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Business Performance Improvement Requires Better
Ideas
Business performance improvement is built on a healthy sequence of good
decisions supported by the decision makers' organizations. Good
decisions come from good thinking, the ability to solicit, consider,
compare, and select good ideas. Thinking "out of the box" is all about
generating the opportunity to have lots of good ideas to choose from.
Good business is about turning good ideas into profitability. Thinking is a Skill
We can consider that intelligence and thinking are different.
Intelligence is our innate capability, what we're born with. Thinking,
on the other hand, is how we learn to use our intelligence, and as such,
is a skill. As a skill, like bowling, golfing, cooking, etc., it can be
actively improved. In one comparison, intelligence is the race car and
it's finite mechanical capabilities, and thinking is the driver who can
learn more and more about how to maximize the utility of the car. Out of the Box, or Rather Across Paradigm
Boundaries
Our brains are wonderful data storage and retrieval systems which prefer
patterns and repetition. They recognize new ideas that are similar
enough to recorded ideas so they "fit" into the pre-existing collection.
Truly new ideas often don't even register in this hierarchy of set
patterns. It also seems
that truly new ideas often come from the "accidental" crossing of
paradigms, mixing new ideas that just don't logically belong together.
The self organizing capacity of our brains goes to work on this new,
unique combination and tries tirelessly to "make sense" of the novel
combination. "Lots of ideas" is the wonderful by product; 90% will be
thrown away, but 10% will often include ideas, never before conceived,
which warrant further consideration. Creativity Techniques
While there are many myths about creativity (creative people are always
artists, or nerds, or not like you and me, etc.) a modern understanding
of creativity recognizes techniques are available to assist anyone who
knows how to use them. Effective creativity techniques deliberately mix
up paradigms while addressing real problems and opportunities to
proactively generate lots of new ideas. These techniques do not need to
depend on a chance occurrence. These techniques can be used at will
whenever individuals or teams recognize they need more ideas. "Creative
people" learn to recognize they may have to use an illogical technique
to generate what they will only later come to recognize and appreciate
as a logical alternative. Go figure!
Seminar Outline
1.
Introduction: Seminar overview. goals, introductions,
assumptions, ground rules.
2.
Creative Process Introduction: Review purpose and strategy of
deliberately creating new ideas.
3.
Select topics which need new ideas: plan to use techniques on a
practical issues.
4.
Select the technique alternatives: Problem Reformulation,
Scoreboard, Knowledge Mapping, Classic Brainstorming, Brainwriting ,
Alternatives, Random Word, Imaginary Brainstorming, Analogies, Picture
Associations, Biotechniques, TILMAG, and Morphological Box; how to use
Creative Thinking Process and select techniques.
5.
Practice with the techniques: Practice with many of the above techniques on
6.
Practice selecting best alternatives: Practice using Scoreboard,
Multivoting, and Decision Matrix to select best alternatives.
7.
Study the phenomenon of creativity: How the brain likes to work
creatively, and how we can take advantage of this; pattern making, free
association, role of techniques. Discuss the paradox of using logical
and illogical thinking techniques to list and create logical useful
ideas; function of “fixed point”
8.
Using techniques in your workplace: How techniques can be used
effectively in a wide variety of business environments
9.
Other Creativity Techniques: Introduction and reference additional techniques.
10.
Next Steps:
Plan for your successful implementation of this new thinking. |