It can be applied in many fields but is particularly useful in engineering and product design. Triz gives you a toolbox of methods to solve contradictions e.g. how can we make this product run faster but with less power?


20. Go back in time. Look back at methods and services that were used in your sector years ago but have now fallen out of use. Can you bring one back in a new updated form? It has been said that Speed Dating is really a relaunch of a Victorian dance format where ladies had cards marked with appointments.


21. Use social networks. Follow trends and ask questions on groups like Twitter or Facebook. Ask what people want to see in future products or what the big new idea will be. Many early adopters are active on social network groups and will happily respond with suggestions.

The ways to innovate are legion. Try some approaches that are new to you in order to boost your innovation capability.

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Paul Sloane writes, speaks and leads workshops on creativity, innovation and leadership. He is the author of The Innovative Leader published by Kogan-Page.