Looptworks took an assumption - that an amount of fabric not usable for a full clothing production run had to be disposed of - and turned it into a series of limited edition clothing. The Mango Money Center approached banking in a way that reminds me of how microfinance initiatives have approached lending. The way we think that a "bank" that helps us handle money has to be, isn't necessarily so.
Chip and Dan Heath's story about how coordination is a necessity for success was also a story about using and building on the multiple perspectives of individual specialists involved in a complex process. I always like their columns and this story - told through the experience of JetBlue - is particularly compelling for me.
Multiple definitions of what "better" means come into play with Bridgestone's new golf balls designed for the average golfer. Just because a certain design improves the performance of a professional doesn't mean it is the best solution for a casual player.
To top it off and send you surfing for a while there is a review of the winners of the 2010 International Design Excellence Awards. One of my favorites was the Slingbox 700U, not because I care about the product, but because I liked that they took an industry standard for dissipating heat - the fan, etc - and turned it on its head by creating a structure that dissipated the heat on its own my means of its inherent properties. That's just cool.
]]>This may be true of emotional intelligence and other varied intelligences as well, but today's focus is on cognitive intelligence and whether being considered intelligent really means you are capable of acting logically and rationally.
The tendency is prevalent enough that it is studied in regards to improving IQ tests and defining what intellgence actually means. Here are a few sample questions you can ask yourself.
Do you lack specific tools to act rationally?
For example, certain questions require specialized knowledge, such as calculating probabilities and comparing a small chance in a large population to a large chance in a small population. If you've never been taught this bit of math, then you're lacking a tool.
For example, if you are told that Harry is an introvert and then asked if it's more likely that he's a librarian or a salesman, then most people will pick librarian because the characteristic goes with the stereotype for the occupation. However, any particular person is a 100 times more likely to be salesman, simply because there are so many more of them.
Are you influenced by the my-side bias?
Most of us have a subconscious preference for those people, stories, or solutions that we identify with in some form or fashion. When tests are run regarding split-second decisions the groups that the individual considers to be on their side are favored. These "my side" decisions can be obvious or subtle, but they do exist.
Do you only focus on confirming and not falsifying?
Most of us will only try to confirm an idea. We won't go out and create the test that would prove something is false instead. This tendency can trip us up with puzzles and in real life situations, even when using standard analytical techniques like the scientific method.
For more try this:
If the above ideas interest you, then you can buy a digital issue of Scientific American Mind and read the full article that inspired this post or go the even more in-depth route and read Keith Stanovich's book on What Intelligence Tests Miss: the Psychology of Rational Thought.
]]>Even more so when it is considered as a series of ideas that arose and influenced each other.
This was the framework set up by British historian Felipe Fernandez Armesto in his book Ideas that Changed the World. (You might also like this interview with Armesto at The Mind's Construction Quarterly.)
What fascinated me was that many of the ideas most relevant to this blog came from either the last century or the ancient past.
Recent ideas:
Ancient ideas:
In between there were many ideas that reflected the strength of one particular perspective, such as nationalism, a range of religious concepts, the superiority of a particular group of people, civil disobedience, and more.
We are all affected by broad, sweeping ideas like the ones in the book, but in our day to day lives we can also become aware of smaller ideas that have become part of the system we're trying to influence.
It is typical to look at what has been done before when trying to solve a problem, but it might also be worthwhile to look for the history of ideas behind what was actually done.
Do those ideas currently hold sway? Are they related to other ideas? Can ideas that are currently prominent in other parts of the overall culture be tied into the problem under review?
]]>The basic principles are in the two pages at the end of the book. They can be pulled from the book's website or from my previous blog posts about the book. You don't read this book for the basic ideas. You read it for the stories and the passion behind them that embeds them into your mind so you can make use of them.
If you understand this, then I recommend this book highly. You won't find specific techniques on working with your team or shifting company culture, or anything like that. But you will find a framework and a method for developing your own inspiration without requiring a muse, plus receive permission to get things wrong, and develop a way to talk about what you're doing when
In the very last chapter of his book, David Murray describes four paradoxes that I feel capture the spirit of the book as much as the six steps are its body.
Material Paradox - originality results from thievery
The book is called Borrowing Brilliance for a reason. We build on what has come before and by combination and incubation with a goal in mind we come up with something unexpected.
Wisdom Paradox - with age comes mental vigor
The continued use of our minds makes them better and more suited to being creative in whatever field or in any field.
Lover's Paradox - love creating but not the creation
Becoming attached to either the borrowed or the new is a step in the wrong direction. He tells stories of mountain climbing and surfing and that's part of the deal here.
Genius Paradox - need for left and right brain
We break down and we build up again. Reduction and holism are needed side by side and step by step, so that the steps repeat themselves.
