Posters and Quotes
50 Innovation Techniques: Addendums
Probe the Constituency |
• In this step, innovators identify who the client is, what the new IT is, what the constraints are, and what research and resources are necessary to become informed. The goal of this step is to gain full understanding of the issue(s). |
Observe the Real Situation |
• Through observation, innovators observe real world application of the issue. The observation should be focused on what makes the customer tick and what confuses and confounds. • Mountains of data are gathered during this phase of the process. |
Develop New Concepts |
• Developing new concepts can be defined in one word: brainstorming. This step of the process calls for any and all ideas to be generated and shared, as Brynteson says, both the “outlandish” and “impractical.” |
Converge and Build Prototypes |
• Brainstorming ideas are distilled down into workable prototypes. • The good and bad are weighed, and decisions are made. |
Implementation Process |
• The central question here is, “How do we put this new process/procedure into action?” |
Step #1: Probe the Constituency: Questions to Consider
• How do others do the task?
• What are their constraints?
• What other technologies can be employed here?
• Name five other processes that this process is like.
• Name five other processes that this process is not like, but may be appropriate, with the use of a little imagination.
• What box can we step out of?
• What possible boxes can we step into?
• What is the history of this process? Has the history been linear or discontinuous?
• What has worked well? What has not?
• What is customer input?
• Who are all of the constituencies?
• What are the formal feedback mechanisms?
• In an ideal world, what would they want?
• Draw realistic pictures.
• Draw unrealistic pictures.
• What are the assumed constraints of the project?
• What other secondary data are available but not explored?
Step #2: Observe the Real Situation: Questions to Consider
• Where can you find people using this process or system?
• Can you observe them without them changing their behavior?
• What method is best for documenting what you see?
digital camera
video camera
copious field notes (with a laptop)
paper and pencil
other
• What kinds of questions can you use to obtain the deepest information?
• Are there other ways of obtaining information that you haven’t thought of?
• Watch users using the process.
• Observe data trends.
• Observe users of data.
• What is the information used for?
• How can this information be more accessible and more useful?
• What confounds and confuses customers?
• What feedback loops are in place that would make this more of a learning organization?
• Do a data dump/synoptic learning mind map to collect and disseminate the data.
• Take pictures.
• Do interviews.
• Take copious field notes.
Step #3: Develop New Concepts: Questions to Consider
• Are we stretching ourselves far enough?
• What boxes have we forgotten?
• What other boxes do we need to enter?
• What connections have not been made?
• What voices are not being heard? What voices are minimized?
• Was convergence too fast?
• What are the unintended consequences of the new prototype?
• How engaged are the participants?
• When are they engaged? Not engaged?
• Are there wacky enough ideas?
Step #4: Converge and Build Prototypes: Questions to Consider
• Is the focus in the right place?
• Can the group poke fun at their own prototypes?
• Is there an atmosphere of friendly competition?
• What are the unintended consequences of each of the prototypes?
• Use Post-it Notes to vote.
• Can we disassemble and reassemble the prototypes?
• What is at stake for each of the prototypes?
• Do we have aliens in the group?
• Are there deliberate provocateurs?
• How can we improve on it?
• In what ways might we…?
• Is everyone engaged? If not, why not?
• What questions are not being asked?
• Are all of the constituencies being represented?
• What will work best given the primary clients of this organization?
Step #5: Implementation Process: Questions to Consider
• Do a force field analysis.
• Who will lose if this innovation is accepted?
• Who will win if this innovation is accepted?
• What are organizational impediments?
• What are individual impediments?
• What action planning is useful?
• What is organizational readiness?
• What are the unintended consequences of this?
• Process improvement ideas (lean manufacturing, Six Sigma)
• Derivative ideas (Starbucks, microloans)
• Breakthrough ideas (Harry Potter, space travel)
• Radical innovations (iPods, wireless)
“Accident is the name of the greatest of all inventors.”
—Mark Twain
Example #1
In 1928, Alexander Fleming left a window open next to a petri dish with a colony of bacteria. He came back the next morning. He looked through a microscope at his ruined experiment. He saw mold destroying the bacteria. He invented penicillin. The formula: accident plus acute observation.
Example #2
Percy Lebaron Spencer had 120 patents, mostly in the defense industry. One day, he walked by a magnetron—a machine used in radar. A chocolate candy bar in his pocket melted. He grabbed a handful of popcorn kernels and put them in front of the magnetron—they popped! The formula: accident plus observation plus experimentation.
Example #3
Eleven-year-old Frank Epperson left a mixture of soda powder and water; it froze to a mixing stick. Twenty years later, he decided to add some flavors, and lo and behold we had the “Eppsicles.” The name needed some refinement: Popsicles. He received royalties for 60 million of them. The formula: accident plus memory plus experimentation.
“There’s no use trying,” Alice said; “one can’t believe impossible things.”
“I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was younger, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
From Alice in Wonderland
• The ballpoint pen was invented by a sculptor.
• The parking meter was invented by a journalist.
• The Wright brothers were bike mechanics, not aeronautical engineers.
• Kodachrome film was developed by a musician.
“There is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things. For the reformer has enemies in all those that profit by the old order, and only lukewarm defenders in all those who would profit by the new order, this lukewarmness arising…partly from the incredulity of mankind, who do not truly believe in anything new until they have had actual experience of it.”
—Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince, 1513
“Success is the ability to go from failure to failure without losing your enthusiasm.”
—Winston Churchhill
“From cradle to grave the pressure is on: BE NORMAL… The trouble with this is that corporate normalcy derives from and is dedicated to past realities and past successes. There is no room for…original thinking.”
—Tom Peters
“The act of experimenting sets up a virtuous cycle of innovation; this cycle can constitute such a dominant characteristic of the organization that the ability to experiment and prototype efficiently and competently itself constitutes a competitively advantageous capability.”
—Dorothy Leonard-Barton, Wellsprings of Knowledge, p. 114
“Innovation requires a fresh way of looking at things, an understanding of people, and an entrepreneurial willingness to take risks and to work hard. An idea doesn’t become an innovation until it is widely adopted and incorporated into people’s daily lives. Most people resist change, so a key part of innovating is convincing other people that your idea is a good one—by enlisting their help, and, in doing so, by helping them see the usefulness of the idea.”
—Art Fry, Corporate Scientist, 3M Fast Company, April 2000, p. 100