Let me start this way. I remember we did the ideation exercise where we had to redesign the table. If we were to re design the table how would we do it. If we had to be crazy with our idea, what would the design look like. Why does the table have a flat surface? why does it have legs, what is it missing? Has the design changed through the years?
Through many entrepreneurship pitching competitions and idea competition, i have heard many people(judges) mention that ideas are cheap. Are they? They might be while pitching for investment, but once you sit down to think of them to solve problems they do not come that easy., or that cheap.
After my aha moment with innovative perspective emerging from inerdisciplinarity, Ulla-maija, one of the two coaches, posted this link.
Excerpt from the article
In Short the article mentions about generating new creative ideas.
1. You should not think that you are less intelligent to come up with ideas. Everyone can come up with fresh, radical ideas – you just need to learn to open your mind and think differently.
2. Break Established thought patterns by challenging assumptions, challenging assumptions will open possibilities.
3.Reword the problem – rewording means that you look at the problem from different angles. It might include why do we want to solve something. What will happen if we do not solve it?
4. Think in reverse- If you cannot think how to improve, think if you can degrade the situations. This how can the situation be worsened. You may get some insight about your problem.
5.Expressing in different medium: Not all of us have verbal reasoning ability. Clay, music, word association games, paint, there are several ways you can express the challenge. This brings newer things that you may have not thought about in words.
Connect the unconnected
The article talks about Newton and the apple, the apple didn’t help newton discover gravity, it was an external stimuli. These stimulus can tickle the brain and excite the ideas hidden inside. So to capitalize we can consciously try to connect the unconnected. Some of the ways of doing it are
– Using random input words from dictionary
– mind mapping
– Pick up a picture
– pick up a thing and see how it could solve
Shifting perspective
– How would you solve it if you were someone else?
If I were a ……
I really like the way the article ends with recommending additional ways to get the creativity flowing. It ends with a statement that puts all of this in work context, or in terms of making yourself more employable. It mentions, ability to generate new ideas is an essential work skill today.
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