I enjoyed reading this book and found it personally inspiring. If innovation is part of what you do, or should be doing, then I recommend giving it a read.
Take a look at my views on the body of Borrowing Brilliance and Murray's six steps to business innotivation.
]]>Every time you return to one of these steps, you do so with more insight and a greater sense of creative intuition. - David Murray
I found this idea strangely comforting, as it means I don't have to be right. I don't even have to have a better solution this time around, because it is information gained, either way.
Even better, it means that it is okay if something feels like a cheap imitation or insufficient, because innovation is actually an evolutionary process, as Murray calls it. Each adjustment and cycle could be extremely significant or a minor variation.
Some interesting questions that he proposes for the stage when you think you may be done are:
Then you take the insight you gain from these mental gymnastics and go back to the beginning so you can pass through the steps of defining, connecting, and incubating and evaluating again.
He doesn't really provide a way to figure out when you're done, or, more accurately, ready to commercialize. He doesn't offer hope for being ready for the budget meeting with something that boosts sales forecasts, but for developing long-term answers, with the development process sometimes delivering short term rewards.
If you're committed to innovation and creativity, then you're committed to the time it takes. You've got to keep trying. To keep climbing. To keep thinking. - David Murray
This is the sixth and final, after a fashion, step in the process of innovation that David Kord Murray writes about in Borrowing Brilliance. The chapter itself contains a good collection of examples of potential mental shifts, some of which might resonate with you.
You can find my posts on the other five steps at:
A homeowner who has had difficulty selling his or her house is assisted by a realtor and a designer. The realtor often comments about some aspect of the house, such as it being too cluttered or too dark. I've seen some of them get pretty energetic about how awful something is.
What they tend to leave out is that's it's not good for selling.
For example, the "cluttered" one that sticks in my mind involved a very well-done display of owl collectibles flanking a fireplace. It was attractive with blank space around each owl and irregular groupings that kept your eyes moving and interested.
The designer put it to the homeowners differently - that the prospective buyers would be looking at the owls and not the fireplace.
Or maybe the homeowners did something else that suited their lifestyle. They put an office in half of the living room or turned the larger master suite over to their kids.
Then the prospective buyers have trouble processing the space and how it will fit their lives.
For someone walking in the door who had seen many other houses to fall in love with this particular one, they needed to be able to see and appreciate the features. They needed to feel the value and not be looking at other things.
It's not about spatial intelligence. Even though both my husband and I can see the potential through someone else's furniture and decor, I could still tell the difference in the emotional connection I felt when it was simple to imagine versus difficult.
It's about leaving the decor and furniture choices and room uses open so they can imagine their own life in the space. Or, maybe, the life they'd like to be living. It's about fulfilling expectations.
So the designer on the show takes over and transforms a few rooms in the house, with a budget of $2000 for materials plus some free labor. Sometimes that labor cost would have been extensive and a wall comes down, for example. Other times the changes are simpler.
Either way the homeowners almost always like the new version better. Some are awe-struck. But what matters is the reactions of the visitors to the open house that are able to see themselves in the house and be inspired by the changes.
Do you leave space for other people to visualize?
Whether you're in business or just trying to get someone to collaborate with you, try asking yourself if you've filled up all the rooms of your mental structure with your personal preferences to the exclusion of others. Can the person you're talking to see a way that he can contribute or she can add her touches?
If most people have trouble emotionally connecting to a dining room that's being used as an office and really seeing themselves eating there when the space is right in front of them, then how much harder is it to see where they fit in someone else's abstract idea?
Does this ring a bell for you? Have you had any experiences like this?
]]>Eureka!
Maybe.
Because just maybe it's a BAD idea. And, yes, when it comes to ideas you're planning to put into action, there are bad ideas.
The fifth step in Murray's innovation process is to judge your ideas.
Ideas take time. They take work. And judgment is the thing that manages that work. - David Murray
First you listen to your head, stepping back and objectively considering the idea as it relates to your original definition of the problem you were trying to solve. After all, Picasso would likely have been just as upset if he'd created David as Michelangelo would have been if he'd created Guernica.
Where does the solution not fit the need? What will be the barriers to its success, such as cost, unlikely buy-in from key players, or a dependance on a technological solution that hasn't been fully tested yet?
What is worth keeping about it? What are the best parts? How is it better than the previous solution?
Having done the logical analysis, what does your gut say? This isn't a question designed to throw away your analysis, but to attempt to enhance it with input from your subconscious.
This is where you begin to find the perfect idea, or as close as we can get anyway, that you can actually implement to address your problem statement.
This post is the fifth in a series looking in the principles of the book Borrowing Brilliance. You can find the others at:
]]>It's when you allow your subconscious mind to put it all together.
Murray's metaphorical explanation is that we tend to think in ruts, to slowly create deep mined paths. Only the subconscious is able to make the types of connections that we really need to make to continue with the process of innovation.
Or at least that's the metaphor that came to my mind while writing.
First you provide the input. You deliberately talk to yourself and allow yourself to hold a problem in your mind.
Then you let it incubate or simmer or bake while you do other things and stop thinking about it, even if only for a few minutes.
And finally you pull out a new thought, accepting that it could bring with it a new reality.
For another perspective on this incubation step in the creative process visit Lateral Action's Why Thinking is Overrated - and make sure to read the comments too.
The chapter in Borrowing Brilliance describing this principle is lyrical and worth reading almost for that purpose alone. This post is the fourth in a series looking in the principles of the book. You can find the others at:
]]>We are hard-wired to make certain judgments instantaneously, on the barest minimum of knowledge. These snap decisions based n first impressions happen because the brain pulls everything out of our subconscious and processes it faster than we can be aware of it. They can be surprising accurate or they can be thrown off and irrelevant.
1. What we were doing immediately before
What we were reading, interacting, or doing right before we need to make a snap judgment influences the result of it. Just reading words that make the brain think "old" can change our behavior and make us move measurably slower. Sometimes this is good, as it can help us adapt to an unknown culture, but sometimes it is a contaminant we would like to avoid, such as when we hope something is true and that hope itself skews our gut feeling.
2. What we've been doing all our lives
Garbage in equals garbage out. Our brain can only make judgments based on what we've presented to it. This includes all those things around us we didn't really mean to include, like media stereotypes of race or gender. Long term exposure to experiences that support the snap decisions we want to make and the first impressions we want to feel can shift what actually happens.
3. What we're prepared for
This is something of a subset of the previous factor. We can't always judge what is weird to us. The sense of the unfamiliar swamps the ability to respond and leaves a negative impression. Sometimes this can change over time. On the flip side, this is also the reason why readiness drills and constant practice enable us to react properly in an emergency.
4. What we're really good at
Input is a matter of depth as well as width. The development of expertise in a given area changes our first impressions by giving them more complexity. We become able to discuss them in a way that the untrained can't. It can heighten the intensity of the gut feeling we develop in relation to our field of study.
5. What information is included
If we don't want our first impression to include information that we, in a planning phase, decided was unimportant, then we need to make sure that it's blanked from our perceptions. If the brain perceives it, then it will include it in the subconscious decision making process, whether we want it too or not. This is why orchestras audition musicians behind screens, so that it is impossible to take the candidates appearance into account.
We can deliberately control our short-term environment when we know we're going into a situation where we know that emotional, instantaneous response will matter and influence our future decision making. For example, we can choose to think about different ways to collaborate before going into a complex meeting instead of ways to defend ourselves against attack. Then we might be more likely to see the cues for one action than the other.
We can make a deliberate effort to decide which assumptions we will ignore, like a car salesman who decided to believe that clothing doesn't indicate whether someone is capable of buying a car. Our first impressions may still swing wildly, but we have a mental framework with which to step over them and move on towards our goals.
We can make a choice to use them. Improvisation is dependent on the ability to move with the flow of action around you, whether it's in the comedy club or in the field of battle. Sometimes we need to avoid introspection and allow our first impressions and snap decisions to take the lead.
We can understand them better. This post only touches the surface. It was inspired by Malcolm Gladwell's book, Blink: The Power of Thinking without Thinking.
I came to Blink with a set of preconceptions. Somehow I'd gotten the idea that it was going to be about how and why we should rely on our first impressions because they are based on our truest knowledge.
But that wasn't it at all.
Blink is about how we DO create instant judgments based on first impressiosn, whether we want to or not. It compiles case studies of different situations and how this inherent tendency is sometimes useful and sometimes destructive.
Like the other Malcolm Gladwell books I've read, Blink is highly story based, often referring to scientific studies, but not in a rigorous way. It is fun to read and raises questions worth thinking about, especially when you're trying to take different perspectives into account to create a new whole.
]]>At the beginning of 2009 I stated that my goal was to make this blog more outward facing, to consider what was important to the reader, and to go after a larger vision for the future. I feel that I accomplished the first part, although made little progress towards the second.
Some of my posts are being discovered by people using search engines. Other posts have impressed someone enough that they've referred their own followers here. I'm grateful for these readers and referrers.
The Worst
I've had two extended periods where I simply haven't blogged. This isn't good for me or helpful to you. And the longer they go on the easier it is to pay attention to other things instead and to not write about what I'm thinking that's relevant to the topics to be explored here, even though I need them to reach my long-term goals.
I intend to publish at least a post every week on Tuesday. Even if they don't meet my internal quality standards for myself. I have some innovation posts to finish up, then I want to get back into systems thinking for awhile, and then into some scientific ideas that apply from a sideways point of view.
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